Historic Highways of America/Volume 1/Chapter 2
CHAPTER II
DISTRIBUTION OF MOUND-BUILDING INDIANS
THE mounds of these first Americans of which we know are found between Oregon and the Wyoming valley, in Pennsylvania, and Onondaga county in New York; they extend from Manitoba in Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.
The great seat of empire was in the drainage area of the Mississippi river; on this river and its tributaries were the heaviest mound-building populations. Few mounds are found east of the Alleghany mountains.
In the Catalogue of Prehistoric Works East of the Rocky Mountains, issued by the Bureau of Ethnology of the Smithsonian Institution,[1] the geographical extent and density of the mounds in central North America is brought out state by state with striking suggestiveness. While the layman is warned that these maps "present some features which are calculated to mislead," and that the maps indicate "to some extent the more thoroughly explored areas rather than the true proportion of the ancient works in the different sections," still some conclusions have already been reached which future exploitation will never weaken.
It is not expected that future investigation will change the verdict that the heaviest mound-building population found its seat near the Mississippi and Ohio rivers. "There is little doubt," writes Dr. Thomas, "that when Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia have been thoroughly explored many localities will be added to those indicated . . . but it is not likely that the number will be found to equal those in the area drained by the Ohio and its affluents or in the immediate valley of the Mississippi."[2]
This fact, that the heaviest populations of the mound-building Indians seem to have been near the Mississippi and Ohio is, of course, shown by the archæological maps. In a rough way, subject to the limitations previously mentioned, it can be found that the following fourteen states contain evidences of having held the heaviest ancient populations:
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Ohio, |
Michigan, |
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Now, by our last census the states which contain the largest population today are:
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New York, |
Indiana, |
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Thus of the fourteen most thickly populated states today perhaps twelve give fair evidence of having been most thickly populated in prehistoric times. As a general rule (but one growing less reliable every day) the heaviest population has always been found in the best agricultural regions; the states having the largest number of fertile acres have had, as a rule, the largest populations—or did have until the cities grew as they have in the past generation.
This argument, though necessarily loose, still is of interest and of some importance in the present study. The earliest Indians found, without any question, the best parts of the country they once inhabited if we can take the verdict of the present race which occupies the land.
Coming down to a smaller scope of territory, can it be shown that in the case of any one state the early Indians occupied the portions most heavily populated today? It has been said that, in Ohio, four counties contain evidence of having been the scenes of special activity on the part of the earliest inhabitants: Butler, Licking, Ross, and Franklin. These are interior counties (at a distance from the Ohio and Lake Erie) and, of the remaining sixty-three interior counties in the state, only seven exceeded 
Archaeologic Map of Wisconsin
[Showing interior location of remains]
In Wisconsin the mound-building Indians labored most in the southern part of the state, where the bulk of that state's population is today—seventy-five per cent being found in the southern (and smaller) half of the state.
In Michigan, a line drawn from the northern coast of Green Bay to the south-western corner of the state includes a very great proportion of the archæological remains in the state. That line today embraces on the southeast thirty-three per cent of the counties of the state, yet sixty-three per cent of the population.
Thus it can be said that in a remarkable measure the mound-building peoples found with interesting exactness the portions of this country which have been the choice spots with the race which now occupies it.
Here, in the valleys, and between them, toiled their prehistoric people. Their low grade of civilization is attested by the rude implements and weapons and domiciles with which they seem to have been content. Divided, as it is practically sure they were, into numerous tribes, there must have been some commerce and there was, undoubtedly, much conflict. Above their poorly cultivated fields, or in the midst of them, they erected great earthen and stone fortresses, and, flung far and wide over valley and hill, stand the mounds in which they buried their dead. 
Archaeologic Map of Ohio
[Showing interior location of remains]