Gladwin County is a little unusual because the name did not come from a Native American word, and it wasn't named after an American politician -- it was named after a British military man - Major Henry Gladwin who was in charge of the Fort at Detroit, and he was the only military leader in the Midwest who withstood the attacks by Chief Pontiac during his siege of Detroit.   Gladwin County is a little ways from Detroit - it's in the central - northeastern section of Michigan 's Lower Peninsula, and it was first settled in 1861 by Marvel Secord , who was canoeing the Tittabawassee River with his family when he came upon the mouth of the Sugar River . The translation of the Indian word Tittabawassee , means "the water that follows the trail." As the story goes, the river was named by an Indian who camped on the banks of the river. The area remained quiet until the 1880's when the lumbering boom hit the thick white pine forests of Gladwin County.   The county seat is the city of Gladwin located at the junction of M-18 and M-61. An annual tourist attraction is the Gladwin Air Show in July at the Gladwin Airport . The show is free and features a lot of old planes going through their paces. Gladwin is situated on the Cedar River , and the town was originally named Cedar until the locals discovered that another city was already named Cedar. Another Gladwin County town that changed its name was Grand Forks , or Three Forks, located at the junction of the Cedar and Tobacco Rivers .   The town was founded by Donald Gunn Ross & Sons, who were lumbermen from Beaverton , Ontario . The Ross family later renamed Grand Forks to " Beaverton " as a tribute to their Canadian home town. Beaverton 's main attraction is the dam at the junction of the rivers that creates a scenic pond that offers some good fishing. Several more dams on the Sugar, Tittabawassee , Cedar, and Tobacco rivers along with the Tittabawassee River State Forest that covers almost a quarter of the county make Gladwin county an outdoor playground in Outdoor Michigan.

Gladwin County Websites and Locations of Interest

http://www.infomi.com/county/gladwin/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gladwin_County%2C_Michigan