Hopewell graves at the mouth of the Iowa River
The Toolesboro Mounds overlook the Mississippi River valley in Louisa County, on the north bank of the Iowa River close to where it empties into the Mississippi, just north of the town of Toolesboro on State Highway 99, the Great River Road. People of the Havana Hopewell culture raised them as burial mounds between about 200 BC and AD 100, and the State Historical Society of Iowa counts them among the best preserved and most accessible remnants of that world.
The mouth of the Iowa River was rich ground for people who lived by hunting and gathering: wild plants in the river-bottom soil, fish, shellfish and waterfowl. The Hopewell buried their dead with goods that showed their standing, and those goods traveled. Hopewell graves in the Midwest hold copper from Lake Superior, shells from the Gulf of Mexico, mica from the Appalachians and obsidian from the country that is now Yellowstone. Copper axes and pins from the Toolesboro mounds are among the finest recovered from sites of their time, and the people here had flint blades and freshwater pearls of their own to send out along the trade routes. Archaeologists believe a village stood nearby, probably flooded or buried by the shifting Iowa River. An earthwork close by, called the old fort, may be a thousand years younger, the work of the later Oneota people.
Early records describe as many as 12 mounds. Settlement and a careless dig by the Davenport Academy of Natural Sciences in the late 1800s took their toll. The family of George M. Mosier, a local landowner, gave the land to the state, the site became a National Historic Landmark in 1966, and a small visitor center went up in 1969. Two mounds stand on the grounds of the education center, which has exhibits and a prairie demonstration plot, and more lie in the fenced woodlot next door. These are graves, and the Historical Society asks visitors not to walk on or near them. The site is a state preserve and accessible all year; check the center's hours before you go.
Other places on the map within a couple of hours.
