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Robert Ritzenthaler and Frederick Peterson: An “Ethnographer’s Paradise” (1954)

The Ho-Chunk are a Siouan-speaking people whose presence in present-day Wisconsin was known to the French at Quebec as early as 1616.

According to oral tradition, they originated at Red Banks, generally assumed to be a site on the Door Peninsula on Green Bay, where they were located at the time of French contact in the 17th century. Their language is related to the Chiwere branch of Siouan that includes the Ioway, Oto, and Missouria, who acknowledge having broken off from the Ho-Chunk and moved west.

Scandinavian Lithic Production

Stone tools were first produced during the early Stone Ages in Scandinavia. The collection at the Milwaukee Public Museum mainly focuses on the Mesolithic and Neolithic time periods when lithic production was at its peak.

Ho-Chunk Culture

The Ho-Chunk -- formerly called the Winnebago -- are members of a Siouan-speaking tribe who were established in Wisconsin at the time of French contact in the 1630s. The oral traditions of the tribe, particularly the Thunderbird clan, state that the Ho-Chunk originated at the Red Banks on Green Bay.

Natural history museums and extinct species have a long, intertwined history, and at the intersection lies the diorama.

Here at Milwaukee Public Museum, our renowned and immersive habitat dioramas have many different extinct or endangered species on display.

Below, we highlight 10 dioramas and how each relates to extinction stories.

Cosmic Curiosities

“I would rather be a superb meteor,

The health and well-being of community members were of prime importance, and Great Lakes Indians people had a number of techniques which they used to prevent and cure various illnesses.

Both illnesses of the body and the spirit were recognized and had specific cures and preventative techniques. Minor illnesses of the body could sometimes be cured by a sweat bath or by taking an herbal or other remedy.