Marquette County History Museum
This high-caliber regional history museum and research archive collects materials on the continuing history and cultural development of the central Upper Peninsula, and interprets them. Its subjects include Native Americans in the area, and the social impact of fishing, shipping, logging, and mining. Only a small fraction of its collections are on view in the three museum galleries.The private museum and J. M. Longyear Research Library were founded by the Longyear Family Trust in 1918. John M. Longyear was an early landlooker from Lansing who settled in Marquette. Longyear found iron-rich land in Upper Michigan and later on Minnesota's Mesabi Range, leased some of his holdings to mining companies, and harvested and managed timberlands as well. In this manner he became extremely wealthy. His autobiography, based on early journals but written in his later years, can be read in Landlooker in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, sold here in the gift shop.
Trade goods, traps, and furs are in the fur trading post. Here in the museum is the actual tamarack tree that marked Mile Post Zero, which established the straight, overland boundary with Wisconsin running from the headwaters of the Brule River to the mouth of the Montreal at Lake Superior, near Ironwood. Many museum visitors are school groups. The scaled-down street of shops organizes small objects for little people.
You can meet the Burt survey party in 1844: a realistic representation of William Austin Burt, the heroically unassuming, unstoppable surveyor of much of the Upper Peninsula, with his compassman. In this audio-enhanced scene they are in the process of locating the Negaunee ore deposit that set off the iron mining boom, using Burt's pride and joy, his solar compass. Burt invented the solar compass to set survey lines where iron deposits made conventional magnetic compasses useless. Burt's lines, run during extremely difficult conditions of bad weather, standing water, insects, etc., have proven accurate over the years.
Two galleries are devoted to each year's changing exhibit. From April, 2005, through March, 2006, it is "Into the Woods: The Natural, Social, and Cultural History of Forests." Highlights include a recreated cookhouse from a 1920s Finnish logging camp, spruce trees from a 9,200-year-old forest found while excavating a Cleveland-Cliffs tailings basin, and displays about changing forests, plus animals, insects, pests, and plants of area forests. The exhibit was developed by the museum's professional staff with help from the DNR, Nature Conservancy, U.S. Forest Service, and Mead/Westvaco.
The museum shop has history-related gifts and good regional books, including its own republication of Dandelion Cottage, Carroll Watson Rankin's delightful popular girls' book from 1904, set nearby in a cottage at 440 East Arch. (In it, plucky girls thwart a stuffy, negative minister and turn an abandoned house into their clubhouse.)
Pick up easy-to-use walking tour guides of downtown and the Ridge-Arch Historic District, and an auto tour guide to outlying districts, for $1 each.
The research library includes some very old Upper Peninsula material from the 18th century. Inconvenient for working people, it is closed over the noon lunch hour and at 4 p.m. but it is now open Saturdays from 11 to 4, same as the museum.
NOTE: The museum will be closed September to Novemer 2010 while it is moved to a new Spring Street location. Hours and cost of admission will then change. —8/2010
145 West Spring at Front in downtown Marquette. (906) 226-3571. Monday-Friday 10-5 except Wednesday 10-8, Saturday 10-3, closed Sunday. Adults $7, ages 12-18 $2, under 12 free.
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POINTS OF INTEREST
Marquette Mountain. With plenty of snow and some of the state's highest runs, this is one of the better known Midwest ski destinations ... more
Alley Kat's Quilt Shop. Outstanding contemporary shop caters to quilters, fiber artists, home sewers, Lots of examples inspire quilters. Designer fabrics, geometrics, wools (for the primitive look), & linen-cotton blends for garments. ... more
Beaumier U.P. Heritage Center . At the Beaumier U.P. Heritage Center are exhibits on the various immigrant groups who populated the U.P., an historical look at student life at Northern Michigan University, and the artifacts from the life of philanthropist and business magnate Sam Cohodas. ... more
Huron Mountain Bakery . Terrific, unpretentious bakery along the highway just south of Marquette ... more
Marquette Baking Co.. This exceptional bakery complements a delightful cluster of food-related shops ... more
Marquette County History Museum. Choice artifacts, some life-sized exhibits with audio, and a good gift shop make this stand out. See an Ojibwa family group,the Burt survey party, a child-scale street of shops ... more
Risak Pottery. Beautifully complex colors adorn the pieces at this Japanese-inspired gallery ... more
Zero Degrees Artist Gallery. Cool new cooperative of broad array of artists. ... more
Greywalls Golf Course. One of Michigan's finest and arguably its visually most dramatic course, Greywalls attracts golfers from across the nation ... more
Peter White Library. A dream library renovated and expanded through community visioning: restored 1904 reading rooms, an exhibit gallery, a children's room designed by kids, a community art gallery and shop, and a café/coffee bar with fresh Greek specialties ... more
Ridge and Arch Historic District. A well-maintained neighborhood of historic homes in a variety of late 19th-century styles, and two richly detailed red sandstone churches with unusual stained glass windows, one by Tiffany ... more
