Leelanau County, Michigan

Leelanau County, Michigan
County
Leelanau County
From left to right: Leelanau countryside and Woolsey airport, near the tip of the Leelanau peninsula
Flag Seal
Location in the U.S. state of Michigan
Michigan's location in the U.S.
Founded	1840 (created) 1863 (organized)
Seat	Suttons Bay Township
Largest village	Suttons Bay
Area
• Total	2,532 sq mi (6,558 km2)
• Land	347 sq mi (899 km2)
• Water	2,185 sq mi (5,659 km2), 86%
Population
• (2010)	21,708
• Density	63/sq mi (24/km²)
Congressional district	1st
Time zone	Eastern: UTC-5/-4
Website	www.leelanau.cc

Leelanau County (/ˈliːlənɔː/ LEE-lə-naw) is a county located in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2010 census, the population was 21,708. The county seat was until recently the unincorporated community of Leland. On August 3, 2004, county voters approved a proposal to move the county seat to Suttons Bay Township, closer to the county's geographic center. In 2008, the county offices completed their move to a new government center built on 45 acres (180,000 m²) of county-owned land, one mile east of the unincorporated village of Lake Leelanau, where a new county law enforcement center was completed.

Leelanau County is included in the Traverse City Micropolitan Statistical Area of northern Michigan.

In 2011, the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, located in the county, won the title of "Most Beautiful Place in America" in a poll by morning news show Good Morning America.

Traditionally, the county's name was said to be a Native American word meaning "delight of life", but it is a neologism made up by Indian agent and ethnographer Henry Schoolcraft, who sometimes gave the name "Leelinau" to Native American women in his tales. He created many faux Indian place names in Michigan, from syllables from Ojibwe, Latin and Arabic. This source contends that the Ojibwas did not use the letter "L".See, List of Michigan county name etymologies.