The Wyandot Indians

The Wyandot Indians. . The Wyandot were a North American Indian people descended from the aboriginal inhabitants of the Ontario Peninsula, between present day Niagara, Ontario and Detroit, Michigan. The ancient name for more than a dozen Iriquoian speaking tribes of this region was Wendat; the French called them Huron. Hunting and fishing could not provide the economic base needed so the Wendot became intensive slash and burn farmers of maize, beans, squash, sunflowers, peas, pumpkins, melons, and tobacco. The Wendot lived a sedentary life in palisaded, densely populated villages made up of bark covered longhouses., In 1649-51 the Wendats were driven from their land and almost annihilated by the musket equipped warriors of the Iroquois League. The few survivors of this purge fled west. A group of these Indians settled here in Wyandotte between the present site of Eureka Road and Oak Street on the Detroit River waterfront. They named this site Maquaqua and enjoyed the protection that Fort Detroit offered to them., With new treaties formed between the Wyandots and the United States Government, the tribe moved from Maquaqua to an area in Flat Rock, Michigan. From there the Wyandots moved to Ohio, then Kansas, and finally to a reservation in Oklahoma, where a tribe of Wyandots remains today., The city of Wyandotte is named in honor of this proud Indian nation., Diagram on right , Above: Imaginary conception of the village of Maquaqua drawn from original descriptions of Huron Indian customs by Patricia Warrow, a descendant of the Wyandot Indians.