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Keweenaw County

In the 1840s, hundreds of people moved into the Keweenaw, a small, rugged peninsula, jutting sixty miles into Lake Superior. They came for copper, participating in the nation’s first mineral rush.

The copper rush led to the organization of the Keweenaw Peninsula into Houghton County in 1847. In 1861, Houghton County broke off, and the northern tip of the Keweenaw Peninsula became Keweenaw County.

Explorers had known of the presence of copper in the area long before 1840. French explorers reported that Indians were collecting copper on the Keweenaw in the 1600s.

But it wasn’t until Douglass Houghton’s survey cited the region’s copper potential that Congress purchased the Keweenaw Peninsula from the Chippewas, and mining by whites began.

In 1843, the U.S. Mineral Agency opened an office at the location of present-day Copper Harbor, and the first mining permits were issued.

The agency over-issued permits, resulting in far too many people flowing into the small peninsula. Disorder followed.

In 1846, John Forster, who was visiting Copper Harbor, wrote that “card playing, the use of the ‘flowing bowl,’ and some good fighting with fist and pistol, were the amusement of this community.”

It was further said that there was no Sunday west of the Sault.

In 1845, the federal government erected a fort at Copper Harbor to bring order to the community and to protect the miners.

Another purpose of the fort was to “encourage the migration of the Indians from Michigan when the time for their removal comes.”

By the end of 1845, there were forty-five organized mining companies on the Keweenaw, but only twelve had miners working.

Then a rich vein of copper was discovered, a few inches thick, at the top of a 200-foot cliff. Halfway down the mountain, it became several feet wide. This became the Cliff Mine, the most successful copper mine in the Western Hemisphere.

By 1846, nearly a thousand copper mining permits had been issued, the the Cliff Mine’s success was never duplicated elsewhere.

Early mining operations were primitive. Miners descended into mines by ladder or were lowered in buckets, and their only light was by candle.

By 1847, the copper rush had ended. President James Polk halted the issuance of mining permits, and Congress consented to the outright sale of mineral lands, which raised the price of speculation considerably.

The hostile terrain, the black flies and mosquitos, combined with the winter isolation and cost, all contributed to the end of the copper rush.

The Cliff Mine continued to operate for some time, however. During the 1850s, no mine in the world could be compared to the Cliff.

Keweenaw County’s population peaked at 7,156 in 1910. Its population today is just over 2,000, making it Michigan’s least populated county.

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