Hurley

History

Hurley is located on the Montreal River, the border between Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. The city is on U.S. Highway 2 (US 2), and is the northern terminus of US 51, and is about south of Lake Superior. Hurley had its origins in the iron mining and lumbering booms of the 1880s. The city is located, along with adjacent Ironwood, Michigan, at the center of the Gogebic Range. The economy of Hurley, together with the city of Montreal in Wisconsin, and the cities of Ironwood, Bessemer and Wakefield in Michigan, was dependent upon the extraction of iron ore from the Gogebic (a/k/a Penokee) Range during the 19th and 20th centuries. Hurley took its name from Canadian-born M. A. Hurley, a prominent attorney of Wausau who won a lawsuit for the Northern Chief Iron Company in 1884. The compensation for winning the lawsuit was that he asked for no fee, but only requested that the town involved in the case be named after him. M.A. Hurley held stock in the Northern Chief Iron Company. The full name "Glen Hurley" was used for one year, but in 1885, the first name was dropped and the community became known as Hurley. The first Plat Map of Glen Hurley was recorded in the Ashland County Register of Deeds by C.N. Nutter, surveyor for the Northern Chief Iron Company of Wausau, in December 1884. Hurley did not become a city until April 1918. Previously, it was the Village of Hurley as part of the Town of Vaughn, one of only three original towns when Iron County was formed in 1893. Vaughn was named for Samuel S. Vaughn, pioneer resident of Ashland, for whom the Vaughn Public Library is named. When the City of Hurley was created, the town of Vaughn was dissolved and divided among the City of Hurley, the Town of Oma (Finnish for "Our Own"), the Town of…

Geography

Hurley is located at (46.450361, -90.189802). According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which is land and is water. It is across the state border and the Montreal River from Ironwood, Michigan, both cities located on the Gogebic Range. Hurley has a cool humid continental climate (Köppen Dfb), with long, cold winters and short, mild summers. In an average year the temperature drops below 32 °F (0 °C) on 192 days, and below 0 °F (-17.8 °C) on 40 days. Hurley is also one of the snowiest cities in the United States with an average of over 160 inches of snow per year due to lake-effect snow from nearby Lake Superior.

Race & ethnicity

Largest nearby schools

• Hurley High
  High · Hurley · 324 students · 14.1:1 ratio
• Hurley Elementary
  Elementary · Hurley · 222 students · 13.1:1 ratio