As part of the Northwest Territory, the Saginaw wilderness was not organized into a county until January 28, 1835. When Canadian, Scottish, German, and Irish pioneers began to settle along the region's many rivers, small communities developed-Burt, Birch Run, Bridgeport, Frankenmuth, Freeland, Hemlock, Merrill, St. Charles, Chesaning, Oakley, and Zilwaukee-in addition to larger towns such as Carrollton, Saginaw City, and East Saginaw. Using stories and photographs collected from life-long residents and historical societies throughout Saginaw County, this book documents the colorful lumbering, agricultural, and industrial past of these communities from the mid-1800s through the early 1900s.

Michigan's foremost lumbertowns, flourishing urban industrial centers in the late 19th century, faced economic calamity with the depletion of timber supplies by the end of the century. Turning to their own resources and reflecting individual cultural identities, Saginaw, Bay City, and Muskegon developed dissimilar strategies to sustain their urban industrial status. This study is a comprehensive history of these lumbertowns from their inception as frontier settlements to their emergence as reshaped industrial centers. Primarily an examination of the role of the entrepreneur in urban economic development, Michigan Lumbertowns considers the extent to which the entrepreneurial approach was influenced by each city's cultural-ethnic construct and its social history. More than a narrative history, it is a study of violence, business, and social change.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1877.