These annual reports are excellent material for a history of any Indian Agency, or collectively for a history of the Indian Wards of the United States Government in Wisconsin in the period from 1910 to 1939. Generally speaking, the reports are quite detailed, highly informative, and interesting. They include information on the Indian population, health, industries, lumber mills, living conditions, schools, law and order, trading facilities, morals and mores, the personnel in charge of the Agencies, agriculture, land allotments, and a host of other things. The Narrative Reports (reports of the superintendent of an agency to the United States Office of Indian Affairs) are supposed to be, and many are, full and free in description of the work being carried on by the agency, its problems and successes. In these reports, the superintendent is encouraged to turn himself loose, and some do, though many are quite sterile. The Inspector's Reports are candid, graphic, and frank. An inspector was sent out to inspect each Indian jurisdiction annually and to report on all aspects of its administration and program. He discusses all aspects of the Agency, personnel, administrators, how agriculture is progressing, schools, etc. The separate Statistical Reports were introduced in 1920 and are strictly a “form” report covering all the work of an Indian jurisdiction that is subject to a statistical approach. The existing file of these reports in the National Archives is not complete for each year for every agency or jurisdiction in Wisconsin, but it is comparatively so.
Although the constituency served by the agencies changed occasionally, records from the Carter Agency and Lac du Flambeau and Laona agencies generally concern the Ojibwe (Chippewa) and Potawatomi Indians; records from the Grand Rapids Agency concern the Potawatomi and Ho-Chunk (Winnebago) Indians; records from the Hayward, La Pointe, and Red Cliff agencies concern the Ojibwe (Chippewa) Indians; records from the Keshena Agency concern the Menominee, Munsee, Oneida, and Stockbridge Indians; records from Menominee Mills concern the Menominee Indians; records from the Oneida Agency concern the Oneida Indians; and records from the Tomah Agency concern the Ojibwe (Chippewa), Munsee, Oneida, Ottawa, Potawatomi, Stockbridge, and Ho-Chunk (Winnebago) Indians.
