Douglass Houghton - Legacy

Legacy

Although he resided in Detroit while he lived in Michigan, Houghton is often remembered in connection with the Keweenaw Peninsula. He explored the area in 1831 and 1832, and conducted a survey of the peninsula in 1840 as State Geologist of the newly formed state of Michigan. Houghton's report of 1841 which resulted from his survey was eighty-eight pages in length and he spent more than twenty-seven pages discussing the copper and copper ore he witnessed in his travels. He famously concluded, "the copper ores are not only of superior quality, but also that their associations are such as to render them easily reduced." He noted that samples of ore he had tested were richer than the copper ore being then mined in Cornwall. He also famously warned against prospectors rushing to the area in hopes of striking it rich: "look closely before the step is taken, which will most certainly end in disappointment and ruin." Nevertheless, Houghton's report prompted a major rush of settlers to the peninsula.

Houghton's place in American history is somewhat problematic. Although he was the state geologist of Michigan for eight years, he never completed a comprehensive final report of his findings. One major reason for this may simply have been his unexpected death at the age of 36. His multiple abilities were ideally suited to the needs of the society of his day, but he was not always successful in reconciling the conflicting demands of the various roles he filled. As a scientist his potential seems to have been considerable, but his death prevented that potential from being fully realized.

The city of Houghton, Houghton County, Houghton Lake, the largest inland lake in the state, and Douglass Houghton Falls, southeast of Calumet are among many Michigan features named in his honor, as is Douglass Houghton Hall, a residence hall at Michigan Technological University. A plaque commemorating Houghton is at the entrance to the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Michigan. A plaque embedded into a stone monument was erected in the town of Eagle River, just a few miles where his boat went down. He and three other professors are also memorialized by a monument near the University of Michigan's Graduate Library that features a broken pillar symbolizing lives cut short. In 2006 the University created the Douglass Houghton Scholars Program, designed to encourage students interested in careers in science. There is also a plant named after him: Houghton's Goldenrod, a variety he discovered in 1839 along the southern shore of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.