KEWEENAW COUNTY
Source: History of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan:
containing a full account of its early settlement, its
growth, development, and resources, an extended description
of its iron and copper mines : also, accurate sketches of
its counties, cities, towns, and villages ... biographical
sketches, portraits of prominent men and early settlers.
Publication Info: Chicago : Western Historical Co., 1883.
KEWEENAW County is situated at the extreme northeasterly
end of the Keweenaw Cape, being the most northerly land in
what is known as the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, except the
islands belonging to Lake Superior.
It was set off from Houghton County by an act of the
Legislature, approved March 11, 1861, and was described as
follows: "All that portion of Houghton County lying north of
Township 55 north, of Range 31 west, and north of Township
56, in Ranges 32 and 33 west, including Manitou Islands of
Lake Superior, and Isle Royale," were declared "organized
into a new county, to be called Keweenaw County," and an
election for electing county officers was directed to be
held on the first Monday in April following. The official
notice of the passage of the act, and the order for holding
the election, did not, however, reach the Supervisors of the
townships thus set off into the new county organization
until the time appointed for holding the election had
passed. They, however, held a meeting April 18, 1861, and
appointed the 18th of May following as a day for holding a
special election to complete the working organization of the
county. After mature consideration, finding it would not
comply with the act, the motion was rescinded at a meeting
held April 30, in order to enable them to consult the State
authorities, and the election passed over until the next
general election in the fall following.
The county seat was established at Eagle River, where a
convenient court house was erected, but no jail has yet been
built; a building has been rented and fitted up for that
purpose.
The officers of the county are: William P. Raley, Judge
of Probate; William B. Wright, Sheriff; John Twohy, County
Clerk and Register of Deeds; Albert A. Brockway, Treasurer;
T. L. Chadbourne, of Houghton, Prosecuting Attorney; William
Tresise, Coroner.
It is divided into seven townships, viz., Copper Harbor,
Eagle Harbor, Grant, Sherman, Houghton, Clifton and Allouez.
Copper Harbor is located at the extreme easterly end, and
Allouez and Clifton are at the western end of the county.
The county comprises the entire outer extremity of what
is generally called "Keweenaw Point," embracing some of the
richest portions of the copper belt and many places of
historic note. The first mining ventures in the search for
copper and silver were extensively made in this portion of
the Upper Peninsula, in fact, the first success in copper
mining in this country was achieved at the Old Cliff, then
called the Pittsburgh and Boston Mine. It was there the
developments of the copper region hung poised, for a time,
upon the action of a single individual—Dr. Avery, of
Pittsburgh. Here the first "permits" were taken out for
mining properties, and here the first settlements in the
copper region were made.
COURTS.
The courts are held at Eagle River the first Tuesday in
February, second Tuesday in May and third Tuesday in
September. It is in the same district with Houghton County,
and is presided over by Hon. William D. Williams, Circuit
Judge.
STATISTICAL.
The first census of this county, taken for the General
Government, was that of 1870. The figures are as follows:
Clifton, 615; Copper Harbor, 359; Eagle Harbor, 778,
including Amygdaloid Mine, 61; Copper Falls Mine, 454, and
Eagle Harbor Village, 233; Grant, 152; Houghton, 1,325;
Sherman, 929, and Sibley, 47.
The townships of Keweenaw County, with their population
in 1880, are as follows: Allouez, 975; Clifton, 247; Copper
Harbor, 141; Eagle Harbor, 527; Grant Township, 365;
Houghton Township, 1,004; and Sherman Township, 1,011. The
total population was 4,270, including four Indians or
half-breeds.
Military Statistics. —The aggregate expenditure of
Keweenaw County up to 1866 for war purposes was $1,000; the
amount expended in relieving the families of soldiers,
$3,620, not including private contributions.
This county produced 119 men for service with the
Michigan commands in the late war, ninety-nine of whom
enlisted previous to September 19, 1863, and nineteen of
whom served three years. In the general history, the record
of officers and men serving with the Michigan regiments is
given.
At the time of the first mining operations, the harbors
on the north shore of the county, being easiest reached,
became the rendezvous of the miners and the depots of
provisions for the various camps. The travel to and from
these camps to the depot at Copper Harbor, and afterward at
Eagle Harbor, was by trails through the wilderness. Dog
trains formed the mode of transportation, save where the
pioneer carried all his worldly effects like "John Brown's
knapsack, strapped upon his back." In summer, those south of
Portage Lake would travel in their canoes or dug-outs to the
head of Torch Lake, and thence by the wilderness trail walk
to the harbor. In winter, by the dog train and on the
indispensable snow shoes over a trackless waste of snow,
wending their way through that same wilderness—the trail
buried from four to six feet under the deep blanket of
snow-spread out everywhere over the surface during the reign
of winter in this northern latitude. Those days have passed
away in the brief space of thirty-six years, and splendid
roads and railroads have taken the place of the old trails
and dog trains, and populous and thriving mining towns take
the place of the then wilderness.
The county is well supplied with water for practical
mining purposes. Besides Schlatter's Lake, Lake Manganese,
Lake Fanny Hooey, Mosquito Lake, Hoope's Lake, Gould's Lake,
Upson Lake, Lake Bailey, Lac La Belle, Gratiot Lake and
Thayer's Lake, and numerous smaller ponds, it is supplied by
Hill's Creek, Gratiot River, Silver Creek and Eagle River on
the north, and the Little Montreal and Tobacco Rivers on the
south, and numerous smaller streams.
