Native Americans The north country was inhabited by the Paleo Indian culture circa 8000 BC. Limited artifacts have been found in the BWCAW from that era and the subsequent Archaic period circa 6000 years ago. Artifacts from the
Early Woodland Era (circa 1300 years ago) have not been found there, but pottery and clay pipes from the
Later Woodland Indians have been found there. The area was then sparsely populated by the
Sioux. Then the Ojibwe arrived and the Sioux migrated westward. The area then became a part of the homeland of the
Ojibwe people, who traveled the waterways in
canoes made of
birch bark. Within the BWCAW are hundreds of prehistoric
pictographs and
petroglyphs on rock ledges and cliffs. It is thought that the
Hegman Lake Pictograph located on a large overlooking rock wall on North Hegman Lake was most likely created by the Ojibwe. The pictograph appears to represent Ojibwe meridian constellations visible in winter during the early evening, knowledge of which may have been useful for navigating in the deep woods during the winter hunting season. The
Grand Portage Indian Reservation, just east of the BWCAW at the community of
Grand Portage, is home to a number of Ojibwe to this day.
European exploration and development canoe during the fur trade era In 1688 the
French explorer
Jacques de Noyon became the first European known to have traveled through the BWCAW area. Later, during the 1730s,
La Vérendrye and others opened the region to trade, mainly in beaver pelts. By the end of the 18th century, the
fur trade had been organized into groups of canoe-paddling
voyageurs working for the competing
North West and
Hudson's Bay Companies, with a North West Company fort located at the
Grand Portage on Lake Superior. The final
rendezvous was held at Grand Portage in 1803, after which the North West Company moved its operations further north to Fort William (now
Thunder Bay). In 1821 the North West Company merged with the Hudson's Bay Company and the center of the fur trade moved even further north to the posts around Hudson Bay. During the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the area's legal and political status was disputed. The
Treaty of Paris, which ended the
American Revolutionary War in 1783, had defined the northern border between the United States and Canada based on the inaccurate
Mitchell Map. Ownership of the area between
Lake of the Woods and Lake Superior was unclear, with the United States claiming the border was further north at the
Kaministiquia River and Canada claiming it was further south beginning at the
Saint Louis River. In 1842, the
Webster–Ashburton Treaty clarified the border between the United States and Canada using the old trading route running along the
Pigeon River and
Rainy River (today the BWCAW's northern border). Additional laws focused on protecting the area's rustic and undeveloped character. In 1948, the Thye-Blatnik Bill authorized the government to purchase the few remaining privately owned homes and resorts within the area. In 1949, President
Harry Truman signed Executive Order 10092 which
prohibited aircraft from flying over the area below 4,000 feet. The area was officially named the Boundary Waters Canoe Area in 1958. The
Wilderness Act of 1964 organized it as a unit of the
National Wilderness Preservation System. The 1978
Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness Act established the Boundary Waters regulations much as they are today, with limitations on
motorboats and
snowmobiles, a permit-based quota system for recreational access, and restrictions on logging and mining within the area.
Land use disputes Some aspects of the BWCAW's management and conservation have been controversial. During the 1970s, a legislative proposal was made to loosen restrictions on motorized vehicles and allow some logging in parts of the BWCAW. The proposal was unsuccessful. During the mid-1990s, a dispute over using trucks to move boats between two portages required mediation. In 1998, using trucks was ultimately allowed. While snowmobiles are not allowed within the BWCAW, a snowmobile trail located from the border provoked a lawsuit in 2006. In 2015, a judge ruled that the snowmobile trail did not violate the Wilderness Act.
Proposed Twin Metals Mine It has been known for decades that there are about four billion tons of copper and nickel ore, "one of the world's largest undeveloped mineral deposits", in the
Duluth Complex, which underlies part of northeastern Minnesota. In December 2016 the federal government proposed banning mining for 20 years while the subject was studied. The
Trump administration cancelled the study in September 2018, clearing the way for mining leases in the national forest. The
Antofagasta PLC subsidiary Twin Metals Minnesota would operate a proposed mine. In October 2021, the
Biden administration filed an application for a "mineral withdrawal" that will put a hold on the development of the mine proposal while the environmental impacts are studied. The completed study could lead to a 20-year ban on mining upstream from the BWCAW. == Recreation ==