The Midwestern United States (also referred to as the Midwest, the Heartland, the American Midwest, Middle America, or the Middle West) is one of the four census regions defined by the United States Census Bureau. It occupies the northern central part of the United States. It was officially named the North Central Region by the U.S. Census Bureau until 1984. It is between the Northeastern United States and the Western United States, with Canada to the north and the Southern United States to the south.
The United States Census Bureau's definition consists of 12 states in the north central United States: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. The 2020 United States census put the population of the Midwest at 68,995,685. The region generally lies on the broad Interior Plain between the states occupying the Appalachian Mountain range and the states occupying the Rocky Mountain range. Major rivers in the region include, from east to west, the Ohio River, the upper Mississippi River, and the Missouri River. The Midwest is further divided by the U.S. Census Bureau into the East North Central states and the West North Central states.
Chicago is the most populous city in the American Midwest and the third-most populous in the United States. Other large Midwestern cities include Columbus, Indianapolis, Detroit, Milwaukee, Kansas City, Omaha, Minneapolis, Cleveland, Cincinnati, St. Paul, and St. Louis. The Chicago metropolitan area has an estimated 9.4 million residents and is the region's largest metropolitan area, as well as the fourth-largest metropolitan area in North America. Other prominent metropolitan areas in the Midwest include Metro Detroit, Minneapolis–St. Paul, Greater St. Louis, the Cincinnati metro area, the Kansas City metro area, the Columbus metro area, the Indianapolis metro area, Greater Cleveland, and the Milwaukee metropolitan area.
The region's economy is a mix of heavy industry and agriculture, with extensive areas forming part of the United States' Corn Belt. Finance and services such as medicine and education are becoming increasingly important. Its central location makes it a transportation crossroads for river boats, railroads, autos, trucks, and airplanes. Politically, the region includes multiple swing states, and therefore is heavily contested and often decisive in elections.
The term West was applied to the region in British America and in the early years of the United States, when the British colonial territories had not extended far from the Atlantic coast and the Pacific seaboard was generally unknown. By the early 19th century, anything west of the Appalachians was considered the American frontier. Over time, the American frontier moved to west of the Mississippi River. During the colonial period, the French settled the upper Mississippi watershed, which included the valleys of the Missouri River and the Illinois River, and called it the Illinois Country. In 1787, the Northwest Ordinance was enacted, creating the Northwest Territory, which was bounded by the Great Lakes and the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. Some entities in the Midwest have "Northwest" in their names for historical reasons, such as Northwestern University in Illinois.
One of the earliest late 19th-century uses of Midwest was in reference to Kansas and Nebraska to indicate that they were the civilized areas of the West. Another term applied to the same region is Heartland.
Among the Native Americans, Paleo-American cultures were the earliest in North America, with a presence in the Great Plains and Great Lakes areas from about 12,000 BCE to around 8,000 BCE.
Following the Paleo-American period is the Archaic period (8,000 BCE to 1,000 BCE), the Woodland Tradition (1,000 BCE to 100 CE), and the Mississippian Period (900 to 1500 CE). Archeological evidence indicates that Mississippian culture traits probably began in the St. Louis, Missouri area and spread northwest along the Mississippi and Illinois rivers and entered the state along the Kankakee River system. It also spread northward into Indiana along the Wabash, Tippecanoe, and White Rivers.
Mississippian peoples in the Midwest were mostly farmers who followed the rich, flat floodplains of Midwestern rivers. They brought with them a well-developed agricultural complex based on three major crops—maize, beans, and squash. Maize, or corn, was the primary crop of Mississippian farmers. They gathered a wide variety of seeds, nuts, and berries, and fished and hunted for fowl to supplement their diets. With such an intensive form of agriculture, this culture supported large populations.
The Mississippi period was characterized by a mound-building culture. The Mississippians suffered a tremendous population decline about 1400, coinciding with the global climate change of the Little Ice Age. Their culture effectively ended before 1492.
The major tribes of the Great Lakes region included the Huron, Ottawa, Ojibwe, Potawatomi, Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Sauk, Meskwaki, Neutrals, and the Miami. Most numerous were the Huron and Ho-Chunk. Fighting and battle were often launched between tribes, with the losers forced to flee.
Most are of the Algonquian language family. Some tribes—such as the Stockbridge-Munsee and the Brothertown—are also Algonkian-speaking tribes who relocated from the eastern seaboard to the Great Lakes region in the 19th century. The Oneida belong to the Iroquois language group and the Ho-Chunk of Wisconsin are one of the few Great Lakes tribes to speak a Siouan language. American Indians in this area did not develop a written form of language.
In the 16th century, the natives of the area used projectiles and tools of stone, bone, and wood to hunt and farm. They made canoes for fishing. Most of them lived in oval or conical wigwams that could be easily moved away. Various tribes had different ways of living. The Ojibwe were primarily hunters and fishing was also important in the Ojibwe economy. Other tribes such as Sac, Fox, and Miami, both hunted and farmed.
They were oriented toward the open prairies where they engaged in communal hunts for buffalo (bison). In the northern forests, the Ottawas and Potawatomis separated into small family groups for hunting. The Winnebagos and Menominees used both hunting methods interchangeably and built up widespread trade networks extending as far west as the Rockies, north to the Great Lakes, south to the Gulf of Mexico, and east to the Atlantic Ocean.
The Hurons reckoned descent through the female line, while the others favored the patrilineal method. All tribes were governed under chiefdoms or complex chiefdoms. For example, Hurons were divided into matrilineal clans, each represented by a chief in the town council, where they met with a town chief on civic matters. But Ojibwe people's social and political life was simpler than that of settled tribes.
The religious beliefs varied among tribes. Hurons believed in Yoscaha, a supernatural being who lived in the sky and was believed to have created the world and the Huron people. At death, Hurons thought the soul left the body to live in a village in the sky. Ojibwe were a deeply religious people who believed in the Great Spirit. They worshiped the Great Spirit through all their seasonal activities, and viewed religion as a private matter: Each person's relation with his personal guardian spirit was part of his thinking every day of life. Ottawa and Potawatomi people had very similar religious beliefs to those of the Ojibwe.
In the Ohio River Valley, the dominant food supply was not hunting but agriculture. There were orchards and fields of crops that were maintained by indigenous women. Corn was their most important crop.
The Plains Indians are the indigenous peoples who live on the plains and rolling hills of the Great Plains of North America. Their equestrian culture and conflicts with settlers and the US Army have made the Plains Indians archetypical in literature and art for American Indians everywhere.