1965, 1970, 1980, 1995 Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.
All rights reserved
First edition 1965
Third revised edition 1995
Published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.
2140 Oak Industrial Dr. N.E., Grand Rapids, Michigan 49505 /
P.O. Box 163, Cambridge CB3 9PU U.K.
Printed in the United States of America
18 17 16 15 12 11 10 9
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Dunbar, Willis Frederick, 1902-1970.
Michigan: a history of the Wolverine State /
by Willis F. Dunbar and George S. May. 3rd rev. ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8028-7055-1 (pbk: alk. paper)
1. Michigan History. I. May, George S. II. Title.
F566.D84 1995
www.eerdmans.com
To my wife Tish
and to our friends
Becky, Mike, Cori, and fessi
CONTENTS
List of Maps
Preface
1. The Physical Environment
2. Michigans First Residents
3. The French Explorers
4. Michigan under French Development
5. Michigan under the British Flag
6. Michigan and the Old Northwest, 1783-1805
7. Michigans Troubled Decade, 1805-1815
8. Exit the Fur Trader; Enter the Farmer
9. The Era of the Pioneers
10. Political Development and Cultural Beginnings
11. A Stormy Entrance into the Union
12. A Cycle of Boom, Bust, and Recovery
13. Out of the Wilderness, 1835-1860
14. Michigan Leads the Way in Education
15. Politics in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Michigan
16. Michigan and the Civil War
17. The Heyday of the Lumber Industry
18. The Mining Boom
19. An Expanding Transportation Network
20. Citadel of Republicanism
21. The Growth of Manufacturing
22. Michigan and the Automobile
23. Progressivism and the Growth of Social Consciousness
24. World War I and Its Aftermath
25. Michigan Becomes an Urban State
26. Depression and War
27. The Postwar Years
28. Years of Change and Turmoil
29. The Enrichment of Cultural Life
30. Toward a New Century
Suggestions for Further Reading
Appendix I
Appendix II
Notes
MAPS
1. Lakes and main rivers of Michigan
2. Iron, copper, and hardwood areas
3. Indian nations and migration routes
4. French forts, missions, portage routes
5. French and Indian War
6. Proclamation Line, 1763, and Quebec, 1774
7. The International Boundary
8. State claims prior to 1776
9. Indian challenge
10. Division of Northwest Territory, 1800
11. Old Northwest, 1803
12. Judge Woodwards plan for Detroit
13. Indian reservations and treaty cessions
14. Michigan boundaries and the Toledo Strip question
15. Internal improvements about 1837
16. Michigans part in the Underground Railway
17. Chief railroads
18. Interurban railways in 1919
19. Voting for Williams in the 1958 election
20. State constitutional ratification, April 1, 1963
PREFACE
M ICHIGAN IS PERHAPS the least typical of all the original forty-eight states in the Union. It is unique geographically because it consists of two large peninsulas, whose shores are washed by the waters of four of the five Great Lakes. In few other states does one find such striking differences between the soils, climate, vegetation, and the development of an area as there is between southern Michigan and the lands north of Saginaw Bay. The highly industrialized southeastern region is in sharp contrast to the sparsely settled Upper Peninsula and the northern half of the Lower Peninsula. In the twentieth century, Michigan became heavily dependent on automotive manufacturing. In the past, Michigan experienced boom periods in the fur trade, land speculation, farming, mining, and lumbering. Politically, it was a stronghold of the Republican Party for three-quarters of a century, only to become, in more recent years, a state where party rivalry is intense and elections hotly contested.
Michigan is a state with a colorful past. Ancestors of todays American Indians began arriving in the area at least as early as 9,000 B.C. Some 11,000 years later the French voyageurs, missionaries, and empire builders were the first Europeans to come to this part of the country. In due time, the British replaced the French, and for a few hours the Spanish flag flew over one of the forts. The early American settlers included a preponderance of Yankees from western New York and New England. From Europe came immigrants, such as the Finns, the Cornish, the Swedes, and the Italians, to work in the mines and lumber camps. Germans, Irish, and Dutch settled in the cities and the rich agricultural area of southern Michigan. The automobile industry attracted large numbers of immigrants from southern and eastern Europe in the early years of the twentieth century, while the industrial expansion of later years, along with other opportunities, brought a large influx of southern blacks and whites, and peoples from Latin America, Asia, and virtually all other parts of the world. The intermingling of these many nationalities and racial stocks, their quest for greater economic opportunity, their exploitation of the states natural resources, their constructive efforts to achieve social justice, their sacrifices to provide educational, religious, and cultural institutions, and their contributions to the nation and to the world constitute the warp and woof of Michigans history.
In Michigan and elsewhere in the United States there has been a remarkable growth of interest in state and local history since the Second World War. It is not a little ironical that just at the time our nation has been more deeply involved than ever before in world affairs we should take such a keen interest not only in our national past but also in the history of our communities, neighborhoods, and states. This interest perhaps reflects a comprehension that here are the grass roots of our history as a nation. The kind of people we are, our outlook on life, our ways of doing things, and our faults and foibles as well as our strengths can best be understood by carefully examining our cities, our rural areas, and our states. This is why state and local history is important, and it is in this sense that this history of Michigan is presented to further an understanding of a nations history through a study of one of its major components.
The history that follows is the latest revision of one originally written by Willis E Dunbar. Dr. Dunbar was born in 1902 in Hartford, Michigan, and he described, in charming fashion, the life he knew as a boy in that southwestern Michigan town in one of his last books,
