Grand Rapids

Grand Rapids is a city in western Michigan, on the Grand River where it falls over a set of rapids. In 1945 it became the first city in the world to add fluoride to its drinking water to protect children's teeth.

Louis Campau opened a fur trading post on the river in 1826, and he later bought land on the east bank and laid out a village. Sawmills on the rapids cut the pine of the surrounding forests, and in the second half of the 19th century the city became known as Furniture City for the chairs, tables and cabinets made in its factories. Gerald Ford grew up in Grand Rapids and represented it in Congress for 25 years before he became president, and his presidential museum stands on the west bank of the river.

Steelcase, based in Grand Rapids, makes office furniture such as desks and chairs. Bissell was founded in the city when Melville Bissell patented a carpet sweeper for his wife's crockery shop, and the company still makes vacuum cleaners in the area. Founders Brewing Company, known for its strong stouts, brews in a former industrial building downtown, one of the many breweries that gave the city the nickname Beer City.

La Grande Vitesse, a red steel sculpture by Alexander Calder, was installed in front of City Hall in the late 1960s as the first public artwork paid for by the National Endowment for the Arts. ArtPrize, an art competition in which the public votes for the winner, fills the streets, galleries and bridges of the center with works each autumn. The John Ball Zoo, on a wooded hill on the west side of the city, keeps animals from many continents.