How the U.P. became the U.P.

History & Culture

People, places, traditions, industries, and turning points that shaped Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

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Jul 25, 20263 min read

Michigan’s First Rocket to Reach Space Didn’t Launch From Florida. It Launched From the End of a Dirt Road Past Copper Harbor.

From 1964 to 1971, NASA and the University of Michigan fired research rockets off the very tip of the Keweenaw, mostly in winter, over...

Jul 24, 20264 min read

Iron Mountain’s Mine Would Not Stop Flooding. So They Built the Biggest Steam Engine in America, and It Never Left Town.

The Chapin Mine sat under a cedar swamp and flooded relentlessly, so Iron Mountain got a 725-ton answer: the largest steam-driven pumping engine ever...

Jul 24, 20264 min read

This U.P. Town Mined So Much Iron the Ground Gave Way. Its People Picked Up Their Houses and Moved.

Iron was found under Negaunee in 1844, and for a century the town mined itself hollow, until fences reading Danger: Caving Grounds ringed its...

Jul 24, 20263 min read

The Deadliest Fire in American History Reached Into the U.P. the Same Night Chicago Burned

On October 8, 1871, while Chicago burned, the deadliest wildfire in American history jumped the Menominee River into the U.P. and took the farming...

Jul 23, 20264 min read

The U.P.’s Grand Island Was Once a Private Game Preserve Stocked With Caribou and Antelope

Around 1900 the president of Cleveland-Cliffs turned Grand Island into a private ark, stocking elk, caribou, and antelope behind armed guards. Lake Superior winters...

Jul 21, 20263 min read

Sailors Have Been Reporting a Serpent in Lake Superior Since 1894. Meet Pressie.

Lake Superior has its own monster legend. Sailors have reported a serpent off the U.P. shore since 1894, the Anishinaabe told of Mishipeshu long...

Jul 20, 20263 min read

Kingsford Charcoal Began With Scrap Wood From a U.P. Sawmill

Ford Motor Company turned scrap wood from its U.P. lumber operations into charcoal briquettes and sold them through auto dealerships. After Ford sold the...

Jul 19, 20263 min read

This U.P. Ghost Town Comes Back to Life One Sunday Every July, and Has Since 1907

Central Mine grew into a Cornish copper town of more than 1,200 people, then emptied as mining ended. Its annual church reunion began in...

Jul 16, 20264 min read

Hemingway Made the U.P.’s Two-Hearted River Famous. He Was Actually Fishing a Different River.

Hemingway named his famous story for the Two Hearted River, but his 1919 U.P. fishing trip was on the Fox near Seney. Here is...

Jul 15, 20262 min read

How Big Annie Became the Flag-Carrying Face of Calumet’s 1913 Copper Strike

Anna "Big Annie" Clemenc marched daily with an American flag during the nine-month Copper Country strike. Her courage made her one of Michigan labor...

Jul 10, 20264 min read

People Were Mining the U.P.’s Copper 7,000 Years Ago, and the 1840s Prospectors Found Their Pits

Native peoples mined the U.P.’s copper as far back as 7,000 years ago, some of the oldest metalworking in the Americas. When the 1840s...

Jul 10, 20264 min read

A Whiskey Smuggler Got Caught in the U.P. After the Crew Drank Too Much of Their Own Cargo

During Prohibition, whiskey poured across the U.P.’s Canadian border, sometimes with the Coast Guard’s help. It starts with a tug called the Arbutus and...

Jul 10, 20264 min read

In the U.P., Finnish Families Built the Sauna Before They Built the House

Finnish immigrants in the U.P. often built the sauna before the house and lived in it while they built everything else. Inside the Copper...

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