Aztalan State Park: Crawfish River Area Fun, History, and Scenery in Jefferson County, Wisconsin

Jefferson County commemorates:

• The same-named New York county origins of early settlers;

• Third President (March 4, 1801 – March 4, 1809) of the United States of America Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826).

Since its politico-administrative creation on December 7, 1836, with 468 settlers, it enjoys a convenient location in southeastern Wisconsin. It forms western borders with Dane County, seat of the state capital named after fourth U.S. President (March 4, 1809 – March 4, 1817) James Madison, Jr. (March 16, 1751 – June 28, 1836). It gives easterly access through Dodge County to the state metropolis Anglicized to Milwaukee from the respective Native American Ojibwe and Potawatomi designations ominowakiing and minwaking for “Gathering place (by the water).”

Lowlands and ridges encourage county transits. Resources explain Lake Michigan, Mississippian, and Woodland settlements. They include:

• Basswoods (Tilia americana), elms (Ulmus americana, rubra), sugar maples (Acer saccharum) in the east;
• Black spruces (Picea mariana), cedars (Juniperus virginiana), tamaracks (Larix laricina) in the southeast;
• Bluestem (Andropogon gerardii, scoparius) prairies in the northwest and southwest;
• Bulrush (Scirpus spp), nut-grass (Cyperus spp), sedge (Carex spp), spike-rush (Eleocharis spp) meadow-marshes in the central-west;
• Lakes (Bean, Blue Spring, Golden, Goose, Green Isle, Hahns, Hope, Koshkonong, Marsh, Maunesha, Mud, Perch, Red Cedar, Ripley, Rock, Rose, Round, Spence, Spring [Lower, Upper], Victoria);
• Millponds (Hoopers, Rome, Watertown);
• Oak savannas (Quercus spp) in the west;
• Ponds (Cushman, Firemen Park, Kurtz);
• Rivers (Ashippun, Bark, Crawfish, Rock, Scuppernong).

Year-round water access acknowledges 26 square miles (67.34 square kilometers) in wetland configurations out of a total county area of 583 square miles (1,509.96 square kilometers). It also arises from:

• 160 frost-free days;
• 7.9 to 84.5°F (-13.39 to 29.17°C) in temperature ranges;
• 33+ inches (83.82+ centimeters) each in annual precipitation and snowfall.

Vegetation sustained by geographical, hydrographical, and meteorological confluences historically attracts:

• Bear, beaver, buffalo, deer, elk, fox, moose, muskrat, raccoons, squirrels, wolves, woodchucks;
• Birds;
• Frogs, toads;
• Turtles.

Its nourishing, sheltering possibilities historically draw sufficient bank- and stream-dwelling arthropods to accommodate freshwater populations of:

• Bass;
• Buffalo fish;
• Catfish;
• Drum fish;
• Gar;
• Pike;
• Suckers.

Its light-filtering role encourages phytoplankton- and zooplankton-eating mussels to control algal and bacterial populations.

Numerous springs account for Jefferson County’s people- and wildlife-pleasing, year-round unfrozen waters. They are one of many reasons why Aztalan perseveres as a:

• Community politico-administratively unincorporated but geographically located within the same-named town;
• Festival annually realized on the Sunday closest to July 4^th;
• Museum operated by Lake Mills – Aztalan Historical Society, Inc.;
• National Historic Landmark, 1964-;
• National Register of Historic Places resource, 1966-;
• State park, 1952-;
• State park friends group, 1994-.

The name’s back-story begins with stockaded mounds being:

• Discovered by Timothy Johnson (June 28, 1792 – January 29, 1871), 1835-/1836-;
• Mapped and named by Judge Nathaniel Fisher Hyer (March 2, 1807 – September 12, 1885), 1837-;
• Surveyed by Increase Allen Lapham (March 7, 1811 – September 14, 1875), 1850-.

Literate North Americans associate hierarchy, maize, pyramids, and squares with Aztecs. They assume the chronicled truth of Aztecs and the Nahuatl language being non-native to Central Mexico. Water-plentiful Wisconsin becomes a possible origin point since:

• Aztlán, the Aztecs’ legendary homeland, means “near water”;
• Aztec long-nosed god maskettes honoring Yacatecuhtli, patron god of pochteca (itinerant, long-distance merchants) number among Aztalan’s copper earrings;
• Aztec settlement of Mexico overlaps with Aztalan’s abandonment during the 12^th – 13^th centuries.

But researchers generally favor highlighting Illinois’ and Wisconsin’s respective Mississippian and Woodland peoples since the meticulous examination of on- and off-site evidence by Dr. Samuel Alfred Barrett (November 12, 1879 – March 9, 1965) as Milwaukee Public Museum Curator, 1909-, and Director, 1920 – 1940.   

The 172-acre (69.61-hectare) park claims:

• 11th to 13th century-built burial and storage pits, circular residences, conical and effigy mounds, fish weirs, garbage dumps, gravel knoll, flat-topped pyramids, rectangular trench-houses;
• 20^th century-reconstructed palisades, steps, watchtowers.  

