Michigan sometimes can seem like a place stuck in time, caught between a past that relied on cutting giant white pines and digging copper out of the Upper Peninsula mines, and a future that seems tied to an endlessly shrinking or "restructuring" automobile industry.

Why, many ask, is our state so unwilling to try new things? Possibly, it's the result of an economy that for decades relied on massive industrial enterprises (the Big Three and their giant suppliers) that gave workers little incentive for innovation or risk-taking. Without any doubt, we've been infected by widespread feelings of dependency and belief in a sort of corporate welfare state.

Certainly, generations grew up believing that all they had to do in life was catch on with "Generous Motors" and they'd be set for life.

As a result, many now sadly believe that the spirit of innovative brilliance and entrepreneurial risk never settled in Michigan.

Ah, but how wrong they are!

This may come as a shock to many, but there was a time when Michigan was widely regarded as the Silicon Valley of America, a place where entrepreneurs seemed to spring up out of the ground and took on the risks of failure with a jaunty optimism.

It happened right around the beginning of the 20th century. Back then, a whole raft of entrepreneurs created entirely new companies that were on the cutting edge of what was then regarded as high technology. Many of them went on to establish firms that became giant players in today’s global economy.

The most famous example: Henry Ford, who in 1903 founded today's Ford Motor Company. Ford became successful thanks to his adaptation of the fundamental new technology of the assembly line. His innovation was to use interchangeable, identical parts to manufacture the automobile quickly and at an affordable price. When Mr. Ford dumped a bunch of identical parts on the floor of an exposition in Paris, the assembled crowd gasped in admiration.

And he had plenty of company:

Herbert Henry Dow, a Canadian chemist, heard about the salt seeps around Midland. He invented a new way of extracting Bromine from the quantities of brine in the area. And the company he started in 1897 to exploit this new technology – The Dow Chemical Co. – is today arguably the world’s leading firm of its kind.

Dr. John Harvey Kellogg was a physician who started a sanatorium in Battle Creek to experiment with his new fangled ideas about a good diet for sick patients. His brother, Keith Kellogg, had the idea that he could sell this stuff and make a profit. So he founded the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company in 1906. The resulting Kellogg Company made Battle Creek the cereal city.

Another physician, Dr. William Upjohn, of Kalamazoo, was aggravated by the problem of finding ways to give his patients just the right amount of medicine. The elixirs of the day varied in potency and the pills were so hard you had to bust them up with a hammer! So, in 1886 he and his brother, Henry Upjohn, founded the Upjohn Pill and Granule Co., later renamed the Upjohn Pharmaceutical Company. It went on to become a world leader for a century, until gradually disappearing into the Pfizer empire after 1995.

J. L. Hudson founded in 1881 the J. L. Hudson Company; by the 1930's it was the third largest retailer in the world. A serial entrepreneur, Mrs. Hudson also founded the Hudson Motor Company (1909-1954) which had a relatively short but glorious life.

Each of these entrepreneurs took advantage of the distinctive resources of Michigan at the time. As a result of the profitable logging operations that cut the great pines of northern Michigan and dug the ore from the mines, Michigan had a lot of start-up capital available to finance new ventures. Mr. Dow had only to look around at all the brine around Midland and figure out how best to take advantage of it.

The Kelloggs were lucky enough to be on the rail line that brought corn to the ovens of their toasted corn flake company and shipped boxes of cereal around the country.
But the point is, however, that both sets of men figured their natural advantage out, at a time when other men couldn’t see it.

Each of these took what they had to work with in what was, back then the Silicon Valley of America and added imagination, drive and quite a lot of luck and guts. They made great companies – and great fortunes – that still stand as monuments to the Michigan economy.

What we sometimes forget is that they weren’t always successful, either -- certainly not the first time. Henry Ford's first two automotive companies failed. Many of the other pioneers of the industrial age had their financial ups and downs as well.

But they endured and pressed on -- and did so without Starbucks, modern medicine or air conditioning. So: even in today's relatively dark days of high unemployment and widespread home foreclosures, there is no reason that men – and women – like them cannot do the same, or better today. In fact, given the lessons we’ve learned from the past, it would be a surprise if they didn't succeed.

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Editor’s Note: Former newspaper publisher and University of Michigan Regent Phil Power is a longtime observer of Michigan politics and economics, and a former president of the Michigan chapter of the Nature Conservancy. He is also the founder and president of The Center for Michigan, a centrist think-and-do tank which publishes the Michigan Scorecard. The opinions expressed here are Power’s own and do not represent the official views of The Center. Power welcomes your comments at ppower@thecenterformichigan.net.