- Appleton's river landscape
formed at the end of the last ice age
when melting snows poured water into glacial Lake Oshkosh.
Draining from the lake,
which would eventually become Lake Winnebago,
the water moved north toward Green Bay,
hemmed in by the high ground of the Niagara escarpment,
creating a river with some unusual features.
- Antoinette Powell: The Fox River runs
from southwest to northeast.
So, if you look at it on a map, it's going
what you think would be the wrong direction,
but water runs
from a high point to a low point.
So, Lake Winnebago is the high point.
[energetic piano]
- Leaving Lake Winnebago,
the Fox River eroded away softer rock layers,
which created a series of falls and rapids
that together equal the drop of Niagara Falls.
[waterfall cascades]
Portaging around the falls
made travel on the Fox slow and difficult,
but with a portage of less than a mile to the Wisconsin River,
the Fox served as a major trade route
for Native Americans and for the Europeans
that would arrive in the 1600s.
- Dustin Mack: The Menominee predominated in the area.
The Fox River was an important aspect
of their life and culture here, as well,
and so they traveled the river by canoe.
It became kind of an outlet into Green Bay,
but also into the interior of the continent.
And so, [paddling water]
by placing themselves along the river,
they gained into a huge trade network
that served them for hundreds and thousands of years.
- When French explorers arrived,
they also relied on the river for traveling.
Appleton would grow [rushing water]
alongside one of the largest falls on the Fox,
at a place the French called "the Grand Chute."
Here, travelers would naturally stop
to decide how to navigate
over or around the dangerous waters.
- Antoinette Powell: There were French fur traders,
French explorers, French missionaries.
The fur trade was extremely important during this era,
especially beaver fur.
It was because of fashion.
In Europe, wealthy gentlemen wore hats
made from felted beaver fur.
The European beavers had pretty much been decimated
by this time, and they needed a new source.
[traditional Meskwaki song "He Lives"]
- As French traders moved into the area,
so did a Native American nation from the east.
A tribe that would give the river its name.
- Johnathan Buffalo: We're created out of red earth.
Thus, we were named
Meskwaki Red Earth people.
By 1650, we moved to Wisconsin.
That's where we get our Chippewa name of Outagamie,
until the French renamed us to "Renard." Fox.
We moved down to the Fox River,
the Butte des Morts area,
Lake Winnebago area
to be closer to the trade that would be coming through.
And we controlled that trade.
- Like other First Nation people,
the Meskwaki made a living from the trade on the river.
For around 50 years, they collected tolls
on the boats of travelers passing by.
Their presence gave the Fox River its name.
But their control of the waterway
grew costly for the French,
who decided to end the domination of the Meskwaki.
[traditional Meskwaki song "I Don't Know Where She Is"]
- Johnathan Buffalo: In 1712, that started the Fox Wars,
which was fought until 1735.
[traditional Meskwaki song "I Don't Know Where She Is"]
It's been roughly estimated we were about 40,000 people.
By the time we left Wisconsin to go to Iowa,
what would become Iowa,
we were about a thousand people.
[traditional Meskwaki song "I Don't Know Where She Is"]
- After the Meskwaki left and the French and Indian Wars ended,
control of what would become Wisconsin
passed from the French to the British,
and, finally, to the United States.
When Wisconsin became a new territory,
the government began treaty negotiations
with the Menominee Nation,
forcing them to give up most of their lands.
- Dustin Mack: The Treaty of Cedars was signed in 1836
between the Menominee and the United States government.
The Menominee ceded four million acres,
part of which was Appleton proper
and the land around it.
- The Treaty of the Cedars opened the land for settlement
by Yankee Americans from the east
and European immigrants.
The Fox River would continue
to provide a valuable transportation and trade route
for the Americans.
And the Grand Chute,
the future site of the city of Appleton,
drew the attention of investors from the east
who saw the falls not as an obstacle to navigation
but as a powerful source of water power for industry.
[classic orchestra music]