88 MICHIGAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 



If now the mean is taken of these corrected zenith distances, each being 

 weighted unity, we have for the latitude 



«= + 42° 16' 48.78". 



A few observations of 8 Ursae Minoris, and 51H Oephei give respec- 

 tively 48.80" and 48.96". They were taken like Polaris, above and below 

 pole, direct and reflected, but no division errors were applied. 



I acknowledge gratefully a grant from the Bache Fund of the National 

 Academy of Sciences for assistance in computing. 



NOTE ON THE EXPANSION OF MICHIGAN. 



BY >rARK S. W. JEFFERSON;, PROFESSOR 'OF GEOGRAPHY, STATE NORMAL COLLEGE, 



YPSILANTI. 



The series of maps in Fig. 1 shows graphically the spread of organized 

 county government in the State of Michigan and appears to conform to 

 what we know of the progress of exploration and settlement in the region. 

 The data have all been obtained from the Michigan Book accompanying 

 Silas Farmer's invaluable map of the State. If Michigan stands for a 

 people and their civilization, here is shown the expansion of Michigan. 



The maps illustrate at a glance such statements as this from p. 117 of 

 the Michigan Book : — ''Almost the entire state north of Saginaw was then 

 [1844] a wilderness." In a fully settled country we expect to find a close 

 adjustment of density of population to its natural resources or its fitness 

 for manufacturing or commerce. In general regions that have special 

 value for men will be more fully occupied than 'other regions. 



In a new country, however, there is a considerable portion of the ex- 

 ploration-period in which the places of denser settlement are simply 

 places of longer settlement, while sparser population means only newer 

 occupation. For a long ]»ei-i»)d in this stage of settlement immigration 

 comes to the earlier settlements since they are the more accessible. Here 

 the newcomer stops and looks about him. Many go no further. Always 

 the newest settlement looks back to a slightly older place from which it 

 drew its first beginnings and long continues to draw many of the sup- 

 plies it cannot XJroduce for itself. Through this mother place must pass 

 all new arrivals for the frontier. Commonly the new settlements are 

 governed from the older ones and this arrangement continues until it 

 becomes inconvenient from Die gi-owth of population and increase of local 

 afi'airs. 



Territorially the early counties of this part of the United States were 

 very large, but the actual settlement was limited to the smaller area that 

 is now the whole of the county, all the rest having been lopped off as the 

 outlying i)arts became settled enough to demand separate county organi- 

 zation. Thus the dates of organizing government in the separate counties 

 of the State afford a tolerable index of the spread of the conditions of 

 civilized life. 



The shaded area in each decade map is the area occupied by organized 

 counties at that date. The Vdank areas had some population probably. 



