Calumet — The snow is two-feet deep, as I make my way to a lonely, tall brick doorway arch. It’s all that is left of the Italian Hall. 

A tarp that’s come loose whips in the wind. A dog barks. There are a few lived-in houses around. But like many northern Michigan towns, many are empty. Buildings are boarded up. 

Here, on Christmas Eve 1913, 73 people, 59 of them children, lost their lives when someone yelled, “Fire!” during a crowded Christmas party for striking miners and their children. There was no fire, but panic ensued. A throng of people tried to escape the upper floor—too many and too fast—creating a stampede in the narrow stairway exit. It is one of Michigan’s most horrific tragedies. 

The hall was later torn down. But the arch, along with a 10-foot granite monument bearing the names of the deceased, remains as a memorial. 

A pickup goes by. Its rusty plow hangs crooked and scrapes along the pavement at intervals. In most small towns, a woman standing alone with a camera in knee-deep snow would cause stares. But no one’s surprised I’m here. I see footprints from other recent visitors. Yoopers don’t forget this heartache. The Calumet Rotary Club lights a candle for each victim every Christmas Eve. The history is alive and well. 

Much of the U.P. seems empty, yet is riven with history. Especially in Copper Country. It’s hard not to constantly be looking back. You find yourself talking about what used to be far more than what will be or could be. This used to be a big town. That used to be a school. A church. An opera house. 

How can a place so young already have ruins? 

I take some pictures and sit a while on a bench, thinking about my own children and reading the names on the monument. William Biri, 7. Mary Smuk, 5. I say a prayer, then I walk downtown. 

Calumet was called Red Jacket until 1929. One might think this was due to the deep red hue of the downtown buildings, but it was actually after a Seneca chief. Regardless, the downtown is truly stunning. 

You can imagine what it must have looked like in its heyday. Bustling shops. Women in long skirts, working men in hats. Horses and carriages, kids and bikes. Talking and laughing in the streets. It’s mostly quiet now. 

I enter the lovely Michigan House Café & Red Jacket Brewing Company. It’s more than 120 years old. When I ask the bartender about the Italian Hall disaster, she doesn’t say much but gives me directions to the visitor’s center. 

Even though the industry has been gone for years, it’s still mining country here. The disaster is a naturally sensitive subject. She does tell me her grandfather used to work the nearby White Pine mine. This was the last surviving copper mine in the Upper Peninsula until it closed in 1995, officially shutting the book on the U.P.’s copper industry. Or so we thought. 

But a new copper mine may be opening up nearby. 

Highland Copper, a Canadian company, owns the Copperwood deposit in Gogebic County. For more than 10 years, Highland has been working to obtain the necessary permits to mine this deposit. Their efforts have proven successful. The Michigan Strategic Fund recently awarded a $50 million grant to start the mine, which aims to be operational for 11 years. 

The Senate Appropriations Committee must still approve Highland Copper’s $50 million grant before the funds will be distributed. In addition, Highland must privately raise $150 million before it can move ahead. Should the funds receive final approval, the company plans to have the mine fully operational by 2027.

Not everyone is pleased. Arguments against the mine abound. They are mostly environmental: the upset of nearby wildlife, noise pollution, the inevitability of waste materials, and potential contamination of Lake Superior and surrounding nature. 

A video outlining these points and linking to a petition to “Protect the Porkies, Protect Lake Superior—Stop the Copperwood Mine!” recently went viral. 

But things aren’t so simple. 

According to a recent poll paid for by the organization InvestUP, 77% to 89% of local residents support the mine, which Highland says will bring $425 million in investment and 380 permanent jobs to the depressed area. I spoke to several Calumet residents who support the mine too. One man noted that mining has been an industry here for thousands of years. If it can help the suffering local economy, why not? 

Numerous U.P. townships, as well as Michigan Tech and Northern Michigan University, have endorsed the project. Besides being a boon for the economy, copper is also desperately needed—most notably for electric vehicles. 

The idea that a portion of the U.P. could become a bustling boom town again is certainly intriguing. But when money and natural resources and livelihoods are involved, things get messy. 

It was this way in 1913 too. Prior to the Italian Hall disaster, union miners had been striking for five months. Morale and union funds were low. Miners were asking for better pay, safer working conditions, and shorter work days, but management wasn’t budging and had called in strike breakers. Violence had erupted more than once on both sides. 

Many of the attendees at the Christmas party that night said they saw the man who’d yelled, “Fire!” and that he was wearing a Citizens Alliance pin. This organization was anti-union, which may have meant the man was paid by mining management to cause the chaos. At the same time, others claimed the opposite motivation—that Charles Moyer, president of the labor union, was profiting from the strike and may have even benefitted from the tragedy.

In the end, no one was ever arrested. The inquisition was bungled, confused by the many languages spoken by immigrants and a lack of interpreters. A jumble of pain and suffering and facts lost to time.  

Uncertainty—more than the recurrence of mines or boom towns or poverty, for that matter—is the only real constant in these old worn-out places.

Faye Root is a writer and a homeschooling mother based in Northern Michigan. Follow her on X @littlebayschool.