Glaciers & Landforms
These massive, moving sheets of ice covered most of Wisconsin thousands of years ago and reshaped the state's landscape.
Glaciers
Located at the very top of Wisconsin, this physical region is named after the largest and deepest Great Lake.
Lake Superior Lowland
Corn, beans, and squash were planted together by Native farmers and are collectively known by this famous nickname.
The "Three Sisters"
Passing down history, cultural lessons, and stories by word of mouth through generations without writing them down is called this.
Oral tradition
Passed in 1787, this U.S. law created the rules for governing western lands and admitting new states like Wisconsin into the nation.
The Northwest Ordinance
Spanning nearly 1,200 miles across Wisconsin, this continuous hiking trail lets people explore land features created by the Ice Age.
Ice Age Trail
Home to Wisconsin's two largest cities, Milwaukee and Madison, this eastern region sits along flat lowlands and limestone ridges.
Eastern Ridges and Lowlands
Thousands of years ago, Native ancestors in Wisconsin hammered and shaped this shiny natural metal into durable tools to use and trade.
Copper
Native nations organized their communities into these family-based groups named after animals or elements of nature.
Clans
Forming much of Wisconsin's western border, this major river served as an essential water highway for trade and shipping.
The Mississippi River
Lakes Superior and Michigan belong to this group of massive freshwater lakes that hold 21% of all the fresh water on Earth.
Stretching across the middle of the state, this low-lying region features sandy plains left behind by ancient Glacial Lake Wisconsin.
The Central Plain
Early Woodland peoples built large earthen mounds in the shapes of animals like bears, birds, and panthers, known by this term.
Effigy mounds
In Ho-Chunk culture, leaders during times of peace came from sky clans, while community leaders during times of war came from these clans.
Earth clans
Fought between 1812 and 1815, this international conflict had a lasting impact on fur trade and Native alliances in Wisconsin.
The War of 1812
Because glaciers never covered southwestern Wisconsin, this region gets its name from the complete lack of glacial "drift" or deposits.
Driftless Area
Timms Hill, the highest point in Wisconsin at 1,951 feet, is located in this large, forested northern region.
The Northern Highland
Located near Lake Mills, this ancient village was built by migrants who constructed a wooden stockade wall around platform mounds.
Aztalan
Rather than ruling like European kings, Native chiefs led by getting community members to agree with their choices, known as leading by this.
Consent
Between 1804 and 1854, the U.S. government used these formal legal agreements to take millions of acres of land from Native nations.
Treaties (or forced land cessions)
When a large block of buried ice melted under dirt and gravel, it left a depression that filled with water to form this type of lake.
Kettle lake (or kettle)
Found in Dodge County in the Eastern Ridges and Lowlands region, this large marsh is celebrated as the largest freshwater cattail marsh in the United States.
Horicon Marsh
Native communities built these traditional round homes out of bent tree saplings covered with tree bark.
Wigwams
The Menominee, Ojibwe, and Potawatomi nations all speak dialects belonging to this major language family.
Algonquian language family
Following Indian removals, white settlers rapidly transformed Wisconsin's landscape and economy in the 1800s through these two major natural resource industries alongside farming.
Mining and lumbering (logging)