When transportation facilities were needed, the “Soo” Canal was built, and at that very time Mr. Heman B. Ely began an agitation for the building of a railroad in this region. Owing to his influence and under his direction the Iron Mountain Road was built from Marquette to the shore of Lake Superior, the first road in the whole northern country. Mr. Ely was well known in other lake states, as well as being one of the leading pioneers in the north. He had built the first telegraph lines from Buffalo to Detroit and from Cleveland to Pittsburg, had been president of a railroad company at Cleveland whose holdings were the foundation of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern, and was director of the Northern Pacific. He was in all his activities a leader to whom the Great Lakes owe much. Railroads built during these years in Ohio and Pennsylvania helped to solve the problem of iron transportation, while the freight traffic in iron ore helped these young roads to live. The enormous demand for iron, due to the great era of railroad building, made furnaces spring up in the Cleveland, Mahoning, and Shenango valleys, and the Michigan industry was fairly launched. For a long time only the Michigan and Wisconsin ranges were worked, but in 1875 presence of large deposits in the Vermilion Range of Minnesota was brought by Mr. George Stone to the attention of Charlemagne Tower, a prominent lawyer and business man of Pennsylvania. Mr. Tower had had large experience in coal mining, both in the examination of coal fields in Pennsylvania for his cases in the law courts, and as an owner and manager of companies. He sent an expedition to explore the Minnesota ranges, and becoming convinced of their wealth proceeded at once to their development. The friends and business associates whom he endeavored to enlist in this venture were sceptical, so Mr. Tower had to proceed single-handed in his task. [Illustration: Iron Ore at a Lake Superior Port. From Stereograph, copyright, 1906, by Underwood & Underwood, New York. Depicting iron ore in a series of railroad cars.]