The Red Cliff Band descends from the Lake Superior Chippewa, the branch of the Ojibwe nation that migrated west along the south shore of Lake Superior from Sault Ste. Marie. Their oral tradition describes stopping places along the route, each guided by spiritual direction, until they reached Chequamegon Bay and Madeline Island. French fur traders and Jesuit missionaries arrived in the 17th century, establishing a trading post and Catholic mission at La Pointe on Madeline Island. The Ojibwe and French developed an economic relationship centered on the fur trade that would reshape the entire Great Lakes region. By the 18th century, the La Pointe Ojibwe had spread across the mainland of what would become Wisconsin and Minnesota. Those who stayed near Madeline Island became known as the La Pointe Band -- the direct ancestors of today's Red Cliff community.

In 1850, the federal government attempted to remove the Lake Superior bands from Wisconsin, a forced relocation that ended in the Sandy Lake Tragedy -- a catastrophe in which hundreds of Ojibwe died of disease and starvation while waiting for annuity payments that never came. The disaster generated enough outrage to reverse the removal policy. The Treaty of La Pointe in 1854 established permanent reservations in Wisconsin. At this point, the La Pointe Band faced a choice that split them in two. Chief Buffalo, known as Kechewaishke, led the Roman Catholic members to a reservation at Red Cliff. Those who maintained traditional Midewiwin spiritual practices settled at Bad River. The division was real but not a rupture -- the two bands have maintained close relations to this day, connected by shared ancestry, shared waters, and a shared view of Madeline Island across the channel.

Life on the early reservation was constrained. Most tribal members worked for white employers in Bayfield, many in the commercial fishing industry that sustained Lake Superior communities. At the turn of the 20th century, the Commission of Indian Affairs permitted lumbering companies to clearcut most of the reservation's timber. Tribal members found work in the logging camps, but the financial profits flowed elsewhere. Through it all, fishing remained central to Red Cliff identity and survival. The landmark 1972 Wisconsin Supreme Court case Gurnoe vs. Wisconsin vindicated a Red Cliff tribal member's right to harvest fish, affirming that treaty-reserved rights still held force. This decision became an important precedent for the broader Voigt decision. During the Wisconsin Walleye War of 1987-1991, when anti-treaty protestors harassed Ojibwe spearfishers at boat landings across the state, Red Cliff member Walter Bresette emerged as a major leader of the treaty-rights movement.

In 2012, the Red Cliff Band did something no tribe had done before: they established Frog Bay Tribal National Park, the first tribal national park in the United States open to the public. The park protects boreal forest, wetland, and undeveloped Lake Superior coastline on the reservation -- a stretch of shore that development pressure might otherwise have claimed. It was an assertion of sovereignty expressed through conservation, a declaration that the band could protect its own land on its own terms. Today, Red Cliff also operates Legendary Waters Resort and Casino on the Lake Superior shore, runs a fish hatchery, and manages an Ojibwe language immersion program for young children. The band's contemporary artists and musicians carry the culture forward -- tribal member Rabbett Strickland is a prolific visual artist, and Frank Anakwad Montano is an internationally recognized Ojibwe flute maker and guitarist. The reservation covers roughly 23 square miles of land and water, a small territory with an outsized claim on history.