Dickson Mounds State Museum

This museum has gone through several iterations through the decades. When my parents visited as kids in the 1950s, it was little more than a wall-​less roof that covered the excavations. When they took us kids in the 1970s, it was a permanent one-​story building. Now, the exhibits are housed in an attractive three-​story museum, located on a very peaceful, green landscape, overlooking the backwaters of the Illinois river, outside of Lewistown.
There is no entrance fee, only a suggested donation, which we were happy to pay.
Our visit started on the third floor with a «Legacy» movie that gives one a sense of the long passage of time over 12,000 years, and how our modern culture has been here only an instant. There’s a nice observation deck up there, too. Then we moved down through the second floor, looking at the «People of the Valley» and «Reflections of Three Worlds» exhibits. Here there are dioramas, pottery chards and arrowheads, and very thorough presentations of American Indian daily life, their foods, tool making, pottery, shelter making, hunting, agriculture, and so forth. One can learn a tremendous amount of information about the Mississippian culture here. We were there a couple hours, which was long enough to see everything at a leisurely pace, but if you want to really learn, you could easily spend more time reading and taking photos.
On the way down to the first floor is a walkway to a large, dark «multimedia exhibit» room with hanging things, flashing lights, various images, noises, and narrators who present the spiritual beliefs of the indigenous people who once lived there. Then out you go back into the lobby where you started. If you have never been to this museum before, then you should be very satisfied with what you encounter there. It is very educational, overflowing with exhibits and artifacts, and it is tastefully done, being respectful of the native cultures who lived there and may still live around there. However, if you visited the museum before 1990, you’ll be wondering where the archaeological excavations are that are no longer on display to the public. They are in the multimedia exhibit room, under a white floor. Laws have been passed on a federal level that make it illegal to display them. And now we arrive at the issue: should these remains be on display or not? The American Indians felt that their ancestors were being treated disrespectfully by being on display, and that their culture was being treated as «The Other» in general. There is a scene in the film «Lakota Woman: Siege at Wounded Knee» where Leonard Crow Dog angrily confronts college students on an archaeological dig, asking them how they’d feel if someone dug up their grandparents. I guess that’s a good illustration of how some of them may have felt – that it was a violation on some level – spiritually or culturally. So, now the excavations are covered up. There aren’t even photographs of it or pencil diagrams. Nothing. There are many issues at play here. Where is the line that separates genuine scientific inquiry from a public spectacle? And can what was a spectacle ever be managed so as to be a respectful and educational display that benefits society? Should respect for one group’s religious beliefs stop genuine scientific inquiry that promotes the progress of knowledge that benefits everyone? Who, precisely, are one’s «ancestors” – just blood relatives or everyone you conveniently want to be – and where do rights to them begin and end? Do the owners of the land on which mounds and other sites are situated have no say in what they can do with their private property now?
People could learn a lot from the excavations: the painstaking detail that goes into excavating an archaeological site and the methods of cataloging the information, seeing the past as valuable and wanting to preserve it, learning about the beliefs and culture of those interred and what that can teach us about our own. New technology such as DNA testing could tell us even more.
This really is an excellent museum, and it’s worth the visit.

This really is a fantastic museum, and I’ve come here several times despite the somewhat long (but enjoyable) country drive.
This is a museum that respects your intelligence, and contextualizes Native American lifeways in an inspiring and respectful way. If you are an Indian, I highly recommend a visit there, where you will be treated to proud displays of great art and artifacts. The general public will leave with a new respect for indigenous life and ancient civilization, which may lead them to other great museums like Cahokia’s and Chicago’s Field Museum.
The benefit at Dixon is that there are no big crowds like at the larger museums, which seriously detracts from the experiences there (think crying kids, insulting assholes, and other horrors). There’s none of that at Dixon Mounds Museum gladly, and the culture there seems to engender a spirit of respect and reverence that visitors naturally manifest.
Five stars to the little museum that dreams big!

This was a nice museum, well worth the long drive out to it’s secluded place. It sits on top of a hill with an awsome view of the area (which when I was there happened to be flooded). It is a new museum, well laid out, and very informative without focusing on being politically correct.

This is a WONDERFUL museum and deserves more attention by the general public. Outside at the Eveland Village, there are three buildings which house the remains from past digs of the Mississippian bldgs. My visit of two hours was a bit rushed but I felt that it more than satisfied my curiosity. The displays and the artifacts were absolutely spectacular; a few displays contained casts of the original pieces.

An excellent museum which describes the life cycles and culture of Native Americans living in the Illinois River valley over a period of 12,000 years since the last Ice Age. The large building complex sits atop a hill once used as a burial grounds by ancient peoples and provides a stunning view from the observation deck. Admission was free.