History of Iowa
Native Americans in the United States have resided in what is now Iowa for thousands of years. The written history of Iowa begins with the proto-historic accounts of Native Americans by explorers such as Marquette and Joliet in the 1680s. Until the early 19th century Iowa was occupied exclusively by Native Americans and a few European traders, with loose political control by France and Spain.
Iowa became part of the United States of America after the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, but uncontested U.S. control over what is now Iowa occurred only after the War of 1812 and after a series of treaties eliminated Indian claims on the state. Beginning in the 1830s Euro-American settlements appeared in the Iowa Territory, U.S. statehood was acquired in 1846, and by 1860 almost the entire state was settled and farmed by Euro-Americans. Subsistence frontier farming was replaced by commodity farming after the construction of railroad networks in the 1850s and 1860s. Iowa contributed many soldiers who fought in the American Civil War. Afterwards they returned to help transform Iowa into an agricultural powerhouse, supplying food to the rest of the nation.
The industrialization of agriculture and the emergence of centralized commodities markets in the late 19th and 20th centuries led to a shift towards larger farms and the decline of the small family farm; this was exacerbated during the Great Depression. Industrial production became a larger part of the economy during World War II and the postwar economic boom. In the 1970s and 1980s a series of economic shocks, including the oil crisis, the 1980s farm crisis, and the Early 1980s recession led to the collapse of commodities prices, a decline in rural and state population, and rural flight. Iowa's economy rebounded in the 1990s, emerging as a modern mixed economy dominated by industry, commerce, and finance, in which agriculture is a comparatively small component.
Prehistory
About 21,000 to 16,000 years ago, Iowa's climate was arctic, and about 12,000 years ago the ice sheets in Iowa began to melt. When the American Indians first arrived thousands of years ago they would hunt and gather living in a Pleistocene glacial landscape. It is estimated that the first settlement had around 1,000 to 2,000 inhabitants. By the time European explorers visited Iowa, American Indians were largely settled farmers with complex economic, social, and political systems. This transformation happened gradually. During the Archaic period, American Indians adapted to local environments and ecosystems, slowly becoming more sedentary as populations increased. More than 3,000 years ago, during the Late Archaic period, American Indians in Iowa began utilizing domesticated plants. The subsequent Woodland period saw an increase on the reliance on agriculture and social complexity, with increased use of mounds, ceramics, and specialized subsistence. During the Late Prehistoric period increased use of maize and social changes led to social flourishing and nucleated settlements. The arrival of European trade goods and diseases in the Protohistoric period led to dramatic population shifts and economic and social upheaval, with the arrival of new tribes and early European explorers and traders.Early Historic Native Americans
Iowa is named after the Ioway tribe which inhabited the land since the 1600's. The French forced the Sauk and Meskwaki tribes out of the Great Lakes region and into Iowa in the 1700's. By 1804, there were a number of Native American groups in Iowa: the Sauk and Meskwaki on the eastern edge of Iowa along the Mississippi; the Ioway along the bank of the Des Moines River; the Otoe, Missouri, and Omaha along the Missouri River, and the Sioux in the Northern and Western parts of the State. Additionally, earlier records indicate the presence of the Illinois in Iowa, though they were nearly gone by the time of the 1804 observations. The total number of these groups in Iowa in 1804 is estimated to be less than 15,000. While these groups generally came initially for food, some of them immigrated as a result of warfare with other tribes or the French. The early and mid-19th century saw the movement of additional groups of Native Americans into Iowa, such as the Potawatomi and Winnebago, followed by the emigration from Iowa of nearly all Native Americans.The first European or American to make contact with Native Americans in Iowa is generally considered to be the Frenchmen Louis Joliet and Pere Jacques Marquette, though earlier contact by others is possible. They had set out to discover the Mississippi River, and on June 17, 1673, contacted the Illinois on the eastern side of Iowa. They also were told at that time of the presence of the Sioux along the Missouri. Upon the departure of Joliet and Marquette from the Illinois village, they were accompanied to the riverbank by nearly 600 Illinois, who showed "every possible manifestation of joy", having treated the first Europeans well and offered them peace. In 1682, Rene Robert Cavelier de la Salle claimed the entire Mississippi valley for France and named it Louisiana in honor of King Louis XIV. Additional exploration by early French, British, and American trappers, traders, explorers, and missionaries informs us of the nature of Native American presence in Iowa from this initial contact in 1673 to the start of settlement by the United States.
