Alberta is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

in L'Anse Township of Baraga County in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its so ...

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

. It is situated on US Highway 41 (US 41) about south of the village of L'Anse at . Alberta is the site of the Ford Center, managed by the

Michigan Technological University Michigan Technological University (Michigan Tech, MTU, or simply Tech) is a public research university in Houghton, Michigan, United States. It was founded in 1885 as the Michigan Mining School, the first post-secondary institution in the Uppe ...

College of Forest Resources and Environmental Science. The community was founded in 1936 after

Henry Ford Henry Ford (July 30, 1863 – April 7, 1947) was an American Technological and industrial history of the United States, industrialist and business magnate. As the founder of the Ford Motor Company, he is credited as a pioneer in making automob ...

declared the banks of the Plumbago Creek to be an ideal spot for a

sawmill A sawmill (saw mill, saw-mill) or lumber mill is a facility where logging, logs are cut into lumber. Modern sawmills use a motorized saw to cut logs lengthwise to make long pieces, and crosswise to length depending on standard or custom sizes ...

. Ford named the town "Alberta" after the daughter of the superintendent of Ford's Upper Peninsula Operations at the time, Fred J. Johnson (not, as is sometimes claimed,

Edward G. Kingsford Edward George Kingsford (March 1, 1862 – July 19, 1943) was an American forest inventory, timber cruiser, real estate developer, and automotive executive, who became the authorized representative for the Ford Motor Company and developed t ...

, for whom the town of

Kingsford, Michigan Kingsford is a city in Dickinson County, Michigan, United States. Its population was 5,139 at the 2020 census, a slight increase from the 5,133 recorded at the 2010 census. It was named for the developer Edward G. Kingsford. Geography Kingsf ...

and Kingsford charcoal is named, as his only daughter was named Dorothy). It was Ford's intention to have a model lumber and sawmill town, as well as to construct a plant in the southeastern forests of the

Keweenaw The Keweenaw Peninsula (, ) is a peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. Part of the greater landmass of the Upper Peninsula, the Keweenaw Peninsula projects about northeasterly into Lake Superior, forming Keweenaw Bay. The peninsula is part ...

At the time Ford established Alberta, wood was used extensively in automobiles. The original village of Alberta consisted of twelve houses, two schools, and a steam-driven mill built to the most modern standards of the day. The Plumbago Creek was dammed to provide a reservoir to serve the town and mill's water supply needs. The mill was a two-story white clapboard wood-frame structure and still stands, now housing a portion of the Alberta Village Museum. The saw mill had a capacity of per day for

hardwood Hardwood is wood from Flowering plant, angiosperm trees. These are usually found in broad-leaved temperate and tropical forests. In temperate and boreal ecosystem, boreal latitudes they are mostly deciduous, but in tropics and subtropics mostl ...

and per day for

softwood Scots pine, a typical and well-known softwood Softwood is wood from gymnosperm trees such as conifers. The term is opposed to hardwood, which is the wood from angiosperm trees. The main differences between hardwoods and softwoods is that the sof ...

. This was a small capacity even by 1936 standards, with Ford's other three mills in the

Upper Peninsula of Michigan The Upper Peninsula of Michigan—also known as Upper Michigan or colloquially the U.P. or Yoop—is the northern and more elevated of the two major landmasses that make up the U.S. state of Michigan; it is separated from the Lower Peninsula of ...

producing twenty to twenty-five times as much. Those who resided in Alberta were expected to divide their time

lumbering Logging is the process of cutting, processing, and moving trees to a location for transport. It may include skidding, on-site processing, and loading of trees or logs onto trucks

milling Milling may refer to: * Milling (minting), forming narrow ridges around the edge of a coin * Milling (grinding), breaking solid materials into smaller pieces by grinding, crushing, or cutting in a mill * Milling (machining), a process of using ro ...

, and

farming Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created ...

. Similarities exist between both the Ford-established and administered communities of Alberta and the town of Belterra, in the

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

ian

state State most commonly refers to: * State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory **Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country **Nation state, a ...

Pará Pará () is a Federative units of Brazil, state of Brazil, located in northern Brazil and traversed by the lower Amazon River. It borders the Brazilian states of Amapá, Maranhão, Tocantins (state), Tocantins, Mato Grosso, Amazonas (Brazilian st ...

. It has been professionally noted that both towns were established by the Ford Motor Company around generally the same time. Both provided much-needed resources for the construction of the

Model T The Ford Model T is an automobile that was produced by the Ford Motor Company from October 1, 1908, to May 26, 1927. It is generally regarded as the first mass-affordable automobile, which made car travel available to middle-class Americans. Th ...

, Alberta was a supplier of wood, and Belterra, a provider of

rubber Rubber, also called India rubber, latex, Amazonian rubber, ''caucho'', or ''caoutchouc'', as initially produced, consists of polymers of the organic compound isoprene, with minor impurities of other organic compounds. Types of polyisoprene ...

to the company. Ford had closed the operations in the community around the year 1943, and the community gradually began to diminish, although it was not until the year of 1954 that the sawmill ceased its operations, and the

Ford Motor Company Ford Motor Company (commonly known as Ford) is an American multinational corporation, multinational automobile manufacturer headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, United States. It was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. T ...

officially donated the town of Alberta, Michigan, and the of land around it to what is now the College of Forest Resources and Environmental Science at Michigan Technological University. Buildings still standing that were part of the original village on this property are now used as a museum, they also support research and serve as a hub for teaching programs for those with

forestry Forestry is the science and craft of creating, managing, planting, using, conserving and repairing forests and woodlands for associated resources for human and Natural environment, environmental benefits. Forestry is practiced in plantations and ...

and

ecology Ecology () is the natural science of the relationships among living organisms and their Natural environment, environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community (ecology), community, ecosystem, and biosphere lev ...

majors, the buildings are also used by numerous universities from around the United States for forestry education.

Climate

References

External links

Alberta Village Museum
{{authority control Unincorporated communities in Baraga County, Michigan Company towns in Michigan Populated places established in 1936 1936 establishments in Michigan Unincorporated communities in Michigan