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   Menominee

Menominee flag

   Along with the Winnebago and Ojibwe (Chippewa), the Menominee were one of the original tribes of Wisconsin and Upper Michigan. Their residence in this area extends back beyond human memory and may have been for at least 5,000 years. Their earliest known location was on the Menominee River which forms the current border between northeast Wisconsin and Upper Michigan with their original territory extending north to Escanaba, Michigan and south to Oconto, Wisconsin. Other tribes occupying Wisconsin before 1600 were the Dakota (Sioux) in the northwest, the Illinois in the south, and, in what may be a surprise for some, the Cheyenne in the west-central area of the state.

   Contact with French fur traders after 1667 caused the Menominee to extend their range west while hunting for fur. Further expansion occurred after the French and Great Lakes Algonquin victory over the Iroquois in 1701. The refugee tribes afterwards began to leave Wisconsin and return east. The once - numerous Winnebago had almost been destroyed by war and epidemic during the preceding 60 years, and the Menominee spread south and west filling the empty space. At their greatest extent, the Menominee controlled most of central Wisconsin as far south as Milwaukee - almost 10 million acres. White settlement and commercial logging rapidly reduced their land base after 1832. Following several treaties and land cessions, the Menominee after 1856 were confined to a 235,000 acre reservation in northeast Wisconsin. Despite attempts to remove them to Minnesota, they have remained on this reservation to the present-day.

Grizzly Bear, Menominee chief

   Before European contact, the Menominee were a relatively small tribe on the northern shore of Lake Michigan. Conservative estimates of their original population are less than 2,000, while the most optimistic do not exceed 4,000. When the French reached Green Bay in 1667, wars and epidemics which had swept Wisconsin after refugee tribes arrived in the 1650s had reduced the Menominee to about 400.

   From the point of near-extinction, the Menominee population slowly recovered reaching 850 in 1736, 1,100 in 1764, and 1,350 by 1806. The American Indian agent in 1829 got a little enthusiastic and estimated there were 4,200 Menominee. This was either outright fraud or included neighboring tribes. A more accurate census during 1854 gave 1,930 in seven villages. Numbers continued to decline, and despite adding a group of landless Potawatomi and French mixed-bloods during the 1870s, the Menominee had dropped to 1,422 by 1910 - the low point. The United States Indian Office in 1937 gave 2,221 which increased to 3,720 by 1957. Current enrollment of the federally recognized Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin is close to 7,200 - 3,400 of whom live on their reservation just west of Green Bay.

Menominee Woman and Child

   The Menominee traditionally had what has classified as an Eastern Woodland Culture which in manner and dress resembled the neighboring Ojibwe ­ long buckskin pants, breechcloth, and long hair usually adorned with fur roach and feathers. The most noticeable difference would have been a distinct Algonquin dialect related to that spoken by the Cree or Fox. They were too far north for reliable corn cultivation - a fact of life the refugee tribes quickly discovered after they had relocated to the area during the 1650s. Instead, the Menominee provided for themselves through a combination of hunting, fishing, and gathering (particularly wild rice which was a staple of their diet). In fact, they relied so heavily on wild rice they referred to themselves as Wild Rice People which in its French form became Folles Avoines. Like most Native Americans, the Menominee adapted to their circumstances, and after they had spread south into areas with better soil and longer growing seasons, they practiced a limited amount of agriculture.

Menominee man playing snake

   Large villages of rectangular longhouses in fixed locations were favored in the summer, but like other Algonquin, the Menominee separated into hunting groups of extended families and small domed-wigwams during winter. Villages usually were not fortified until after warfare became common in northern Wisconsin during the 1650s. Their kinship was patrilineal with totemic clans grouped in two divisions for ceremonial and social purposes. As indicated by the number of older bands listed above, Menominee tribal organization before contact was loosely organized without central authority. This changed with the arrival of the refugees and the resultant warfare. At later dates a tribal council decided civil matters with a war chief taking command only during war. The fur trade also changed the Menominee economy with emphasis shifting from the gathering of wild rice to hunting for profit. Like other tribes in the region, the Menominee referred to Americans as "Long Knives."

Menominee Woman and Child

   The Wolf River treaty signed in May, 1854 established a reservation for the Menominee in northern Wisconsin. The Menominee became the only Wisconsin tribe to entirely avoid removal. A final treaty signed with the United States in 1856 ceded two townships for the purpose of creating a separate reservation for the Stockbridge Indians ...finally settling the land disputes with the New York Indians which had begun in 1821. The Menominee Reservation contained 235,000 acres of their homeland (less than 3% of the original 10 million acres they controlled). Joined later by a small group of Potawatomi, the Menominee have remained in this location ever since.

Menominee forest

   Timber interests descended on the area to exploit its forests after the Civil War. Despite the legend of Paul Bunyan taught in our schools, these men were determined to become wealthy and bring civilization to northern Wisconsin by converting it into a bunch of tree stumps. What they immediately noticed was the United States had obviously made a serious error in creating the reservation. The Menominee had actually been left with a valuable resource - 350 square miles of prime White Pine timber.

   The Menominee in 1872 began operation of their own tribally-owned saw mill which competed directly with private American timber companies in the area. Wisconsin's timber was soon gone and the lumber barons moved on, but the Menominee remained. In the first large-scale application of this concept in the United States, the Menominee began a program of sustained yield harvest in 1908 to assure an income for future generations. The enterprise was a success, and became the primary source of income for the Menominee. By 1955 the United States Treasury had accumulated over $10 million in a Menominee trust account from their timber operations.

   However, the government apparently did not always fulfill its obligation to supervise the mill in their best interest, and after a lawsuit initiated against the federal government, the Menominee won a $9.5 million judgment for mismanagement between 1954 and 1959. Not too coincidentally in 1961, the federal government unilaterally terminated the Menominee's tribal status, and their reservation became a Wisconsin county. The saw mill could not provide enough tax base to pay for all of the services a county government was required to provide, and the Menominee instantly went from being one of the most self-sufficient tribes in the United States to the lowest standard of living in Wisconsin - a pretty clear indication of the current economic status of most Native Americans in the United States relative to their white counterparts. To meet their obligations, the Menominee were forced to sell part of their reservation as lakefront lots for vacation homes. Federal recognition was restored in 1973.

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