Mines of Spain State Recreation Area and E. B. Lyons Nature Center

The park is named after the agreement between the Spanish Empire and Julien Dubuque. ==History==

Prehistoric settlement The earliest known inhabitants of this area were from the Late Archaic period (2,050 BCE to 450 BCE). This era is marked by an increasing sense of regionalism and sedentary occupation of land. The existence of copper in northeast Iowa from the Lake Superior region suggests the practice of long-distance trade. Archaeologists have located evidence of a wide variety of projectile points from this era, population expansion, exchange of raw materials and finished goods, and galena, which is associated with more complex mortuary rituals. Evidence from the Woodland period (450 BCE to 1250 CE) are found in pottery, burial mounds, and cultivated plants. Locally, this period of settlement grew out of the Late Archaic period, which in turn transitioned into the Oneota period (950 CE to European contact). The Julien Dubuque Monument, also located here, was individually listed on the NRHP on the same date. They were collectively named a National Historic Landmark District on November 4, 1993. ==Julien Dubuque Monument==

When Dubuque died in 1810 he was buried according to the Meskwaki burial customs. In 1897 a group of leaders from the City of Dubuque decided to build a monument to Julien Dubuque, who they considered their community's founder. It came at a time when the city's economy had declined and the decision to build the monument came from the local booster movement, which was common in many Midwestern cities at the time. Human remains were discovered when footings were dug for the monument, but they were not identified and it could not be positively confirmed that this was actually the place Dubuque was buried. That is not as important as this was the place these people thought was the grave of Julien Dubuque, his wife Potosa, and her father Peosta, a Meskwaki tribal chief. The significance of the monument is less about who is supposedly buried here, and the historic events associated with them, as the historical trend (boosterism) that brought the monument about. The monument is a cylindrical tower that is high, wide, and walls that are thick. It is composed of locally quarried limestone and it has no roof. The monument features narrow windows, grillwork that covers its entrance, and a bronze plaque that reads "Julien Dubuque. Miner of the Mines of Spain. Founder of Our City. Died March 24, 1810". It was designed to have a "medieval design" and in that vein its ashlar block construction is capped with crenellations. It is located on the edge of a bluff above the mouth of Catfish Creek at the Mississippi River. The monument was originally designed to be situated in a rustic setting, but park features such as a roadway, footpaths, benches, and interpretive signs were added during the 20th century. ==See also==