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Michigan Counties

The boundaries of the 83 counties in Michigan have not changed substantially since 1897.

Oakland County, Michigan

Oakland County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

County Seat: Pontiac
Year Organized: 1819
Square Miles: 873

Court House:

1200 N. Telegraph Road
Building 12 E-Courthouse Tower
Pontiac, MI 48341-0470

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Oakland County was named for the many oak openings in the area.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

History

Oakland County was named for the many oak openings in the area.

Set Off: 1819

Organized: 1820

Created by territorial Gov. Lewis Cass in 1819, sparsely settled Oakland was twice its current size at first, but shrank as Michigan's population grew and new counties were established. Woodward Avenue and the Detroit and Pontiac Railroad helped draw settlers in the 1840s. By 1840, Oakland had more than fifty mills. Pontiac, located on the Clinton River, was Oakland's first town and became the county seat. After the Civil War, Oakland was mainly an agricultural county with numerous isolated villages. By the end of the 19th Century, three rail lines served Pontiacand the city attracted carriage and wagon factories. Streetcars began moving people in the late 1890s.

Developers turned southern Oakland County into a suburb of Detroit in the 1890s, when a Cincinnati firm platted a section of Royal Oak called "Urbanrest." Migration worked both ways. Several thousand people moved from Oakland County farms to Detroit as the city attracted factories. By 1910, a number of rich Detroiters had summer homes and some year-round residences in what became Bloomfield Hills. The auto age enveloped Pontiac in the early 1900s. The Oakland Motor Car Co. was born in 1907 and became a part of General Motors Corp., which was soon Pontiac's dominate firm.

In the 1950s, jobs and people began leaving Detroit. Northland Center opened in 1954. Oakland County passed Wayne County in effective buying power by 1961, when it ranked 28th in the nation in household income. It ranked second-highest nationally in per capita income for counties of more than a million people, behind New York County (Manhattan). The median price of a home in Oakland County skyrocketed to $164,697, more than $30,000 above the national median.

Neighboring Counties:

Insert Counties Here

Cities and Towns:

- Auburn Hills	city	Incorporated Area
- Berkley	city	Incorporated Area
- Beverly Hills	village	Incorporated Area
- Bingham Farms	village	Incorporated Area
- Birmingham	city	Incorporated Area
- Bloomfield	township
- Bloomfield charter	township
- Bloomfield Hills	city	Incorporated Area
- Brandon charter	township
- Clawson	city	Incorporated Area
- Commerce charter	township
- Detroit	city	Incorporated Area
- Farmington	city	Incorporated Area
- Farmington Hills	city	Incorporated Area
- Ferndale	city	Incorporated Area
- Franklin	village	Incorporated Area
- Groveland	township
- Hazel Park	city	Incorporated Area
- Highland	township
- Highland charter	township
- Holly	village	Incorporated Area
- Huntington Woods	city	Incorporated Area
- Independence charter	township
- Keego Harbor	city	Incorporated Area
- Lake Angelus	city	Incorporated Area
- Lake Orion	village	Incorporated Area
- Lathrup Village	city	Incorporated Area
- Leonard	village	Incorporated Area
- Lyon charter	township
- Madison Heights	city	Incorporated Area
- Milford	village	Incorporated Area
- Milford charter	township
- Novi	city	Incorporated Area
- Oak Park	city	Incorporated Area
- Oakland charter	township
- Orchard Lake	city
- Orion charter	township
- Ortonville	village	Incorporated Area
- Oxford	village	Incorporated Area
- Oxford charter	township
- Pleasant Ridge	city	Incorporated Area
- Pontiac (County Seat)	city	Incorporated Area
- Rochester	city	Incorporated Area
- Rochester Hills	city	Incorporated Area
- Rose	township
- Royal Oak	city	Incorporated Area
- Royal Oak charter	township
- South Lyon	city	Incorporated Area
- Southfield	city	Incorporated Area
- Springfield charter	township
- Sylvan Lake	city	Incorporated Area
- Troy	city	Incorporated Area
- Village of Clarkston	city	Incorporated Area
- Walled Lake	city	Incorporated Area
- Waterford charter	township
- West Bloomfield charter	township
- White Lake charter	township
- Wixom	city	Incorporated Area
- Wolverine Lake	village	Incorporated Area

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

Online High Schools

County Resource Guide

Counties: US Map

The history of our nation can be seen as a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names we've given our counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of our country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."

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