Chicago has been an economic and political focal point of the Midwest since its establishment by nonindigenous settlers in the 1780s. Although most of the forests were cut in the region, tourism replaced that economic activity, and Aaron Shapiro discusses that effort in The Lure of the North Woods: Cultivating Tourism in the Upper Midwest. Rivers are not always treated very well, as Eileen McMahon and Theodore Karamanski explain in North Woods River: The St. Croix River in Upper Midwest History, which focuses on the destruction and recovery of the river.