File:George Catlin - Mew-Hew-She-Kaw, The White Cloud, Chief of the Ioways - 1995.05T - New Britain Museum of American Art.jpg|alt=A painting portrait of Mahaska, a chief of the Ioway nation, looking towards the right.|thumb|Mahaska, a chief of the Ioway nation.
Ioway tribe
From the late 1600's to mid 1700's, the Ioway tribe lived along the Missouri River, eventually moving to southeast Iowa. There was an estimated 1,000 to 1,500 inhabitants and was the most powerful tribe in Iowa at the time. The Ioway built their villages in wooded areas near rivers with good soil for farming. They stored corn, squash, beans, and other foods in pits. File:Iowa 1798.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Iowa, 1798, showing several tribes, including Pawnee, Ioway, Dakota, and Omaha ; approximate state highlighted.|alt=A 1798 map of Iowa showing many Native American tribes including the Pawnee, Ioway, Dakota, and OmahaWomen cooked in clay pots, and families ate with bowls and spoons made from bison horns. After interaction with European traders, they also used metal bowls and spoons to eat. It wasn't until the 1720's when they used horses brought in by other plains tribes. In the 1760's they were forced to move west due to threats of attacks from the Sioux who acquired European weapons. The Ioway took part in the fur trade with France and Britain in the early 1800's. French traders from St. Louis also visited the tribe, sometimes marrying Ioway women to improve chances at success in the fur trade. The tribe had many troubles with other tribes in Iowa in the early 1800's. Disputed over territory caused raids to take place against the Suak and Meskwaki. In search for buffalo, the tribe started hunting in Omaha and Osage territory, causing an attack from the Omaha in 1814. Another small-pox epidemic killed off around a quarter to a half of the tribe, leaving only around 800 people left. In the early 1800's, the Ioway left Iowa and fled into Missouri, and later into Nebraska. The tribe tried starting a petition to move back to Des Moines, but President Andrew Jackson ignored the petition, marking the end of the tribe in Iowa. In 1824, an estimated 4,800 people lived in Saukenuk, the main village of the Sauk and Meskwaki.
Sauk and Meskwaki tribes
The Sauk and Meskwaki constituted the largest and most powerful tribes in the Upper Mississippi Valley after the Ioway relocated. They had earlier moved from the Michigan region into Wisconsin and by the 1730s, they had relocated in western Illinois due to the French attacking the nations. By 1732, only 140 Meskwaki survived and found refuge with the Sauk. There they established their villages along the Rock and Mississippi Rivers.They lived in their main villages only for a few months each year. At other times, they travelled throughout western Illinois and eastern Iowa hunting, fishing, and gathering food and materials with which to make domestic articles. Every spring, the two tribes travelled northward into Minnesota where they tapped maple trees and made syrup. In the late 1700's, Julien Dubuque convinced the Meskwaki leader to mine for land near present day Dubuque. Dubuque married a local woman and was incorporated into the tribe. He brought French labourers and Meskwaki women to help run the mines. Fort Madison was constructed in 1808 to control trade along the Mississippi, and to prevent the reoccupation of the area by the British; Fort Madison was defeated in 1813 by British-allied Indians during the War of 1812 and was the site of Iowa's only true military battle. The Sauk leader Black Hawk first fought against the U.S. at Fort Madison.
File:Black Hawk path.png|thumb|The path the Sauk took during the Black Hawk War.|alt=A map of portions of Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois showing a dotted path that the Sauk Native Americans took during the Black Hawk War.