Announcer 1 next, in American History tv exclusive. Our cities tour visits lansing, michigan, where we learn more about its unique history and literary life. For eight is now, we have traveled to u. S. Cities bringing Historic Sites to our viewers. You can watch more of our visit at cspan. Org citiestour. He was a pioneer. State not until the legislature designated this area as the new capital that he came with these other folks and helped build the capital. They had a slightly more sensible approach. We had nothing here. There was no transportation. They had seven months to build a veryal city and that was a interesting and exciting and unique story of the beginning. Established the about 1836, about a year before it became a state. The designated detroit as the capital but they were told that detroit could be easily attacked and they should move the capital inland but couldnt decide where. Constitutionhe that the first session of the legislature of 1848 should be held in the new capital, which should be inland. Decide and years to they waited until they had 10 months left. Statetown in the whole wanted it to be by them, because it would be a great boon for their community. They kept voting and nobody could decide and finally, the people who were thinking about this area, putting a dam and a mill, they decided they would try to attract the legislature to this area. Thosemiller was one of who lead that. Ande was persuading lobbying, but it was James Seymour who made a map, put a here and said, if you put it here, it will be. His many miles it passed the legislature. They had voted 70 times, they never thought it would be the last time, but it was. That is how they decided on lansing. He came from new york. For a storeorking in jackson. When he came here, the story is that 1000 people came to this spot, which was nothing, so they had to figure out where they would sleep, what they would eat. He got the supplies and sold them. The first thing he did was chop down all the trees. Aboutere going through three or four boxes of axes every day. To get rid of all the wood. Stumps and bunch of marshy, watery ground. Dont get the idea that it was a great little town. They were extremely excited about having the capital come to be here. When they said it would be here, they would come on their sleds with horses and watch the capital come in. Tree, ay cut down a huge tree and pulled it all the way to the capital and started cheering and yelling and having a party over the fact that it was coming here. They built a hotel, James Seymour, which is where the legislators could be. They had to walk one mile from the capital. There were 66 members of the house of representatives and 22 in the senate and all of their lobbyists that came with them. They built a white framed twostory capital there, which became the meetinghouse and the library and Everything Else for this community that didnt have anything. That was their first building. Theas a couple years before capital we see today was built. The first meeting at the new capital was january of 1848. Their order of business was plank roads. Charters were given out to private groups. Department, so if your town wanted a road, you had to figure out a way to get it. The issued charters to build paint plank roads. James turner became the organizer of the road. You could never build will now because it took so much would. They had everybody working on it, the farmers who had land close to the road, the Business People came out and worked on it. Andas a major enterprise when one was finally built, they had a party. Here investeded in having a store room. They were constantly afraid that the legislature would get fed up with the inconveniences of having this capital in the middle of the forest and would vote not to have it. Theas really not until 1860s when they decided you have the permanent state capital , where they really at ease about the fact that they were not going to move away. The Michigan State capitol, where cspan is learning about the city. This is the third building to house government. Next, we take you inside for a tour. Our state capital was constructed starting in 1872, concluded in 1879. We are celebrating our 140th birthday. 25 years ago, the was fully restored and the goal of the project was to have the building look as it did when it first opened in 1879. Our territorial capital and our first state capital was in detroit. Detroit served as the capital for 10 years. Our first state constitution stipulated that 10 years down the road, the legislature would siteto approve a permanent in capital city. There were a lot of cities competing to become the state capital. Lansing was sort of picked as the capital city because no one wanted to pick lansing. It was offered as a compromise. A smallslature built wooden building, which they use for about 30 years until our present capital was constructed. Here ise of the capital renaissance revival, or neoclassical. The exterior is faced with saintsaens sandstone and the exterior is castiron. Right now, we are standing in the rotunda of the capital. This is the first base our tour groups get to come into. We are 160 feet from the floor we are standing on to the inner dome. The exterior dome goes another 100 feet above that for a total of 267 feet from the ground to the very top of the capital, which is comparable to the height of the u. S. Capitol in washington. Are in the governors parlor. The second floor, east wing of the capital. The parlor was used originally as a receiving space to meet legislatures, constituents, maybe the occasional foreign interior. Space is basically used for the same function nowadays. This space is probably the most actively restored out of any in the capital because we had wonderful photographs and line drawings