GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Dozens of people gathered Monday night at the corner of Lake Drive and Robinson Road SE. Surrounding them were a handful of businesses and the hum of cars passing by. But the occasion that brought them all together helped attendees picture what this same plot of land would have looked like before those buildings were erected, and before cars were invented.

More than 200 years ago, what is now Lake Drive was part of a 10-mile footpath linking the villages of the Grand River Bands of Ottawa Indians. People used the path to carry goods to be traded. Now, that history is being recognized in the form of an education sign planted in the same ground where the path used to be.

Ron Yob is the chairman of the Grand River Bands of Ottawa Indians and a seventh-generation desc

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