CHIPPEWA COUNTY. 401 



the upper peninsula, was surveyed in 1852, its construction commenced in 

 1855 and it was completed and equipped for business in 1857. 



C. D. Lawton, of Lawton, Van Buren county, who has spent much time in 

 the upper peninsula, contributes the following facts respecting the status of 

 horticulture in that region: — 



He has seen fair apples grown there, also many fine trees which sometimes 

 bear well. There is an abundance of plums, when frosts do not catch the 

 bloom in spring. These are mostly wild, red plums, although the cultivated 

 varieties (domestica) seem to be equally successful where tried. Pears do 

 pretty well also. At least he has seen trees loaded with excellent fruit, 

 which matured nicely. 



He never elsewhere saw Early Richmond cherry trees more heavily loaded 

 with fruit than here, wherever they have been planted. The branches needed 

 to be propped up, to prevent breaking under the loads of fruit. 



Currants and gooseberries also abound. Strawberries grow luxuriantly 

 and bear prodigously, and the same is true of raspberries and blackberries. 



Although this is a cold country, it has much good soil, well adapted to root 

 crops, as well as to many of the hardy fruits, which will doubtless be saccess- 

 fully grown as soon as agriculture shall become ;i staple industry. 



CHIPPEWA COUNTY. 



Chippewa county was set off and organized by an act of the Legislative 

 Council of the Territory of Michigan, approved December 22d, 1826, and 

 which took efEect from and after the first day of February, 1827. Its bound- 

 aries were originally the Mississippi river on the west and the British domin- 

 ions on the north. 



The seat of justice was fixed by the terms of the act at Sault de St. Marie. 



The name, Chippewa, is that of a once powerful tribe of Indians, some- 

 times known as Ojibways. 



This county is now bounded on the west by the recently organized county 

 of Luce, which was taken mainly from its western portion. 



Sault de St. Marie was one of the points ;it which the French established 

 their earliest missions and trading posts, and at no period since has it ceased 

 to be an important station, either for military or fur trading purposes. In the 

 summer of 1822 a visitor here, writing to the Detroit Gazette, says: "Of 

 the climate and the soil the facts thus far disclosed will permit us to speak 

 in favorable terms. Potatoes, oats, peas and garden stuff generally succeed 

 with certainty every year. Mr. Johnston will raise twelve hundred bushels 

 of potatoes this season, and has some fine fields of oats, peas and herd's grass. 

 In his garden we find radishes, lettuce, carrots, etc. Several varieties of the 

 common rose and the hyacinth, pink and violet are now in bloom, and the 

 surrounding fields abound in delicious strawberries." 



A county agricultural society was organized in this countv on June 28th, 

 1878. 



John H. Foster, in vol. 8 of Pioneer Collections, 1885, says: "Within the 

 last ten years the Sault has taken a new lease of life, and is now a flourish- 

 ing town. The agricultural resources of Chippewa county, of which the 



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