Mounds State Park is a state park near Anderson, Madison County, Indiana featuring Native American heritage, and ten ceremonial mounds built by the prehistoric Adena culture indigenous peoples of eastern North America, and also used centuries later by Hopewell culture inhabitants.

It is separate from (and about 79 miles northwest of) the similarly named Mounds State Recreation Area (near Brookville, Franklin County, Indiana).

[citation needed] When working at the Anderson mounds, archeologists learned that the maps used since the late 1800s were inaccurate.

This area was used for rituals and has been targeted by looters in the past, who caused significant damage to the artifacts and their stratigraphy.

[4] The central mound was excavated in 1968/69 and found to have three clay layers, each with ashes, showing a succession of use periods.

When excavated, two human burials were found inside the tomb; a 50-year-old adult male, and the redeposited partial remains of a cremated individual.

[citation needed] The only other aboriginal features on the platform were numerous small post holes encircling the top.

[7][8] In 1900, a series of strange misshapen skeletons were unearthed from similar mounds in nearby Alexandria, Indiana.

In 1910, several locals admitted to stealing chimpanzee skeletons from the nearby Muncie Zoo's monkey house.

While the amusement park exploited the native-made mounds, it also helped to protect them by making them a point of regional pride and a destination; otherwise they might have been plundered or otherwise destroyed.