The Keweenaw Peninsula of northern Michigan is the only place on earth where large amounts of copper are found in the pure metallic "native" state. The Making of a Mining District is the first book to fully document how the value of these unique deposits came to be recognized, from the time Europeans first became aware of the native copper shortly after 1500 to the establishment of the region as one of the great copper mining districts of the world. Krause focuses on the period from 1820 to 1865, when the district's true mining potential became clearer to many and when American science changed from a pleasant amateur diversion into a more rigorous professional discipline, a change clearly reflected in attitudes toward this unique region.