of what it would look like when the building first opened. Such detail as which portraits were hanging on the walls and which specific locations those portraits were hanging. The portraits in the parlor are of former governors. All governors who served in our capitals with the exception of governor croswell. He was the first governor to serve in the capital. What you see here is all painted by hand. The ceiling of the parlor is very unique in that it is original. It took for people over two months to clean the ceiling, using qtips and cotton balls, inch by inch so they didnt damage the original artwork. We moved onto the floor of the Michigan State senate. This is where our members meet three days a week to pass laws for the state of michigan. Michigan senate is a 38 member body with approximately 250,000 people per district. It is a fouryear term. The legislature and senate have met here since 1879. Sports over nine acres of handpainted design and it is a tribute to the time, the victorian time. Buildingeople expect a built in the late 1800s to basically be blackandwhite. People dont realize how colorful the victorians were. This is a prime example. What you see is as close as we can come to what the building looked like shortly after it opened in the late 1870s. That includes restoring the original deck, the original chandeliers up above. Each of those chandeliers has 1760 pieces of crystal and glass. The ceiling contains the coats of arms for each of the 50 states, even though there technically werent 50 states in the union. They are in order of entry. They start in the back left corner as you approach the room and come around the perimeter as the stays join the union. In the senate, we have six wonderful portraits of individuals that were important to our nation and our state history. Portrait of the marquis to lafayette. Who was verychman well respected for the help he had given us during the revolution. Hung atrait is actually all three of our state capitals. It was commissioned fairly early on. That speaks volumes about the strong affection americans had for lafayette. Of the frontght wall is a portrait of the michigan governor during the civil war. He was a Founding Member of the Founding Party and was a suffragist. Worked very hard for womens rights. Abolitionist prior to, during and after the war. Very important individual to the history. Off to the right wall, a hamilton,f ms. Michigans first female legislator. In 1920, whend women first got the right to vote. A year prior to that, michigan was the first place to ratify the 19th amendment to the u. S. Constitution, giving women the right to vote. Recent portrait additions to the capital, this fine portrait of mr. William webster. Mr. Ferguson was the first africanamerican legislator. He was elected to the house of representatives in 1892. The reason we chose to hang presented fergusons portrait was very intentional. Two years before he was elected, he had an Important Court case on the Supreme Court of michigan. He was a resident of detroit and one evening, a friend was visiting from out of town. Being a good coast a good host, he took him out to dinner and he was reserved refused service. He sued the Restaurant Owner for wrongful discrimination based on color. The case made its way to the highest court and the justices on the michigan Supreme Court ruled in his favor. That spur his interest in politics. Two years later, he does and runs for the Michigan House of representatives and was elected as our first person of color to serve in this building. Moved into the Michigan House of representatives. Historically, it was known as representative paul. This is the largest room in the capital, reflecting the larger membership of the house of representatives. Representing 90,000 people. For a twoyear term. In the Michigan House of representatives, above the rostrum, the speakers chair and the speakers area, we have embellished on the walls mexican Michigan State coat of arms. Errico coat of arms is unique, designed by territorial governor. Interesting and most prominent features is the elk on the left and the moose on the right. Very few elk or moose in michigan. The reason they are featured so weminently is because coatlly copied part of our of arms from a company logo that had and elk and a moose. On the central portion of the coat of arms is latin and it means i will defend. It is tied into the fact that michigan shared such a large border with the british. Michiganas to defend against a british invasion. I had what i consider to be the Great Fortune of being raised in lansing. Quite literally in the long shadow of this magnificent building. One of my earliest childhood memories was visiting the capital. Standing here in the rotunda thismy family and having incredible sense of humility, all, inspiration. I see that on a daily basis when i bring it to her groups in and they look up at the dome and get this incredible feeling of inspiration. To me, this building represents what we are proud of as a state and what we are capable of and what we hope to achieve in the future. I work for the Michigan StateCapitol Commission and we have a lovely motto. A Mission Statement if we will. This capital stands for. Continuing our look at lansing, we visit the Michigan History Museum to learn the origins of the state. From its Indigenous People to early manufacturing to becoming the car capital of the world. We are at the Michigan History Museum in downtown lansing. We are part of State Government, so our museum tells the stories of michigan including lansing. Today, we are going to walk through our gallery. Our museum is a walkthrough time. You come out in the museum and it is just at the end of the ice age. We talk about the first Indigenous Peoples and go through the end of