Gratiot County

Gratiot County, Michigan
Gratiot County Courthouse
Seal
Location in the U.S. state of Michigan
Michigan's location in the U.S.
Founded	1855
Named for	Charles Gratiot
Seat	Ithaca
Largest city	Alma
Area
• Total	572 sq mi (1,481 km2)
• Land	568 sq mi (1,471 km2)
• Water	3.1 sq mi (8 km2), 0.6%
Population
• (2010)	42,476
• Density	75/sq mi (29/km²)
Congressional district	4th
Time zone	Eastern: UTC-5/-4
Website	www.co.gratiot.mi.us

Gratiot County (/ˈɡræʃɪt/) is a county in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2010 census, the population was 42,476. The county seat is Ithaca, although its most populous city is Alma.

Gratiot County comprises the Alma, MI Micropolitan Statistical Area, which is also part of the Mount Pleasant-Alma, MI Combined Statistical Area.

The Gratiot County Courthouse was built in the classical revival style by Claire Allen, a prominent southern Michigan architect. It is one of seven sites in the county listed on the National Register of Historic Places (No. 76002291 added 1976). In June 2012, the 212.8 MW Gratiot County Wind Project opened, the largest wind power installation in the state.

The county is named for Captain Charles Gratiot, who supervised the building of Port Huron's Fort Gratiot. It was set off in 1831; organized in 1855. Gratiot County was a New England settlement. The original founders of Ithaca and of Alma consisted entirely of settlers from New England. These people were "Yankees", that is to say they were descended from the English Puritans who settled New England in the 1600s. They were part of a wave of New England farmers who headed west into what was then the wilds of the Northwest Territory during the early 1800s. Most of them arrived as a result of the completion of the Erie Canal as well as the close of the Black Hawk War. When they arrived in what is now Gratiot County there was nothing but a virgin forest and wild prairie, the New Englanders laid out farms, constructed roads, erected government buildings and established post routes. They brought with them many of their Yankee New England values, such as a passion for education, establishing many schools as well as staunch support for abolitionism. They were mostly members of the Congregationalist Church though some were Episcopalian. The Congregationalist Church has since gone through many internal divisions and many branches of it have since become known as the Church of God. Due to the Second Great Awakening many became members of the Baptist church and many also converted to Methodism. Culturally Gratiot County, like much of Michigan would be culturally very continuous with early New England culture, for most of its history. In the 1890s, German immigrants began settling in Gratiot County.See List of Michigan county name etymologies. Emil Lockwood, a noted Michigan legislator, represented Gratiot County in the Michigan Senate from 1963-1970, much of the time as Senate Majority Leader. There are six Michigan historical markers in Gratiot county, namely: