Kin-Com-A-Ong Spring was chosen as the site of the 1826 Treaty of the Mississinewa because a plentiful spring from an adjacent hill created a wilderness valley paradise and the location was centrally situated with enough open land for a treaty camp. In the early 1820s, the northern half of Indiana was predominantly occupied by members of the Miami and Potawatomi tribes, who still held rights to the land in this area despite serious defeats by General Anthony Wayne along the Maumee River in 1794 and William Henry Harrison at the Battle of Tippecanoe in 1811. In 1826, Congress appropriated funds for a treaty meeting to acquire additional land for white settlements and to establish a canal system along the Wabash River, and Governor James B. Ray of Indiana, Governor Lewis Cass of Michigan, and General John Tipton were appointed to represent the U.S. government. Tipton selected this place, where the Treaty Camp was built in the spring and summer of 1826. The treaty meeting took place in October 1826 and lasted about two weeks, and on October 16 and 23, 1826, the Potawatomi and Miami surrendered rights to much of their land in northern Indiana and southern Michigan in exchange for silver, goods, and other services. The Treaties of 1826 opened this land to white settlement and allowed construction of the Wabash and Erie Canal. The original Treaty Camp had ten buildings, and its reconstruction began in 1987 based on a description in surveyor Elijah Hackleman's 1836 writings.