A Most Superior Place

Lake Superior is aptly named. The greatest freshwater sea in the world, like an ocean it makes its own weather. Around Superior's basin, resurgent wilderness feeds from it -- a rich and evolving emerald necklace draped over the shoulders of a watery god, resolutely indifferent to human concern.

Within an easy day’s drive of this wonderland live more than 20 million North Americans. Most of these people are at least vaguely aware of its existence. Some have even seen it. Few know it well.

Those hardy folk who know Superior best live within its reach. That’s not an easy place to be. With  few exceptions, the towns there are small and getting smaller, as populations age and young folk leave, drawn away by an urban song promoting opportunity as the one true way to easy living.

If not that, then a new kind of wilderness at least.

What most of us consider routine goods & services are, in this region, too often hard to come by or don't exist at all. What most of us might consider poverty is commonplace. How many people do you know that must scrounge wood so to stay unfrozen in their homes through the long, dark winter?

These towns and villages are remnants of a robust past. At different times Voyageurs roamed the rivers and forests, taking furs. Lumbermen then cut those forests to the ground, with the magnificent hardwood and fabled pine used to build cities like Chicago and Detroit. Miners blasted and dug six dangerous days a week in order to scavenge copper and iron that helped fuel the Industrial Revolution, which led to the United States of America as it is today.

Quintessentially American, places with names like Bessemer and Ironwood, Ontonagon and Grand Marias were settled by waves of immigrant workers from across Europe and beyond. And of course, before any of these were the Potawatomi, Ojibwa and Sioux, whose cultural memories of this place far precede any invasive white folk and whose presence on this land remains vibrant, which keeps ancient memory alive.

Over the next year or so I’ll explore many facets of the Superior basin. You’re invited to come along, in more or less real time.

Whether you already know and love the region, have visited upon occasion, or if you’ve never come within 10,000 miles of the these northwoods, together (if vicariously) we’ll come to know this Superior place and its people better. Whether by seeking them out and listening to their stories, or by eavesdropping on locals in their diners.

I guarantee that if what you take from rural U.S.A. is all that the media spits up on a daily basis, some characters in the story of this lake will surprise you.

We’ll slog through swamps, hike forests, paddle streams and lakes, meaning primarily to document ruins of failed construct before multigenerational despair and resurgent wilderness eats them. Take periodic rest beneath the shade of a hemlock beside shining waters so blue it hurts the eyes to look. And together, we’ll sit in awe on the Superior shore after night falls, the heavens ascend and the Northern Lights dance.

It’s time to hit the road to see what we can see. Maybe even learn a bit along the way. Feel free to ride shotgun -- that seat is reserved for you.