French Canadians in Michigan

by John P. DuLong

"As the first European settlers in Michigan, the French Canadians left an indelible mark on the place names and early settlement patterns of the Great Lakes State. Because of its geographic importance in the fur trade, Michigan was a magnet for the canadien traders who settled along the Detroit-Illinois trade route and the Straits of Mackinac. When Britain conquered New France in 1763, most Europeans in the Great Lakes Region were Francophones. John DuLong explores the history and influence of these early French Canadians and traces the successive nineteenth- and twentieth-century waves of migration from Quebec that created new communities in Michigan's industrial age."--BOOK JACKET.