Mention
MICHIGAN and most people think of
cars, heavy industry and inner-city Detroit.
Midwesterners prefer to focus on its
magnificent scenery. The beaches, dunes and
cliffs along the 3200-mile shoreline of its
two vividly contrasting
peninsulas -
bordering four of the five Great Lakes -
rival many an oceanfront state.
The mitten-shaped Lower Peninsula
is dominated from its southeastern corner by
the industrial giant of Detroit ,
surrounded by satellite cities heavily
devoted to the automotive industry. In the
west, the scenic 350-mile Lake Michigan
shore drive passes through likeable little
ports before reaching the stunning Sleeping
Bear Dunes and resort towns such as Traverse
City in the peninsula's balmy northwest
corner. The desolate, dramatic and thinly
popu lated Upper Peninsula , reaching
out from Wisconsin like a claw to separate
lakes Superior and Michigan, is a far cry
indeed from the cosmopolitan south.
In the mid-seventeenth century, French
explorers forged a successful trading
relationship with the Chippewa, Ontario and
other tribes. The British , who
acquired control after 1763, were far more
brutal. Governor Henry Hamilton, the
"Hair Buyer of Detroit," advocated
taking scalps rather than prisoners. Ever
since, Michigan's economy has developed in
waves, the eighteenth-century fur, timber
and copper booms culminating in the state
establishing itself at the forefront of the
nation's manufacturing capacity, thanks to
its abundant raw materials, good
transportation links, and the genius of
innovators such as Henry Ford .
Despite the slumps of the Seventies and
Eighties, car production remains the major
source of Michigan income - and tourism is
now a four-season money-spinner.
