25 Facts About Lucius Lyon

Lucius Lyon was a US statesman from the state of Michigan.

Lucius Lyon received a common school education in Shelburne and then worked with his father on the family farm.

At age 18, Lucius Lyon began attendance at academies in Shelburne and Burlington, and he taught school in between academy terms.

Lucius Lyon studied engineering and surveying with John Johnson of Burlington, and moved to Detroit, Michigan Territory, in 1821.

Lucius Lyon initially worked in Michigan as a teacher, then took up surveying, and was eventually appointed Deputy Surveyor General of Michigan Territory.

Lucius Lyon placed the initial point of the Fourth Principal Meridian on December 10,1831.

Lucius Lyon participated in the survey parties which established the baseline and meridian used to define townships in Wisconsin.

Lucius Lyon's detailed knowledge of Michigan's geography enabled him to make a persuasive argument to residents of Michigan that accepting the Upper Peninsula in lieu of the Toledo Strip was an equitable solution.

Lucius Lyon was elected as a non-voting Delegate to the US Congress for the Michigan Territory, serving from 1833 to 1835.

On March 28,1836, Lucius Lyon was a witness to the Treaty of Washington of 1836, in which the Ottawa and Chippewa nations of Indians ceded much of the land in the northern portion of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan.

Lucius Lyon was witness to a separate treaty on May 9,1836, with the Chippewa in which additional land was ceded.

Lucius Lyon did not run for reelection in 1839 and moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Lucius Lyon was a member of the Board of Regents of the University of Michigan from 1837 to 1839, and was appointed Indian commissioner at La Pointe, Wisconsin, in 1839.

Lucius Lyon was elected as a Democrat from the newly formed 2nd district in Michigan to the 28th Congress, serving one term from March 4,1843, to March 3,1845.

Lucius Lyon was the first person to represent Michigan in both the US Senate and US House.

Lucius Lyon did not run for reelection to the US House in 1844.

Lucius Lyon moved the office for this post from Cincinnati, Ohio, to Detroit, Michigan, and served from 1845 to 1850.

Lucius Lyon was a major financial backer of Hiram Moore, an inventor and a founder of the village of Climax, Michigan.

Lucius Lyon owned a large tract of land in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and engaged in a feud over platting the area with the other major land owner, Louis Campau.

Lucius Lyon wanted to call it the village of Kent rather than Grand Rapids.

Lucius Lyon is remembered in Grand Rapids for attempting to commercialize salt deposits in the city by boring a hole and extracting salt from the brine water below.

Lucius Lyon professed the Swedenborgian religious faith and was an active advocate for temperance until he later became affiliated with the Washingtonian movement, which advocated the total abstinence from consuming alcohol.

Lucius Lyon died at the Detroit home of his nephew George W Thayer on September 24,1851.

Notably, in 1836, Lucius Lyon purchased much of the property in a small village in Ionia County, Michigan, and renamed it Lyons.

Lucius Lyon platted the village, established the first post office and installed his brother, Truman, as the first postmaster, although he never lived in the village.