the 20th century. We are standing in the exhibit we call the first people exhibit. It talks about Indigenous People who lived here for thousands of years before the arrival of europeans. It is one that we have recently renovated. The focal point of this exhibition is this gigantic mural here. Story of the people through four seasons. The big picture we want to convey is what an advanced civilization they had before that theyrrival and had very sophisticated social structures. It was different in the western civilization. Landchose to live off the and not try to control the land. Timespent a lot of their working in harmony with the land to meet basic needs. Out is the to point structure. There are a lot of misconceptions that native americans all lived in teepees, but in michigan, they lived in wigwams. We have an illustration here of one. They would use birchbark or maple to build this frame and woveny it with ruben reeds or grasses. They would live in these yearround. The nice thing is they are compact and mobile. They can pick the birchbark off and move to place to place as the seasons change. Now we have moved into the gallery that talked about how michigan became a state. Michigan was slow to settle, due to the swamplands. The opening of the earache canal spreadin 1825 to migration. By 1835, the territory of michigan felt that i had reached congresss requirements for becoming a state. We had the right population, a and ourconstitution governor appeal to congress to become a state and it was rejected. Was unsettled business between michigan and ohio in who would own toledo. Both states saw it as a valuable port on lake erie and on the river that would help with transportation. It took about two years. They call it the toledo war. Michigan finally agreed with the country would let it become a state, they would let toledo become part of ohio and as a consolation prize, michigan got the western half of the Upper Peninsula and i think everyone definitely michigan got the better deal, because that is what they found iron and copper ore deposits that were a rich Natural Resource that helped michigan become leaf manufacturing state it did in the 20th century. The peninsula was rich with native forests. Douglas urveyor went up to the peninsula and discovered iron ore and copper. The 19th century in michigan can largely be considered extraction of Natural Resources. In the last half of the 19th century, most of the lumber in the lower part of the peninsula was cut down and harvested. Fullscale mining efforts began in the Upper Peninsula for copper and iron. As you can see, when you are extracting copper and iron, it rarely comes out perfect. This is copper or that has other impurities in it. That necessitated the building of some of michigans first factories to process. Take theseorges, to Raw Materials and purify them. Remove the impurities to make the pure copper that is used in items such as ingots and pots and candlesticks. All of this early manufacturing to process the or is one of the things that set michigan up to become a major manufacturing center. Some of the earliest Manufacturing Industries in michigan were related to transportation. We had Carriage Companies operating out of flint. Railcar Companies Operating out of detroit. Ship building a Huge Industry in detroit. One of the biggest early beanie fracturing facilities was the fact that michigan had become the stove capital of the world. Wereiah and james dwyer two brothers who founded three of the four most successful stove companies in detroit. Here are some examples of the cast iron stoves they made. At the turn of the 20th century, about 1900, michigan became known for the industry it is still known for today. That is the manufacturer of automobiles. In order for that to happen, had to have success from the early industries. Had money and capital that could invest in these companies from lumbering and mining. The initial investors had a lot of money to invest. We also had infrastructure and factories that made the stoves, that made transportation vehicles. They could be repurposed for this new phenomenon. The last piece that helped michigan become the motor city state was the ingenuity of the early founders of the automobile industry, from henry ford, who is assemblyline is famous, and this is a recreation of his a summary line, to Walter Chrysler and william durrant, who founded General Motors. This exciting boom in manufacturing in automobiles was huge in the southern part of michigan, particularly southeastern michigan. At the same time, the northern part of michigan was largely farming as a major industry. The advantage the advances of technology resulted in new motorizedes like the tractor. Other scientific breakthroughs in farming and agriculture helped usher in a new era of farming in michigan and enabled family farms to grow in into sustainable businesses. Early in the 20th century, 25 of Michigan Farmers were dairy farmers. While the factories are booming in michigan, we have got farming on a larger scale happening. Both worlds exist simultaneously. We have now moved into the part of the museum that talks about michigan during world war ii. Particular, the production that took place. 1940, right before the u. S. Entered world war ii, our president put a call out. Most thee the great arsenal of democracy. We needed to create the projects that would help the allies win. Michigan and detroit in particular were quick to answer the call. Most factories are Companies MakingConsumer Products manufacturing, including all of the automobile factories. One of the most successful factories that was built to make products for the war was ford motor companys willow run plant. There is a gigantic mural behind inthat shows the innovation making planes on an assembly