Milwaukee Public Museum-stored artifacts include bone-, metal-, stone-made:

• Abrader-stones, awls, axes, celts, chisels, drills, hoes, hammer-stones, knives, paint-stones, pestles, scrapers, spades;
• Arrowheads, hooks;
• Baraboo pipestones;
• Beads;
• Burned clay-and-grass bricks;
• Chunkey game-playing disks, spears;
• Ear-spools;
• Gulf, river shells;
• Hixton silicified sandstone from Silver Mound;
• Lake Michigan and Woodland grit-tempered, Powell Plain and Ramey Incised shell-tempered pottery;
• Mississippian tri-notched projectile-points;
• Upper Peninsula copper.

Aztalan’s treasure-piece is the 25-year-old, 5’6” (1.68-meter) “Princess” buried with 18 funerary beads and covered with 1,978 beads in three 54-inch (1.37-meter) belts.

Locals and visitors frequent Wisconsin’s Aztalan State Park for:

• Fun;
• History;
• Scenery.

Fun is the natural outcome of:

• Boating, canoeing, fishing, and kayaking the Crawfish River;
• Jogging, skiing, snowshowing, walking 2 miles (3.22 kilometers) of open-prairie, ungroomed trails;
• Hunting and trapping designated open areas;
• Picnicking in open and reservable shelters;
• Sight-seeing.

It easily links with equally enjoyable educational experiences through the archaeology and history lessons inherent in human- and nature-made landforms and reconstructed, restored and surviving monuments. As a result, visits to Aztalan State Park tend to be delightfully habit-forming since a day is not enough to:

• Determine if the fish weir and surviving mounds really are haunted;
• Enjoy the four-season beauty of Wisconsin's most mysterious site.

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Jefferson County, Wisconsin: namesake of Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826), third U.S. President (March 4, 1801 - March 4, 1809) honors Jefferson County, New York, point of origin for settlers to counterpart county in Wisconsin.
1800 oil on canvas by Rembrandt Peale (February 22, 1778 – October 3, 1860)
White House Art Collection: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Thomas_Jefferson_by_Rembrandt_Peale,_1800.jpg

Snapper Prairie, about 10 miles (16 km) north of Aztalan State Park: small remnant of formerly large 2,500 acre low prairie in floodplain of the Crawfish River
Jefferson County, southeastern Wisconsin: Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, CC BY ND 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/widnr/6583090589/

Pickerel frog (Lithobates palustris, formerly Rana palustris) transitions from Crawfish River to terra firma of Aztalan State Park.
amphibious landing onto restored mound: benet2006, CC BY 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/benetd/9541056414/

Map of Aztalan: 1850 survey by Increase Lapham
I. Lapham, The Antiquities of Wisconsin (1855), Plate XXXIV: Biodiversity Heritage Library (BioDivLib), Public Domain, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/biodivlibrary/51263979423/; 

depiction of Yacatecuhtli in Patterns of Merchants in Codex Borgia, Mesoamerican ritual and divinatory manuscript written prior to Spanish Conquest of Aztec Empire (February 1519 – August 13, 1521):
Presently housed in the Vatican's Apostolic Library, the namesake of The Most Rev. Dr. Stefano Cardinal Borgia (Dec. 3, 1731 – 1804) was discovered among Cardinal's effects in 1805 by Prussian explorer Alexander von Humboldt (Sept. 14, 1769–May 6, 1859).
Codex Borgia, p. 55 (cropped): Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Codex_Borgia_page_55.jpg

restored earthen mound with screen of posts
Aztalan State Park, Jefferson County, southeastern Wisconsin: benet2006, CC BY 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/benetd/9538263375/

Milwaukee Public Museum Curator Samuel Barrett noted "Princess" burial as "unique in Wisconsin archaeology": young female, 20 to 25 years of age, with deformity of spinal column and wrapped with three belts decorated or woven with clam shell beads:
belt around shoulders with 585 beads, belt around waist with 846 beads, and belt around lower part of legs and ankles with 547 beads, for a total of 1,978 clam shell beads (Samuel Barrett, Ancient Aztalan, p. 243)
Wisconsin Historical Marker for Princess Burial Mound; stone Princess Mound marker atop conical "Marker" mound: Lake Mills Aztalan Historical Society, Inc. @LakeMillsAztalan via Facebook May 25, 2013, @ https://www.facebook.com/LakeMillsAztalan/posts/377122509066789/

Jefferson County's Aztalan State Park: U.S. National Historic Landmark (NHL), July 19, 1964; U.S. National Register of Historic Places (NRHP), October 15, 1966
earthen platform mound, Aztalan State Park, Wisconsin State Natural Area #408: Joshua Mayer (wackybadger), CC BY-SA 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/wackybadger/4339257767/

Wisconsin Official Marker for Aztalan, erected 1991
marker (lower right), Aztalan, Registered National Historic Landmark, by U.S. Department of the Interior National Park Service, 1964
marker (lower left), "Aztalan Mound Park," by The Wisconsin Archaeological Society, 1927: Dual Freq, CC BY SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Aztalan_State_Park_Entrance_Sign.jpg

Aztalan State Park's earthen platform mounds are characteristic of Mississippian civilization.
Mississippian civilization flourished ca. 800 CE to 1600 CE in Eastern, Southeastern and Midwestern United States.
one of three earthen platform mounds originally constructed by Aztalan people between 1050 and 1200 CE: Joshua Mayer (wackybadger), CC BY-SA 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/wackybadger/4339258803/

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