Page 3 - Reflect DSM (City of Des Moines, IA)

Historical Overview
The Des Moines River, and from its name Fort Des Moines and the current City of Des Moines,
is named after a historic indigenous nation called Moingoana by the French explorers who
met them along the river. The river’s name, called the Riviere des Moingonas in French,
eventually became known as the River des Moines by the Americans. Thus, the City is
named after a Native nation.

One of the first permanent settlements in and around where Des Moines is today was (or
is) located under the current water treatment plant along the Des Moines River. At the
“Palace” site, indigenous peoples established housing structures around 7,000 years ago.
From that time on, people settled along the river in increasing numbers. While it is difficult to
identify specific cultural descendants of archaeological societies, these people and others
who followed them made pottery, lived in sometimes fortified villages and towns, practiced
agriculture, and had wide-spanning trade networks.

During a time period around 1500, people from the Oneota archaeological society formed
several historic nations, including the Ioway. The Ioway were sovereign over all of central
Iowa until about 1820. Starting in 1825, however, in treaties with the United States, they were
first designated co-owners of the land with the Sac and Fox and then written out of their
ownership. Instead, the Sauk and Meskwaki were designated sovereign over these lands.
Those two nations had arrived from the east during the 18th century, initially seeking refuge
from the French.

In 1842, the United States insisted that the Sauk and Meskwaki sell all their remaining
lands – which amounted to central Iowa – to the federal government, in exchange for
their debts to traders and an unspecified future land holding further west. Because they
were dependent on American trade goods, the nations could no longer refuse or resist.
According to the treaty, they had to immediately remove from the eastern half of their
lands to the area around Des Moines, and then remove from Iowa in 1845. Fort Des Moines
was built to administer and control this transition. After this removal, the State of Iowa could
be founded in 1846, and the Town of Fort Des Moines developed into the modern City of
Des Moines.

The nations who were forced to leave their homelands in central Iowa were then further
relocated in the later 1800s. Today, the Ioway have sovereign lands on two reservations,
one on the Kansas-Nebraska border and one in Oklahoma. This is also where the Sauk and
Meskwaki (or Sac and Fox) have reservations, in addition to the Meskwaki Settlement in
central Iowa. In that case, the state of Iowa actively supported some Meskwaki in re-settling
here in the 1850s and 1860s. Despite the treaties leading to removal, some Native people
always stayed behind and continued to live on their homelands. While the Ioway have no
reservation lands in the state named after them, the Meskwaki, the Winnebago (Ho-Chunk),
the Omaha, and the Ponca do.

Statement written by Sebastian Braun, Director of American Studies, Director of Graduate Education
(Anthropology), and Associate Professor of Anthropology, at Iowa State University

Adopted Plan (September 2023) iii