Illinois State Museum

• Wild Plants

• Cultivated Plants

• John Wood's List

• Three Sisters

• Experiments

• Spooner

Cultivated Plants

Native Americans were the first people to cultivate plants in Illinois. They gradually changed their customs from a pure hunting and gathering society to one that included semi-permanent settlements and agriculture.

In the late eighteenth century, Euro-Americans and Americans from the eastern and southern states immigrated to the new Illinois Country of the Indiana Territory and set up homesteads with farming.

This section of the History of Illinois Agriculture describes these developments, including how Native Americans grew beans, corn, and squash together, John Wood's list of the plants he found in cultuvation in 1818, scientific developements in crop farming, and insect pests.