Status Wheel

Grand Rapids Michigan is a beautiful city along the Grand River and is only about 30 miles from Lake Michigan. It’s not a large city for the country but it is the second largest city in its state. It started of as that home of a few Native American tribes that inhabited the area for thousands of years. Then of the British came in do do some fur trading which was typical for that time. The first famous person to live in this area was I suppose the first settler to the area Isaac McCoy, Baptist minister, who arrived in 1825. Then there was Joseph and Madeline La Framboise who were the first to establish a trading post in the area.

Madeline La Framboise came from a fur trading family and stayed with the trade with the help of her husband. Joseph was murdered in 1806 so she was left to handle the business on her own. Of all the northwest territory, Madeline was the most successful fur trader. It was a hard and dangerous business to be in during those times. Most women were not subjected to such a difficult business. But Madeline took it on and became the most outstanding business women in the state.

Another modern women to be raised in Grand Rapids was actress Gillian Anderson. She was actually born in Chicago and spent the first part of her life living in different places. As an infant she lived in Puerto Rico and then in London until age eleven. That is when she moved to Grand Rapids with her family. Her father was a film maker and she took to acting a passion she discovered when she got a roll in the community play while in High School. She also had another love which was archeology and marine biology. It is funny or fitting that she ended up on the hit television series the X-Files in 1996. Which then put her on the map as the Sexiest Woman in the World according to FHM. There are plenty of rooms in the hotels Grand Rapids has available to come and see the beautiful area.

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