Beaverton, MI

Beaverton is a Gladwin County city at the confluence of the Tobacco and Cedar rivers, which gave the first settlement the name Grand Forks. Lumbermen arrived around 1863; Donald Gunn Ross & Sons founded the present city in 1890, and Beaverton became a village in 1896 and a city in 1903. The 2020 census counted 1,145 residents.

The city's work history shifted from timber to plastics. Gladwin County became a center of plastics manufacturing in the second half of the twentieth century, and Beaverton acquired the title Thermoforming Capital of the World. Present-day landmarks keep older and newer stories close: the Ross and Porter trailhead park adds a current recreation stop, and the annual Memorial Day parade crosses the M-18 bridge before ending at the park monument. Beaverton is a river city whose streets still reflect lumber-era origins, while its industry and civic calendar carry the community into the present. The river crossings keep the original Grand Forks geography visible in the city's daily map.