Hi, I'm Maggie Sivett.

A few months ago, Curious City answered a question about why there are no federal Native American reservations in Illinois.

After all, there are dozens and dozens of rivers, towns, and streets named for indigenous people.

And the state itself is named for the Alinaweck, a confederation of tribes that lived across the area.

It's a painful but fascinating history.

President Andrew Jackson's policy was, you know, Indian removal.

And they wanted to get as many Indians out of there and remove them as far away as they could.

And when the original inhabitants of the Chicago area were killed or forced out,

settlers often plowed over their homes and lands, destroying their artifacts in the process.

I really feel like Native Americans are just completely missing from our understanding of the region.

That's listener Judy Pollock, who notes how important Native Americans were in making Chicago what it was.

And that got her wondering about the sacred ceremonial sites known as effigy mounds that are associated with native people.

These are large earthworks made from soil, usually about three to seven feet high, that form

shapes that can be seen from overhead.

This week, we revisit a story where producer Jesse Dukes finds out if there ever was one

of these effigy mounds here in Chicago,

and how they were created.

People used to say that the Phoenicians must have built them,

or people from Mars must have come down and build them.

That's coming up.

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