Visit the Mysterious Cahokia Mounds Near St. Louis

You don't need to experience the occasional peculiar lights and sounds abroad on the late night grounds of Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site to realize this is a home to mystery. With a population that may have once topped 20,000, this was the largest city in prehistoric North America (800-1400 AD), located at the center of a complex of smaller outlying communities and farmsteads.

One mystery is what the inhabitants of the city called themselves. Scientists refer to the culture generally as Mississippian because it thrived along the Mississippi River system. The name itself, Cahokia Mounds, is taken from an Illini tribe that lived there when the French Jesuit "black robes" arrived. Even the Cahokia were mystified by the Mound Builders, the Jesuits found.

Once hidden by trees and overgrowth, the 2,200 acre site these days is open and grass-covered, permitting an unimpeded view of the many mounds. The environmental manicure also puts you more in touch with the vanished city that once occupied the spot.

A mural inside the front entrance of the multi-media Interpretation Center offers an artist's view of daily life at Cahokia Mounds. The center also provides a film on the Mound's history, a gift shop, snack shop, and, naturally, a range of displays which includes a recreated village that demonstrates living arrangements, storage, and other aspects of life in Cahokia.

Monk's Mound dominates the site. It got its name from the French priests who at one time conducted services on the mound. The terraced Monk's Mound is across the street from the visitor's center, built by laborers who carried in the earth, one basket at a time, to create the largest structure of its kind in the Western Hemisphere. After climbing the steps up the side of the 100-foot mound, you can stand on the top terrace and share the panorama once available to it's sole inhabitant, the ruler of the city, known as the Great Sun. The tremendous view of the Mississippi floodplains includes, these days, the Gateway Arch and St Louis skyline close at hand to the west. Much closer, just west of Monks Mound, you can see Woodhenge, a reconstructed observatory consisting of wooden poles grouped in a circle.

There is mystery in the decline of Cahokia. Perhaps success and growth drove the people out, the city eventually becoming so large it couldn't sustain itself. An overdependancy on the primary food source, maize (corn), may have resulted in nutritional deficiencies. There may have been a critical shortage of firewood for heating and cooking. Plague and warfare are other possibilities. Of course, it may have simply been a combination of circumstances with one element tipping the balance towards the end.

But for centuries the city was stable, the center of a vast network of trade. In the 1920's, the state began conducting archeological research at the site which continues. Since 1982, Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site has been a World Heritage Site like the pyramids of Egypt or Angkor in Cambodia.

Activities are scheduled throughout the year including a contemporary indian Art Show in July, the colorful annual Powwow in September with dances, demonstrators, and traders tents, the Annual Indian Art Show also in September, Sunrise Observances at equinoxes and solstices at Woodhenge, storytelling events, nature/culture hikes, plus various presentations, workshops, and classes.

Admission is free, although there is a suggested donation of $2 for adults, $1 for children. The Interpretive Center is open 9am to 5pm daily. Tours are self-guided but volunteers are available to answer questions. An orientation film called "City of the Sun" is screen hourly from 10am to 4pm. Grounds are open 8am to dusk.

Only eight miles from St Louis as the crow flies, you can reach Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site by taking the off-ramp at Exit 24 on I-255, nearly within sight of Cahokia Mounds, and turn left on Collinsville Road.

Collinsville offers plenty of motel and restaurant facilities for the traveler.