The greenstone belt, which traverses almost the entire
length of this county, terminating near its southern line,
is a marked feature of the mineral belt extending through
Keweenaw County. It is a broad belt of semi-crystalline
trap, which rises, at its highest elevation, 800 feet above
the lake, forming the southern escarpment or wall in this
portion of the range, which begins at the extremity of
Keweenaw Point, and trends westerly about twenty miles,
thence takes a southwesterly course. The greenstone has a
northerly and northwesterly dip, corresponding with the
other belts of this portion of the range of about 24° to 30°
to the horizon. From the top of the range the land slopes
with a general gradual descent to the north and to the west
to Lake Superior, distant in this direction from two to
three miles.
On the south side, the elevation drops abruptly a
distance of one or two hundred feet to a low-lying plain,
which forms the valley of the Eagle River and other streams,
and which reaches to the east until it meets the foot of a
second range of hills having a trend generally parallel
with the principal elevation, and known as the southern or
Bohemian Range. This portion of the range, as far as the
greenstone extends, is frequently crossed by veins having a
nearly vertical dip and a lateral direction, generally at
right angles to the formation and a width of from one foot
to three feet, and have been found to carry copper
sometimes in extraordinary quantities, some of them having
proved among the most remarkable deposits of copper that the
world has revealed.
Both north and south of the greenstone are numerous
amygdaloid beds, which are crossed by the fissure veins, and
which usually carry a greater or smaller percentage of
copper. There are also found in some portions immediately
underlying the greenstone and farther to the south beds of
conglomerate, which, in some instances, contain copper in
workable quantities. But surpassing all these, except the
fissure veins, the most important of the copper-bearing
deposits of the district, is what is known as the ash bed, a
scoriaceous amygdaloid bed lying north of the greenstone,
having a varying width of from five to twenty feet, and
yielding at favorable points about 1 per cent of copper.
The great copper mining belt of Keweenaw County, which
has thus far been the most successfully worked, lies
immediately south of the greenstone, and pitches under it.
The cupriferous deposit lying north of the greenstone
known as the "ash bed"—a name given to it by Mr. S. W. Hill
in his geological reports, from its being composed of
scoriaceous bowlders, held together in a pasty mass
resembling volcanic ashes, as near as can be described. In
some places it is largely amygdaloidal in its character; in
others the scoriaceous bowlders predominate, appearing as
though they had been ejected from some place and dropped in
their muddy bed, and the whole solidified together. This
deposit extends from near Copper Harbor to the Atlantic
Mine, on the south side of Portage Lake, in Houghton County,
varying in width from five to thirty feet. There is no
copper found in the bowlders, but it is found generally
through the cementing mass-often in the form called "shotted
copper." This same bed extends the entire length of Isle
Royale with a reverse dip, and on the reverse side of the
greenstone range through the island. There is a perceptible
amount of oxide of iron in the ash bed, supposed to have
been oxydized in reducing the copper, attributed to the
rapid changes in metamorphism causing such changes of the
magnetic and voltaic relations existing between the various
formations as to cause the deposit of the copper in its
native state. Much of the ancient mining was done on this
vein.
This ash-bed formation, to be profitably mined, requires
to be worked upon an extensive scale; the immense amount of
the deposit and the facility of mining it renders it almost
certain of success when operations are undertaken on a
magnitude with the amount of material required to make it
pay.
RELIGIOUS.
The Catholic Churches in Keweenaw County are located at
Eagle Harbor, the Cliff Mine and at Delaware.
The Church of the Holy Redeemer at Eagle Harbor was built
in 1843-44 by Father Baraga, afterward Bishop Baraga. The
first missionary, as the priests there were then called, was
Louis Thielle.
The Church of the Assumption was built at the Cliff Mine
in 1858.
The church in Delaware was built by Rev. Patrick Flanagan
in 1863.
Services are held in Copper Harbor and at Eagle River in
private houses, and in the schoolhouse at the Central.
The different priests who have officiated in Keweenaw
County are as given in their order: Andrew Andolshek,
Patrick Flannagan, John Brown, Matthias Orth, John Burns,
Oliver Pelisson, Luke Mozini, Angelo Paginina and again for
three years, Andrew Andolshek. There are now about one
thousand five hundred Catholics in Keweenaw County,
including heads of families and children.
The Methodist Episcopal Church was early represented in
Keweenaw County. In 1847, the Rev. J. H. Pitezel was
appointed to the Eagle River district by the general
conference. He was located at the Cliff Mine, where a
"class" had been formed the year previous.
Churches have been since erected at the Phoenix,
Central, Cliff and Allouez Mines and at Eagle Harbor, and
services held in several other places in the district, as at
Delaware, Eagle River and at the Ashamed (Petherick) Mine,
which will soon require the aid of an assistant clergyman.
MEDICAL.
The medical department of Keweenaw County consists of the
physicians to the mines, who also attend to the citizens in
their immediate vicinity. The miners all contribute a
stipulated sum monthly from their wages, which secures them
the regular attendance of the physician, when his services
are needed, without further expense. These gentlemen belong
to what is known as the Allopathic school. They are also the
surgeons to the mines, having the general care of the miners
and their families.
By this arrangement the very important necessity of
having a physician at hand in cases of accident and injury
is well supplied, where otherwise able physicians and
surgeons would hesitate to locate.
