Wisconsin Stories: River & Roads

journeys: along the mississippi river | national register of historic places

Archaeological Sites and Museums to Visit
Along the Wisconsin Side of the Mississippi River
The following sites and museums are arranged from north to south.

Bird or Bow and Arrow Petroform
WHS marker in wayside on east side of state Highway 35, 1 mile south of state Highway 61 bridge to Red Wing, Minn.

Fountain City Area Historical Society, Fountain City
Exhibit of extensive local collection of prehistoric artifacts with identification key.

Perrot State Park near Trempealeau
Site of early historic French post, conical and effigy mounds, and Nature Shelter exhibits on local archaeology (including replica of destroyed rock art panel).

Nicholls Mound and interpretive signs
Located 2.5 miles southeast of Trempealeau (on the Great River Bike Trail)

Riverside Museum, La Crosse
Exhibits on prehistoric and historic life ways along the Upper Mississippi River.

Myrick Park, La Crosse
Small effigy and conical mound.

Riverside Cemetery, 1.5 miles north of Genoa
Nine remaining conical mounds from extensive group mapped by Increase Lapham in 1852, now with historic graves and headstones (unmarked).

Battle at Bad Axe
Located 2 miles north of DeSoto and 1 mile south of the town of Victory, along Wisconsin's Great River Road (state Highway 35). WHS Sign in wayside along state Highway 35 facing Battle Bluff and Battle Hollow, and Vernon County Historical Society markers near and in Black Hawk Recreation Area (County Highway BI [for Battle Island])

Villa Louis and Fort Crawford I
Located on "the island" at Prairie du Chien. Villa Louis is a mansion home established by fur trade magnate Hercules Dousman. His home rests upon a knoll that may have been an enormous Indian mound and was initially used for the site of Fort Shelby American) and McKay (British) early in the War of 1812. The first Fort Crawford was constructed adjacent to the knoll following that war and was used until a Second Fort Crawford was constructed on the mainland beginning in 1829. A Wisconsin Historical Society site.

Wyalasing State Park
Easily visible animal-shaped effigy mounds. Located near Bagley, overlooking the confluence of the Wisconsin and Mississippi rivers.

Nelson Dewey State Park above Cassville
Easily accessible and visible conical, linear and a chain of mounds.

The Mississippi River Museum in Dubuque, Iowa
A Great museum that does great interpretive exhibits on the Mississippi River.

Pikes Peak State Park
Just North of McGregor Iowa, it has the best views of the confluence of the Wisconsin and Mississippi Rivers.

Effigy Mounds National Monument, Harpers Ferry, Iowa
2000 acres of preserved bluff land with the largest concentration of Native American earthworks in the U.S.

The Putnam Museum, Davenport, Iowa
Another Great regional museum with outstanding river exhibits.

Francois Vertefeuille House
Prarie du Chien, Crawford County.

The National Register of Historic Places
http://www.shsw.wisc.edu/histbuild/index.html

The National Register of Historic Places is the official Federal list of properties significant in American history, architecture, engineering, and archaeology.

Learn more about and visit two of these significant buildings in our state.

Francois Vertefeuille House
The Francois Vertefeuille House is one of the few surviving examples of its type of log architecture in the United States.

Brisbois House
The Brisbois house is constructed of locally quarried limestone and is a rare pre-statehood example of the Federal Style.

Brisbois House
Prairie du Chien, Crawford County.