![]() ![]() The mouths of the Presque Isle and Iron Rivers are some twenty-five miles apart, between which are the Porcupine Mountains, skirting along the shore of the lake in a crescent form. However, between the Iron and Presque is a small stream a mile or more east of the latter, and, some four miles farther eastward, the Carp River empties into the lake, having their rise only some eight or ten miles southeastward. The next of any importance on the east is Iron River. It falls into Lake Superior about five miles below or east of the mouth of Black River.īetween Black and Presque Isle Rivers, there are three small streams, which fall into the lake, but have their sources only a few miles back. Presque Isle River, like the Black, has its source on the north slope of the water-shed, with a general northward course thirty-five miles to the lake, with a descent of over eight hundred feet, and, with its tributaries, draining an area of some 250 miles. The Black River is the next of any size, which rises on the north slope of the water-shed, its general course being northward to the lake, with a fall of some eight hundred and forty feet is thirty miles in length, and drains an area of 250 square miles of country. It is formed by the Pine and Balsam Rivers, some thirty-five miles southeastward from its mouth, and forms the dividing line between Michigan and Wisconsin. Of these rivers which thus traverse the county are, first, the Montreal, a small stream, navigable only for canoes from the falls at its mouth in high water periods. The great water-shed of the peninsula traverses from an east to west direction, extending from five to ten miles from its southern limit, upon which the various rivers and streams find their source and fall northward into Lake Superior. ![]() Physical Characteristics —The general surface features of- Ontonagon County are broken and rocky. It has an area of 2,500 square miles, and is subdivided into four townships- Ontonagon, Rockland, Greenland and Carp Lake. ![]() On the east it is bounded by Houghton and Marquette Counties, and the southwest by Lincoln and Oconto Counties, Wis. Ontonagon County is located in the extreme western limit of the Upper Peninsula, is triangular in form, with a northwestern frontage on Lake Superior of about eighty miles, extending from the mouth of the Montreal River, or the lake, at the western triangular point-which river forms the line between Wisconsin and Michigan —to a point a short way east of Franklin, at the mouth of Misery or Carver River, on the south shore. Ontonagon is a euphonious illustration of the Chippewa language. Like many of the rivers, villages and counties bordering on the great upper lake region where these once powerful nations of native Americans were monarchs of the vast domain, which bear names given by them, or selected by early missionaries, voyagers or pioneers. ONTONAGON is an Indian name of the Chippewa dialect and means "my bowl is gone." In the primitive days of this region, a little Indian girl of the Chippewa nation came to the edge of the river, near where it empties into Lake Superior, with her little wooden bowl to get a drink, and, while dallying with it in the water, it slipped from her hand and glided off upon the moving surface beyond her reach, when she, in her moment of excitement and sorrow, exclaimed "On-to-na-gon!"-"Oh, my bowl's gone!" From this incident, the name of Ontonagon was then given by the Chippewa Indians to the river which bore away into Lake Superior the bowl of their little bright-eyed girl and subsequently the same name was given to the village, and then the county, when it was set off from Houghton. THEIR IMPROVEMENTS, INDUSTRIES, MANUFACTORIES Of its Counties, Cities, Towns and Villages, HISTORY of the UPPER PENINSULA of MICHIGANĪN EXTENDED DESCRIPTION OF ITS IRON AND COPPER MINES. Ontonagon County Michigan History Genealogy ![]()
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