Keweenaw National Historical Park
Michigan
Tonight
🌗 46% moon
5 h fully dark
Crowds
low
Entrance
Free entry
The stories of people and copper in the Keweenaw Peninsula have been intertwined for more than 7,000 years. Indigenous peoples made copper into tools and trade items. Investors and immigrants arrived in the 1800s in a great mineral rush, developing thriving industries and cosmopolitan communities. Though the mines have since closed, their mark is still visible on the land and people.
Activities
No entrance fee.
Hours & seasons
The Calumet Unit of Keweenaw NHP encompasses the Village of Calumet and part of Calumet Township. Park grounds (with the exception of private property and the Keweenaw Heritage Sites) are open to the public from sunrise to sunset. The Calumet Visitor Center at 98 Fifth Street has seasonal hours of operation.
Hours are reported by the park — verify before you go.
📞 9063373168
✉ kewe_information@nps.govConditions
Quietest months (fewer crowds): Jan, Feb, Apr, Dec
Typical crowds: low
Weather now: ☀️ Clear, 79°F
⛅ 84°/56°
🌧️ 81°/61°
🌦️ 73°/55°
Typical monthly recreation visits · NPS avg 2023–2025 — orange months are the quietest by crowds.
Quietest months
Relative crowds by month — lighter is quieter; ringed months are the calmest by crowds.
Jan
0%
Feb
2%
Mar
3%
Apr
2%
May
20%
Jun
64%
Jul
100%
Aug
100%
Sep
61%
Oct
27%
Nov
7%
Dec
2%
Log a sky reading
Measured the sky with an SQM meter or app? Add your reading (16 = city glow … 22 = pristine). Opt in under “Travelers like you” to share it on the community leaderboard.
Things to do
Keweenaw NHP Ranger Programs
Go Underground · Tour duration varies by site.
Hiking into History · 4 mi · Hiking duration will vary by site.
Discover Keweenaw Lighthouses
Visit Museums and Heritage Centers
Research History
Experience Keweenaw Geology
Step Back in Time · Tour duration varies by site.
Visitor centers
Calumet Visitor Center
Accessibility
122 audio-described place(s)
Reported by the park — verify before you go.
Not an official safety source — always defer to NPS.gov and rangers for life-safety decisions.
By the numbers
A visual read on Keweenaw National Historical Park — its character, trails, sky, and weather.
Park fingerprint
How this park scores across the dimensions travelers care about.
Trail difficulty
Difficulty mix across this park's trails.
3-day forecast
Daily high and low temperatures (°F).
People & stories
Figures tied to Keweenaw National Historical Park — each spans a cross-park journey.
Alexander Agassiz
— Copper, Copper Mining, MiningAnna Klobuchar Clemenc
— Mine, Mining Towns, Mine TownBessie Altman Kosman
— Keweenaw, Keweenaw Nhp, JewishDaniel Dunbar Brockway
— Calumet, Calumet Hecla, CopperMaggie Walz
— Suffrage, Keweenaw, CalumetPassport stamps
Mark the stamps you've collected — they show in your memory and along your routes.
🎫 Calumet Visitor Center
🎫 Keweenaw National Historic Park
Places to see
101 5th St. Green Block
audio
101 6th St. Kinsman Block
audio
104 5th St. Calumet Block
audio
105-107 5th St.
audio
109-111 5th St. Hermann Block
audio
116-120 5th St. Holman Block
audio
119 5th St. Hennes Block
audio
200 5th St. Jacka Block
audio
201 5th St.
audio
201 6th St. Calumet Post Office
audio
205-207 5th St.
audio
211 5th St. Ruppe Block
audioAudio & media
🎧
🎬
🖼
Learn more
In 2016, six rangers were awarded a national or regional Freeman Tilden Award for excellence in interpretation. Learn more about their amazing programs!
The Calumet and Hecla Mining Company (C&H) officially formed in 1871. As the industrial landscape was shaped to access the copper lode, the commercial and housing districts also expanded. Today, the landscape of the Calumet Unit includes an industrial core, the adjacent civic and commercial district of the Village of Calumet, and several housing areas.
Who knew all these connections existed between Isle Royale and the Keweenaw? Archaeologists and historians have helped to reveal them. With your help in preserving these sites, there are sure to be many more yet to be uncovered.
Isle Royale and the Keweenaw Peninsula may appear unrelated, two distinct landmasses separated by the great expanse of Lake Superior. Yet this fresh, cold water connects them across the distance, while obscuring another way the two places are connected: a distinctive copper-rich geology, and the people who have mined the metal over time.
History and archaeology go hand in hand.
Research has indicated that Indigenous people may have been mining the Keweenaw’s copper deposits as early as 8,000 years ago and on Isle Royale as early as 6,500 years ago, making these two land masses home to some of the western hemisphere’s oldest mines.
Both the island and the peninsula have industrial copper mining pasts.
As World War I entered its second year, the American Institute of Metals trade journal blithely remarked that “[i]t is almost impossible to kill a man in an up-to-date and scientific way without using copper."
Ranger School
Park-grounded courses you can learn with the Ranger.
Commercial and Non-Industrial Occupations Post-Visit 2: Research Careers of Entrepreneurs
Open →
Commercial and Non-Industrial Occupations Post-Visit Activity 1: Discussion and Journaling
Open →
Commercial and Non-Industrial Occupations Post-Visit Activity 3: Photograph Collection
Open →
Commercial and Non-Industrial Occupations Pre-Visit Activity 1: Entrepreneurs
Open →
Commercial and Non-Industrial Occupations Pre-Visit Activity 2: Non-Mining Jobs
Open →
Commercial and Non-Industrial Occupations Pre-Visit Activity 3: Picture Taking
Open →
Influence of War Post-Activity 2: Influence of War on Copper Industry
Open →
Influence of War Post-Visit Activity 1: Review Copper Use in Wars
Open →
Influence of War Post-Visit Activity 3: Exit Slip
Open →
Influence of War Pre-Visit Activity 1: Creating a Timeline of Wars and Conflicts from 1800-1980
Open →
Influence of War Pre-Visit Activity 2: Research
Open →
Influence of War Pre-Visit Activity 3: Examine and Predict
Open →
How Keweenaw National Historical Park connects
This park's activities, topics, location, and on-the-ground places — one hop in the graph. Drag to explore; click an activity, topic, or related park to follow it.
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Activity
Topic
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VisitorCenter
PassportStamp
Trail
ThingToDo
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