Dutch Heritage In Kent And Ottawa Counties

On February 9, 1847, Rev. Albertus C. Van Raalte chose a site on Michigan's Black River and founded what became Holland. Motivated in part by a potato famine and crop failures, the settlers also sought religious freedom. Other countrymen followed, leaving an indelible mark on the character of southwest Michigan. Jan Douma and Matteus Notier, Union soldiers from Graafschap, guarded the bier of slain president Abraham Lincoln. Newbery Medal-winning children's author Meindert DeJong came from Grand Rapids, as did Caldecott Medalist Chris Van Allsburg. The legacy includes Hope, Calvin, and Kuyper Colleges, the world-class Fredrik Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park, the Fred and Lena Meijer Heart Center at Spectrum Hospital, DeVos Performance Hall, Van Andel Arena, the DeGraaf Nature Center, Windmill Island, Dutch Village, and Veldheer's Tulip Gardens. The Dutch forefathers passed their values on to their progeny to make the area what it is today.

On February 9, 1847, Rev. Albertus C. Van Raalte chose a site on Michigan's Black River and founded what became Holland. Motivated in part by a potato famine and crop failures, the settlers also sought religious freedom. Other countrymen followed, leaving an indelible mark on the character of southwest Michigan. Jan Douma and Matteus Notier, Union soldiers from Graafschap, guarded the bier of slain president Abraham Lincoln. Newbery Medal-winning children's author Meindert DeJong came from Grand Rapids, as did Caldecott Medalist Chris Van Allsburg. The legacy includes Hope, Calvin, and Kuyper Colleges, the world-class Fredrik Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park, the Fred and Lena Meijer Heart Center at Spectrum Hospital, DeVos Performance Hall, Van Andel Arena, the DeGraaf Nature Center, Windmill Island, Dutch Village, and Veldheer's Tulip Gardens. The Dutch forefathers passed their values on to their progeny to make the area what it is today.

"Industry in the Wilderness by Frank Rasky is an account of the overcoming of natural elements in order to harvest the resource wealth of northwestern Ontario. It is part of the Dundurn Local History series. It is an oral history of lumberjacks, gold seekers, bush pilots, and early hydro men. Herein lies the major problem with the book. Rasky attempts to cover four important aspects of northwestern Ontario in only 128 pages. This impossible task is even further complicated by the fact that more than half of the book is devoted to pictures and diagrams ... The pictures and diagrams dominate the book to such an extent that one could ignore the text and still find a wealth of information about the topic. The diagrams of a paper mill, a gold mine, and a hydro-electric power plant could be a valuable teaching aid to students interested in those areas. The pictures are exceptionally good."--Umanitoba.ca/cm/cmarchive/vol12no5/industryinthewilderness.html.

Wyoming, Michigan, became a city in 1959, the same year Alaska and Hawaii became states, but its history began more than a century earlier. The first permanent settlers came in 1832, and in 1848 the region split, with the northern portion becoming Wyoming and the southern Byron Center. Wyoming flourished. The farmers came first with the businesses that supported them, and industry followed. The various gypsum mines were among the earliest arrivals. General Motors built a stamping plant on Thirty-sixth Street that helped pull the township out of the Great Depression in 1936. It was a success, so the company built a diesel plant on Burlingame Avenue. Reynolds Metals, Steelcase, Light Metals, Bell Fibre, and others found Wyoming a good place to relocate. People wanted to live where they worked, and that meant an ever-increasing number of houses were built, followed by additional schools, churches, shops, and restaurants. Rogers Plaza was West Michigan's first enclosed mall. Though often contentious, the local government did its best to live up to an ambitious slogan, "Wyoming: the City of Vision and Progress."

The Congressional Record is the official record of the proceedings and debates of the United States Congress. It is published daily when Congress is in session. The Congressional Record began publication in 1873. Debates for sessions prior to 1873 are recorded in The Debates and Proceedings in the Congress of the United States (1789-1824), the Register of Debates in Congress (1824-1837), and the Congressional Globe (1833-1873)

The first ever guide to green fun in the Mitten state

Not just in the middle geographically, the Midwest represents the American average in terms of beliefs, attitudes, and values. The region's religious portrait matches the national religious portrait more closely than any other region. But far from making the Midwest dull, "average" means most every religious group and religious issue are represented in this region. Unlike other volumes in the series, Religion and Public Life in the Midwest includes a chapter devoted to a single city (Chicago), a chapter on a single Mainline Protestant denomination (Lutherans), and a chapter on religious variations in urban, surburan, and rural settings. This fourth book in the Religion by Region series does not neglect the pervasive image of the "typical" Midwesterner, but it does let the region's marbled religious diversity come through.