Adolph LaMuth Collection |
Underground at a Calumet & Hecla copper mine.
(Click on the photo for a larger version).
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Before there was a state of Michigan . . . before copper phone wire and copper pipes . . . before reliable transporation in the Lake Superior region . . . there was the Copper Country.
Indiginous people have dug for copper for centuries. In the early- to mid-1800s, European settlers came and tried their hands, setting off the nation's first mineral rush -- years before the famed California Gold Rush.
This rush would be significant, as thousands of immigrants found their way to a wilderness on the shore of Lake Superior. They would become vital to the industrial growth of the U.S.; at one point, providing more than half of the nation's copper.
By the 1920s, though, the mining boom had started a downward slide. But Henry Ford's better idea — and a large bridge over the Straits of Mackinac — would make it possible for more and more people to enjoy the area's other main attraction — the natural beauty.
The Copper Country Trail tells both of these stories, combining scenic beauty with many landmarks of historic significance. The byway offers colorful forests in the fall, inspiring vistas of Lake Superior any time, and remnants of the first mining boom in the nation's history.
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