Michigan consists of two peninsulas: the heavily forested Upper Peninsula (commonly called "the U.P."), which juts eastward from northern Wisconsin, and the more populated Lower Peninsula, stretching north from Ohio and Indiana. The peninsulas are separated by the Straits of Mackinac, which connects Lake Michigan and Lake Huron, and are linked by the 5-mile-long Mackinac Bridge along Interstate 75. Bordering four of the five Great Lakes and Lake St. Clair, Michigan has the longest freshwater coastline of any U.S. political subdivision, measuring 3,288 miles. The state ranks second behind Alaska in water coverage by square miles and first in percentage, with approximately 42%, and it also contains 64,980 inland lakes and ponds.
In the 17th century, French explorers claimed the Great Lakes region for New France, though the area had largely been inhabited for thousands of years by Indigenous peoples such as the Ojibwe, Odawa, Potawatomi, and Wyandot. French settlers and Métis established forts and settlements. Some people contend that the region's name is derived from the Ojibwe word ᒥᓯᑲᒥ (mishigami), meaning "large water" or "large lake". While others say that it comes from the Mishiiken Tribe of Mackinac Island, also called Michinemackinawgo by Ottawa historian Andrew Blackbird, whose surrounding lands were referred to as Mishiiken-imakinakom, later shortened to Michilimackinac. After France's defeat in the French and Indian War in 1762, the area came under British control and later the U.S. following the Treaty of Paris (1783), though control remained disputed with Indigenous tribes until treaties between 1795 and 1842. The area was part of the larger Northwest Territory; the Michigan Territory was organized in 1805. Michigan was admitted as the 26th state on January 26, 1837, entering as a free state and quickly developing into an industrial and trade hub that attracted European immigrants, particularly from Finland, Macedonia, and the Netherlands. In the 1930s, migration from Appalachia and the Middle East and the Great Migration of Black Southerners further shaped the state, especially in Metro Detroit.
Michigan has a diversified economy with a gross state product of $719.392billion as of Q4 2024, ranking 14th among the 50 states. Although the state has developed a diverse economy, in the early 20th century it became widely known as the center of the U.S. automotive industry, which developed as a major national economic force. It is home to the country's three major automobile companies (whose headquarters are all in Metro Detroit). Once exploited for logging and mining, today the sparsely populated Upper Peninsula is important for tourism because of its abundance of natural resources. The Lower Peninsula is a center of manufacturing, forestry, agriculture, services, and high-tech industry. (Full article...)
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Madonnaland: And Other Detours in Fame and Fandom is a non-fiction book written by American essayist and musician Alina Simone. It is a biography of American singer Madonna, as well the author's own analysis of music and pop culture. Upon its release on March 3, 2016 by University of Texas Press, Madonnaland received positive reviews from critics, who praised her writing and bold subject choice. Rolling Stone magazine listed it as one of the 10 Best Music Books released in 2016.
Consisting of six chapters, Madonnaland finds Simone visiting Madonna's birthplace, Bay City, Michigan, where she spoke with the local people about the singer. The book also analyses Madonna's career and fame, with the author delving into her own music career and obscure Bay City bands. Simone had been initially commissioned to write a new biography about the singer. However, due to already available excess content on her, the author felt she would not be able to find anything new. Instead, she ended up writing Madonnaland about her own failure to create a Madonna biography, why Bay City did not have any commemoration for the singer, as well as unknown music bands, pop culture and celebrity life. (Full article...)
... that although nine alibi witnesses placed Temujin Kensu more than 400 miles from a shooting in Port Huron, Michigan, in November 1986, he was convicted of murder and has been in prison ever since?
The metropolitan area surrounding and including Detroit, Michigan, is a ten-county area with a population of over 5.9 million, a workforce of 2.6 million, and about 347,000 businesses. Oakland County is the county with the most jobs and highest GDP in the area, located north of the city of Detroit. The six-county Metropolitan Statistical Area has a population of about 4.3 million, a workforce of about 2.1 million, and a gross metropolitan product of $200.9 billion. Detroit's urban area has a population of 3.9 million. A 2005 PricewaterhouseCoopers study estimated that Detroit's urban area had a gross domestic product of $203 billion.
About 180,500 people work in downtown Detroit, comprising one-fifth of the city's employment base. Metro Detroit has propelled Michigan's national ranking in emerging technology fields such as life sciences, information technology, and advanced manufacturing; Michigan ranks fourth in the U.S. in high tech employment with 568,000 high tech workers, which includes 70,000 in the automotive industry. Michigan typically ranks third or fourth in overall research and development expenditures in the United States. Metro Detroit is the second-largest source of architectural and engineering job opportunities in the U.S. Detroit is known as the automobile capital of the world, with the domestic auto industry primarily headquartered in Metro Detroit. As of 2003, the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers claimed that new vehicle production, sales, and jobs related to automobile use account for one of every ten jobs in the United States. (Full article...)
Image 21Père Marquette and the Indians (1869), by Wilhelm Lamprecht (from Michigan)
Image 22Treaty of Paris, by Benjamin West (1783), an unfinished painting of the American diplomatic negotiators of the Treaty of Paris which brought official conclusion to the Revolutionary War and gave possession of Michigan and other territory to the new United States (from Michigan)
Image 35Union members occupying a General Motors body factory during the Flint Sit-Down Strike of 1937 which spurred the organization of militant CIO unions in auto industry (from History of Michigan)
Image 43Detroit in the mid-twentieth century. At the time, the city was the fourth-largest U.S. metropolis by population, and held about one-third of the state's population. (from Michigan)
Image 44Cora Reynolds Anderson became the first woman elected to the House of Representatives in Michigan in 1925. (from History of Michigan)
Image 48A map of Michigan by Henry Schenck Tanner, published in 1842, showing such county names as "Negwegon County," "Okkuddo County," and "Unwattin County," prior to an 1843 legislative action renaming sixteen counties in northern Michigan (from History of Michigan)
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The Flag of Michigan
The Seal of Michigan
State Quarter – Released in 2004
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