Daily Archives: May 8, 2014

We cannot vouch for the truthfulness of any report on this site. If you feel a location has been reported in error, or want to dispute a report, please contact us.

(If you seek a pleasant peninsula, look about you)

The State of Michigan (i /mn/) is located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is a French adaptation of the Ojibwe word mishigama, meaning "large water" or "large lake".

Michigan is the eighth most populous state in the United States. It has the longest freshwater shoreline of any political subdivision in the world, being bounded by four of the five Great Lakes, plus Lake Saint Clair. In 2005, Michigan ranked third among US states for the number of registered recreational boats, behind California and Florida. Michigan has 64,980 inland lakes and ponds. A person in the state is never more than six miles (10km) from a natural water source or more than 87.2miles (140.3km) from a Great Lakes shoreline. It is the largest state by total area east of the Mississippi River.

Michigan is the only state to consist entirely of two peninsulas. The Lower Peninsula, to which the name Michigan was originally applied, is often dubbed "the mitten" by residents, owing to its shape. When asked where in Michigan one comes from, a resident of the Lower Peninsula may often point to the corresponding part of his or her hand. The Upper Peninsula (often referred to as "The U.P.") is separated from the Lower Peninsula by the Straits of Mackinac, a five-mile (8km)-wide channel that joins Lake Huron to Lake Michigan. The Upper Peninsula is economically important for tourism and natural resources.

Michigan was home to various Native American cultures for thousands of years before colonization by Europeans. When the first European explorers arrived, the most populous and influential tribes were Algonquian peoples, specifically, the Ottawa, the Anishnabe (called Chippewa in French, after their language Ojibwe), and the Potawatomi. The Anishnabe, whose numbers are estimated to have been between 25,000 and 35,000, were the most populous.

Although the Anishnabe were well-established in Michigan's Upper Peninsula and northern Lower Peninsula, they also inhabited northern Ontario, northern Wisconsin, southern Manitoba, and northern and north-central Minnesota. The Ottawa lived primarily south of the Straits of Mackinac in northern and western Michigan, while the Potawatomi were primarily in the southwest. The three nations co-existed peacefully as part of a loose confederation called the Council of Three Fires. Other First Nations people in Michigan, in the south and east, were the Mascouten, the Menominee, the Miami, and the Wyandot, who are better known by their French name, Huron.

French voyageurs, explored and settled in Michigan in the 17th century. The first Europeans to reach what later became Michigan were those of tienne Brl's expedition in 1622. The first permanent European settlement was founded in 1668 on the site where Father (Pre, in French) Jacques Marquette established Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan as a Catholic mission to minister to the Ottawa Indians, and to serve as a regional headquarters for further Catholic missionary activities in the upper Great Lakes area. It was here that the first European building was erected in Michigan, within the US Midwest, and also within what is now the Canadian province of Ontario.

Soon afterward, in 1671 the outlying mission of Saint Ignace was founded approximately 50 miles south. Then in 1675 the mission of Marquette was also founded approximately 200 miles to the west of Sault Ste. Marie, on the south shore of Lake Superior. Together with Sault Ste. Marie, these three original Jesuit missions are the first three European-founded cities in Michigan. Due to the generally skilled, tolerant and helpful manner of these early Jesuit missionaries, the Indian populations in the area received these missions well, with relatively few difficulties or hostilities, despite the fact that the ratio of the European populations, vs: the native populations of these settlements was usually in favor of the native Indians from early on. "The Soo" (Sault Ste. Marie) has the distinction of being the oldest city in both Michigan and Ontario. It was split into two cities in 1818, a year after the U.S.-Canada boundary in the Great Lakes was finally established by the U.S.-U.K. Joint Border Commission following the War of 1812.

In 1679, Lord La Salle of France directed the construction of the Griffin, the first European sailing vessel built on the upper Great Lakes. That same year, La Salle built Fort Miami at present-day St. Joseph.

Read more from the original source:
Bed Bug Registry Database Michigan, Usa, National Bed Bug ...