394 GENERAL HISTORY. 



election of the proper officers, on the first Tuesday of May in that year. The 

 location of the county seat was determined by the board of supervisors, who 

 located it at Mackinac City. It has since been removed to Little Traverse, 

 now known as Harbor Springs. 



The county was named for Kobert Emmet, the eloquent but unfortunate 

 Irish patriot, who was executed by the British government as a traitor. 



As shown by the direction of the water courses, the highest elevations in 

 the county lie near its center; the streams diverging therefrom in all direc- 

 tions. No portion of the county is supposed to reach an elevation exceeding 

 two hundred feet above Lake Michigan. 



The earliest permanent settlement by white people was by Kobert Cooper, at 

 Little Traverse.(now Harbor Springs), in the fall of 1851, although the region 

 had been previously visited and temporarily occupied for missionary, fishing 

 and trading purposes; but owing, doubtless, to the incursions of the Mormons 

 from Beaver island, no very considerable settlements were made until 1875. 



The earliest plantations of apple trees were made by the Indians at an early, 

 but uncertain period. In the field notes of the government survey, made in 

 1840, an apple tree ten inches in diameter is mentioned. 



In 1871 Thomas M. Downing reports in substance as follows to the State 

 Board of Agriculture : 



The soil and climate of this county are unexcelled, even by the far-famed 

 Grand Traverse region. There are all kinds of soil to be found, from the 

 lightest sand to a heavy clay loam. They are mostly limestone soils. Gen« 

 erally the high lands are the most fertile. There are late frosts in spring, and 

 early frosts in autumn, but they are not severe enough to injure anything 

 but corn. 



The Indians comprise the most of the population, and they do nothing to 

 fertilize the soil. Up to this time there has been but one thorough farmer in 

 the county — the Rev. J. B. Wiekamp, who owns a thirty-acre farm in a high 

 state of cultivation. He averages of wheat, thirty-three bushels per acre; 

 oats, seventy-five bushels; potatoes, three hundred bushels. 



In speaking of apples, he remarks that grafting and pruning are but Greek 

 to the Indians, and yet they have a few fine, healthy and productive trees. I 

 have, on my land, an apple tree grown from the seed planted by an Indian 

 twelve years since. It fruited the fourth year, and has continued to do so 

 every year since; last year yielding three barrels of fine fruit, resembling 

 Ehode Island Greenings. Corn has never been planted in plowed ground by 

 anyone until the present year. The Indians only make holes with a hoe, 

 drop and cover the seed, and hoe once. Potatoes are never hoed after plant- 

 ing. Turnips, beets, carrots, etc., are grown on so small a scale that the 

 yield per acre cannot be given. 



Job Kohr of Cross Village, in speaking of other particulars, remarks that 

 only a few plantations, and those of small fruits, have yet been made for 

 commercial purposes, and these merely for local marketing. A small nursery 

 has been started at Petoskey. 



The census of 1884 gives to this county of apple orchards, 483 acres; ^,969 

 bearing trees yielding in 1883, 427 bushels of fruit. 



Peach orchards, 9 acres; 30 bearing trees, yielding in 1883, 1 busliel of 

 fruit. 



The. value of orchard products of all kinds, sold or consumed in 1883, was 

 1309.00. 



