Owashtanong

Owashtanong, “far-flowing water” in Odawa, is the Grand River of Michigan. It winds northwest through the lower peninsula to Lake Michigan, passing a long stretch of rapids at the place later called Grand Rapids. By the late seventeenth century the Grand River Odawa had established several villages along its banks, and the river served as an important route for travel and trade.

In the Treaty of Chicago in 1821, the Odawa, Ojibwe and Potawatomi ceded land south of the Grand River to the United States, apart from several small reservations. Settlement grew beside the rapids from 1826, and a dam was built on the river in 1835. The waterway continued to connect the interior with the lake shore as the surrounding country changed.