An elder spokesman for the Potawatomi Indians, Chief Simon Onanguisse Kahquados made a number of trips to Washington, D.C. in the early twentieth century in an effort to regain land that his people had lost through treaties with the United States government in the 1800s. Kahquados wore this coat on his last trip to Washington and also wore it on other important occasions, such as trips to the state capital in Madison where he often spent time researching and presenting information about his ancestry.
Military
OBJECT HISTORY: Old Abe, the Live War Eagle
A bald eagle stands guard over the State Assembly Chamber in Wisconsin’s Capitol building. Between two and three feet tall, the raptor has the characteristic white head and tail feathers, a brown body, and a yellow beak and talons. He sits atop a tree stump in front of a large mural called Wisconsin that represents the state’s…
What is a Point Blanket Coat?
The practice of converting Hudson’s Bay Company blankets into coats began years before the company began mass-manufacturing point blanket coats in the twentieth century. During the fur trade, Native Americans hunters traded beaver pelts for …
Old Abe’s Visual Legacy
Old Abe began his career as a real, live eagle, serving as a mascot during the Civil War. In the decades that followed, the Grand Army of the Republic brought the bird on tours around the country. In the many …
French Wisconsin at Fort la Baye
French explorers, voyageurs (fur traders), Jesuit priests, and other settlers began arriving in the Upper Great Lakes region of North America in the mid-1600s. Jean Nicolet supposedly landed near present-day Green Bay, Wisconsin in 1634, naming the …
French Cartography in the Great Lakes
French mariners and explorers using the Le Maire Sundial Compass depended on both their own specialized navigational expertise and maps produced by French cartographers. Many such maps were created based on explorer accounts of the navigable waterways …
Dr. James T. Reeve
The owner of this particular cupping kit was Dr. James T. Reeve. Dr. Reeve was born near Goshen, New York, on April 26, 1834. Despite losing his father at age five and his mother five days before …
OBJECT HISTORY: Draft Drum
The hollow metal cylinder sits on the rusted, triangular metal base. A latch and a small hinged door are open, exposing a small square hole where the names of potential draftees could be placed. A thin metal crank protrudes from the center of the cylinder ready to be turned at any moment. This is a…
Kemp Trial
One ringleader of the 1862 Ozaukee County Riot was Nicholas Kemp, an immigrant from Luxemburg, Germany, and blacksmith by trade, who had emigrated to America in 1846. At the time of the riot he was in the …
Ozaukee County Draft Riot
Following the South’s attack on Fort Sumter in 1861, Wisconsin, and the North as a whole, experienced a surge in patriotism and an eagerness to fight for the North, offering more volunteers than were needed. …