 When Europeans first started exploring Minnesota , the region was inhabited primarily by tribes of Dakota , with the Ojibwa ( sometimes called Chippewa , or Anishinaabe ) beginning to migrate westward into the state around 1700 . The economy of these tribes was chiefly based on hunter @-@ gatherer activities . There was also a small group of Ho @-@ Chunk ( Winnebago ) Native Americans near Long Prairie , who later moved to a reservation in Blue Earth County in 1855 . 
