Douglass Houghton’s Grave

Half of northern Michigan seems to be named after him, and for good reason. Douglass Houghton was the state’s first geologist — the man whose surveys revealed the Upper Peninsula’s vast copper deposits and touched off a mining rush that built fortunes and towns. He served as Detroit’s mayor along the way, and died young: drowned in a Lake Superior storm in 1845, at just 36.

He rests at Elmwood, the brilliant, restless scientist behind a dozen Michigan places that bear his name. On our list.