Lower Harbor. The beautifully designed focus of the city's Lake Superior waterfront, with a fresh and smoked fish shop, a playground/picnic park next to the marina, a historic lighthouse, a breakwall to walk out on ... more
Marquette Maritime Museum. A colorful museum with lots of great stuff: superb replicas of freighters, three Fresnel lighthouse lenses, hands-on fishing nets and a pilot house, colorful flags from Great Lakes freighters, a miniature reconstruction of a famous WWII naval battle ... more
U.S.S. Darter-Dace Silent Service Memorial. A fascinating computerized, narrated diorama of the Philippine naval battle that crippled the Japanese navy, highlighting the critical role of two subs with U.P. crews and a replica conning tower are part ... more
Marquette Harbor Light. Visitors can now tour this oft-photographed lighthouse on the rocks and take the catwalk 300' out to Lighthouse Point, with great panoramic views of Presque Isle, ore dock, harbor, and town ... more
Lakeside bike path from the Inner Harbor to Presque Isle. You can rent a bike or rollerblades for this beautiful, busy shoreline path from the inner harbor to magical Presque Isle Park, passing a beach and picnic area for students and one for families ... more
Lake Superior & Ishpeming RR Ore Dock. Extending a full quarter mile out into the lake, this huge 75' landmark is where you can watch taconite pellets of iron ore delivered by train and noisily dumped into a waiting ore carrier ... more
Moosewood Nature Center. Started by science teachers, the enthusiastic young staff offers 20 programs and outings a month for families and has some live native reptiles and amphibians to watch. A paved Bog Walk Trail is outside ... more
Presque Isle Park. One of the coolest city parks anywhere, it's a rocky, wooded peninsula jutting into Lake Superior with great vistas, 5 miles of walking paths, swimming pool and water slide, picnic grounds, bandshell ... more
The Village shopping district on Third Street. Between downtown and campus, Third Street has several popular restaurants, an excellent outdoors shop, a terrific fabric shop, a consignment shop, a bead shop ... more
Superior Dome. See the wood framework of the world's largest wood dome, used for athletics and community walking and jogging. Interesting exhibits in its outer corridor feature U.P. minerals, ethnic groups, and Upper Peninsula legends John Voelker, Dominic Jacobetti, Nita Engle, Glenn Seaborg, and Sam Cohodas ... more
DeVos Art Museum at Northern Michigan University. With this facility, the Upper Peninsula has a real art museum, open year-round, with some high-level nationally important exhibits along with local and regional shows ... more
Father Marquette Park/ Chamber of Commerce.. Tourist info with a grand view of a picture-perfect town, harbor, and lighthouse ... more
Marquette County Courthouse. A grand public building from 1902, used with respect. See the impressive courtroom where the Anatomy of a Murder case was tried, the great view from the steps, and the display of Voelker legal memorabilia ... more
St. Peter Cathedral and Baraga Archives. In the cathedral, stained glass windows of saints and scenes from Jesus's life. Next door, the papers of the snowshoe priest from Slovenia involved with the early history of many Michigan communities ... more
Upper Peninsula Children's Museum. Low-tech, free wheeling, imaginative fun in a whacky micro city, a recyclatorium, and a great gift shop. Kids learn about microbiology after sliding down a toilet, fly in a real fuselage cockpit ... more
Marquette Food Co-op. Cheerful one-stop shopping with good produce and more trail mixes, energy bars, soy milk and juices for travelers in the attractive new location downtown ... more
Park Cemetery. Download WMOT deejay Jim Koski's chatty Park Cemetery walking tour and a stroll through this hilly, wooded cemetery becomes a guided tour of the graves of Marquette's founding elite ... more
Jilbert's Dairy. An ice cream parlor is the centerpiece of this headquarters complex of the U.P.'s premier dairy, where you can see milk being processed, picnic next to a giant cow, and shop for various U.P. foods and knick-knacks ... more
Brewmaster's Castle Home. The exterior is exotic, but get a look at what's inside ... more
Mount Marquette Scenic Lookout. A rocky summit provides a glorious views of the city, the bay, and the vast expanse of Lake Superior beyond ... more
Marquette Branch Prison. The 1889 part of the prison that looks like it's out of Victorian England, with pretty inmate-tended flower gardens out front ... more
U.S. 41 road cut with ancient algal stromatolites. Looming above Highway 41, this rocky cliff reveals eroded remains of ancient (2 billion-year-old) mountains once far higher than today's Rockies ... more
Michigan Welcome Center. The picnic area provides a striking view of Marquette Bay and the distant city of Marquette, with helpful tourist info in the log Welcome Center ... more
Blueberry Ridge Cross-Country Ski Trail/Escanaba River State Forest. 12K of trails, 1.7 miles of them lighted, are groomed for ski-skating and diagonal stride ... more
Lakenenland. One of the U.P.'s most unusual roadside attractions, a pipefitter's quirky sculpture park. Part political, part fanciful, done just for fun. No fee, nothing to buy. ... more
Hunt's Map Guide to the Upper Peninsula
• 13 detailed U.P. maps
• Full color, on sturdy, water-resistant paper
• Folds out to 12”x38”
• Only $6.95
To learn more & buy online, click here
