Mackinac Bands of Chippewa and Ottawa Indians

The Mackinac Bands of Chippewa and Ottawa Indians are descendants of Anishinaabe people who migrated from somewhere in the Northeast to the Great Lakes area[1] (now known as Michigan) sometime around 1500 CE, and the remnants of the Michinemackinawgo who previously inhabited Mackinac Island and the Straits area.

The Odawa, Ojibwa, and Potawatomi people were closely related and affiliated as the Council of Three Fires.

It occupied territory around Mackinac and traded with French colonists at their post set up at St. Ignace, in what later became Michigan, United States.

They later also traded with British and United States traders, after the border was changed and as a result of wars among those powers.

The people who are members of the Mackinac Bands of Chippewa and Ottawa Indians have been petitioning for federal recognition since 1998.