MACKINAC ISLAND

summer resort, Mackinac county, northern Michigan, U.S. It is situated in Lake Huron near the Straits of Mackinac, and has ferry connections to St. Ignace and Mackinaw City. The island, 9 miles (14 km) in circumference and thickly forested, has been a state park since 1895. The island retains an 18th- and 19th-century atmosphere; the horse and buggy and the bicycle are used for transport, and automobiles are banned. First visited by French explorers in the 1600s, the island was an ancient Indian burial ground called Michilimackinac (Green Turtle) when, because of its strategic location, the British established a fort there in 1780. After the United States took possession (1783), it became the headquarters of John Jacob Astor's American Fur Company and later developed as a resort. Occupied by the British during the War of 1812, it was regained by the United States in 1815. The island is bordered by limestone cliffs and rises in the east to 339 feet (103 m); it includes Skull Cave and Arch and Sugar Loaf rocks. Old Fort Mackinac, Beaumont Memorial (dedicated to U.S. Army surgeon William Beaumont, who while serving at the fort observed human digestion through the open stomach wound of a French-Canadian trapper), and the American Fur Company Trading Post are preserved as historical museums. The island's resplendently Victorian Grand Hotel dates from 1887. Pop. (1990) 469.