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search National Park Collection at L.L.Bine.com and be an outsider with L.L. Bean. bean. More than a thousand years ago in the upper Midwest, indigenous people were moving mountains,

literally.

The mound builders changed the landscape by piling earth into tall shapes that could

only be appreciated from up above. Native American ceremonial and burial mounds can be found

throughout the United States. In Northeastern Iowa and southern Wisconsin, many of these mounds

are found in shapes of animal effigies.

People known as the Woodland Indians

started building them between 800 and 1600 years ago.

There are four types of earthen mounds, conical, linear, compound, and effigy.

The conical and compound mounds were often used as burial mounds. Effigy means in the shape of and are found in the shapes of mammals,

birds, and reptiles. Effigy mounds were for burials and ceremonies,

though only a quarter of them have any burial material inside.

The purpose of the mountains is still a mystery today.

Researchers guess that they could have been for religious ceremonies, burial ceremonies,

or as a way to connect with the spiritual world.

I'm Jason Epperson and this week on America's National Parks Effigy Mounds National Monument in Harper's

Ferry, Iowa.

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