Michigan's German Settlers

Fifteen German immigrants from Franconia, Bavaria, led by the Reverend August Craemer, founded Frankenmuth in 1845. They were advised to settle here by the Reverend Frederick Schmid, Lutheran pastor of Ann Arbor’s German colony, founded in the 1820s. Other German agricultural villages were founded in the Saginaw Valley in the 1840s and 1850s. Here, as in many other areas of Michigan, German settlers have contributed greatly to the state’s cultural heritage.

Plaque via Michigan History Center