Many modifications in Menominee custom and thought was brought about by the fur-trade. This included a major shift in the make-up of the clan system. The tribe moved from a village and moiety (2 major subdivisions) organization to mobile band groups. This is probably what accounted for the 34 separate bands at the time of movement to the Reservation in 1854.

At first the bands tended to follow clan lines, representing linked families congenial to one another. The bands were not bands because they were originally clans, but were rather economic and friendship groups which were organized along clan lines. Personal preferences gradually broke up much of this distinctiveness. Never the less at least some of the bands retained strong clan marks right up to reservation days; the Oconto River band for example is said to have been mostly "Beavers" and the Calumet band east of Winnebago Lake were "Thunderers".

When the various bands moved to the Reservation, beginning in 1852, the band leaders chose locations that appealed to them. The members of their bands either grouped themselves nearby or selected other areas according to their own preferences. This began a steady decline of the band system almost from the first days of the reservation period. Just as the band system developed as an adjustment to the roving life of the fur-trading days, so now it began to break up with the start of a more settled way of life. The kind of life they led in the early days before the fur-trade era changed their lifestyle.

When the Band Leaders moved their groups to the present Reservation they settled in the following areas. The first to arrive, in 1852, were the Southern Bands. Ais-miqta, Karon (Carron), Lamotte, Akine-bue (Kinepoway), Osh-kiqhi-na-nui, and Wa-ta-sau, with their followers, settled on the east bank of the Wolf River near the payground. This area later became the village of Keshena.

The Bear people, headed by Oshkosh, together with Shu-nu-ni-u (Souligny), Ma-tshikine-u (Chickenay), and Shawano, settled along the west bank of the Wolf River, the area north of Keshena Falls. Most of the Thunder people settled further up the Wolf near Wayka Creek. They were led by Powahe-kuna (Poegonah) along with Keso and Ni-aqtawa-pomi with their followers.

In 1854, the Menominee River People arrived on the Reservation. They made their homes at the original payground, the place the important young chief of the band, Keshi-niu, gave his name. Some of these people along with a group led by their leader, Tshishikwo-nuwau, moved to the northeast. The Peshtigo Band, led by Asha-wuni-pinas made their headquarters in the same direction near a lake called Peshtigo.

The Oconto River Band, under the leadership of Pikwu-kunao, founded the settlement known as South Branch on the Little Oconto River. Kineopway decided to move to the area now called West Branch. All this early settlement was near the waterways because the canoe was the essential mode of travel and transport. They also chose areas of the Reservation that was open country. The areas they did not immediately move to was dense forest area.