Free and Open to the Public

The Dodge County Historical Society's Winter Speakers Program is set to begin soon on Saturday, November 8th at 1:00 PM when we welcome back fantastic speaker Peter Shrake Curator of Circus World Wisconsin as he presents “The Grand Council: the First Treaty of Prairie du Chien in 1825.”

Summary:

The First Treaty of Prairie du Chien was signed August 19, 1825 by US representatives William Clark and Lewis Cass, and leaders of the Sioux, Sac and Fox, Menominee, Ioway, Winnebego (Ho-Chunk), and Anishinaabe (Chippewa, Ottawa and Potawatomie). It was proclaimed on February 6, 1826 and codified as 7 Stat 272.

Following the War of 1812, the US sought to stabilize the Upper Mississippi region where intertribal warfare and encroaching settlers threatened the fur trade and frontier peace. Thousands of tribal representatives gathered at Prairie du Chien to negotiate a general peace and establish formal boundaries among tribal lands- creating what became known as the “Prairie du Chien Line.”