On July 3, 1829, Horace Blackman, accompanied by Alexander Laverty, a land surveyor, and
Pewytum, an Indian guide, forded the Grand River and made camp for the night at a site now marked as Trail and N. Jackson Street. They arrived there along a well-traveled Native American trail leading west from
Ann Arbor. Blackman had hired Laverty and Pewytum to guide him west. Returning to Ann Arbor and
Monroe, Blackman registered his claim for at two dollars an acre. He returned to the Jackson area in August 1829 with his brother Russell. Together they cleared land and built a cabin at what would become the corner of Ingham and Trail streets. The town was first called Jacksonopolis. Later, it was renamed Jacksonburgh. Finally in 1838, the town's name was changed to simply Jackson.
Birthplace of the Republican Party – "Under the Oaks" Jackson is one of the birthplaces of the
Republican Party. The first official meeting of the group that called itself "Republican" was held in Jackson on July 6, 1854. A Michigan historical marker at what is now the northwest corner of Second and Franklin streets in Jackson commemorates an anti-slavery county convention held that day. Meeting outside to avoid a hot, overcrowded hall, the group ultimately selected a slate of candidates for state elections. The marker identifies this as the birth of the Republican Party. The site, an oak grove on "Morgan's Forty", then on the outskirts of town, became known as "Under the Oaks". The political party formally recognizes its birthplace as being
Ripon, Wisconsin, where the name "Republican" was first suggested in March 1854. But, Republican presidents have visited Jackson and this marker.
Crawfordsville, Iowa also has a claim as the birthplace of the party: the first private meeting of what would become the Republican Party occurred when Whig Party defectors met privately in Crawfordsville in February 1854. The meeting was to lay the groundwork for the creation of a new political party.
Auto industry Before Detroit began building cars on assembly lines in 1910, Jackson factories were making parts for cars and assembling them. By 1910, the auto industry had become Jackson's main industry. More than 20 different brands of cars were once made in Jackson, including:
Reeves,
Jaxon, Jackson,
CarterCar,
Orlo, Whiting, Butcher and Gage;
Buick, Janney, Globe, Steel Swallow, C.V.I.,
Imperial, Ames-Dean,
Cutting, Standard Electric, Duck,
Briscoe, Argo,
Hollier, Hackett, Marion-Handly, Gem, Earl, Wolverine, and Kaiser-Darrin. Ye Ole Carriage Shop in Spring Arbor displays more than 60 antique and classic cars, including five one-and-onlys and 16 made in Jackson. One of these is a 1902 JAXON. Today the auto parts industry remains one of the largest employers of skilled machine operators in Jackson County. The city was also an early site for the
moped parts industry.
Birthplace of the Coney Island hot dog In 1914
Macedonian immigrant
George Todoroff founded the first
"Coney Island restaurant" and created his famous
Coney Island hot dog topping. His Coney Island restaurant was located directly in front of the railroad station on East Michigan Avenue and was open 24 hours. The restaurant proved to be a popular dining option for rail passengers. Over the course of 31 years, Todoroff sold more than 17 million Coney Island hot dogs. Today two "Coney Island" restaurants unaffiliated with Todoroff's are located in a building near the train station on East Michigan Avenue: Virginia Coney Island and Jackson Coney Island. In addition, several area restaurants throughout the Jackson area offer their own version of the Coney Island hot dog, or just "coney", as it is referred to by local residents. Jackson's version of the coney dog is distinctly different from those featured in Detroit-area Coney Island restaurants or other Coney Island restaurants throughout Michigan and the Midwest. In 2014 Todoroff's Coney Island celebrated its centenary.
Michigan's first state prison (1838–1934) The legislature authorized Michigan's first state prison in 1838. A temporary wooden prison, enclosed by a fence of
tamarack poles, was built on 60 acres donated for that purpose inside the city limits of Jackson. In 1839 the first 35 prisoners were received.
A permanent prison was built three years later. Beginning in the 1850s, Warden
H.F. Hatch placed more emphasis on the education and rehabilitation of prisoners. By 1882, Michigan's First State Prison (1838–1934) had developed as the largest walled prison in the world. Within its walls, the factories and surrounding farms, manned by cheap inmate labor, made Jackson one of the leading industrial cities in the nation. In 1934 a new prison was completed just north of Jackson's city limit in Blackman Township; it took all of the state prisoners. The historic building is now used as an artists' resident community, known as the Armory Arts Village. Tours of the original prison site on Cooper Street are available through the Original Jackson Historic Prison Tours. A closed, fully intact cell block at the modern prison in Blackman Township was operated as the Cell Block 7 Prison Museum from 2014-2019. Independently operated by the accredited Ella Sharp Museum, this was the only museum where visitors could enter a closed cell block on the grounds of an active prison for a self-guided tour.
Corset industry (1860s–1920s) Numerous railroad connections were constructed to Jackson, linking it to many markets. The local invention of the duplex
corset by Bortree helped make Jackson a center of corset manufacturing. By the early 20th century, as many as 16 manufacturers of women's corsets operated here; the majority were located on Cortland and Pearl streets. As elastics were adopted in manufacturing and fashions changed, the corset industry quickly declined. The majority of the corset manufacturers in Jackson closed their doors by 1920. Only three of the original corset companies survived past the 1920s, by changing their production to therapeutic and prosthetic support garments and devices. "The First" Moses Bortree founded the Bortree Corset Company, the first corset manufacturer outside of New York, in 1868 at 112 W. Cortland. Founded to make crinoline skirts and bustles (hoop skirts!), they began manufacturing Bortree's newest creation, the Duplex Corset, in 1875. Within five years, production rose from 50,000 to 300,000 corsets per year. "The Biggest" Founded in 1884, the Jackson Corset Co. became the largest manufacturer of corset and waist garments in the US. Located at 209-215 W. Cortland St., they employed almost 300 people by 1895. "Woman-Owned" The Coronet Corset Manufactory opened in 1880 at 146 W. Main St. and later moved to 131-133 W. Pearl St. Coronet had the distinction of being run by the first and only female president, Mrs. C.A. McGee, who invented and patented the Coronet Corset.
1986 Jackson car-semi truck collision At approximately 9:20 P.M. on Tuesday, March 11, 1986, four teenage girls who were all classmates from nearby
Bronson Junior-Senior High School were returning to their homes after spectating a regional high school basketball game at
Lumen Christi Catholic School when their driver stopped her 1975
Oldsmobile at an intersection and waited to turn onto the four-laned
M-60 Highway. A minute later, for reasons unknown, the driver drove forward a bit and hesitated before proceeding to turn in front of the oncoming path of a semi-truck trailer. Despite the driver of the truck alerting them with his horn and lights moments in advance, he collided broadside with their car and the two vehicles dragged until they stopped at a median. All of the victims were pronounced dead on arrival at the city's Foote Hospital. The truck driver was uninjured. The county's worst vehicular accident in its history sent shockwaves across Michigan and across the country. One of the victims, 14-year-old Laura Wilber, would have had her birthday the following day, to which the other victims had planned on celebrating. In an investigation made and concluded by the Jackson Police Department, the primary cause of the accident was the driver's failure of judgement contributed by sudden and unpredictable movements without warning. The police also discovered that none of the victims were wearing seatbelts. ==Geography==