The Copper Country became a showplace for industrial mining. By 1900, after more than 50 years of copper production, the Keweenaw’s landscape was a testimony to the power, progress, and prestige of area mines. The Copper Country skyline included towering shafthouses covering mine openings, immense smokestacks and magnificent church steeples on land often donated by mining companies. Between these lofty structures, which dominated the Copper Country landscape, were the contrasting homes of mine managers and mineworkers. A simple understanding of the social pecking order of mine employees could be seen by comparing the large homes for managers, midsized houses for mining captains and shift bosses, and a variety of small, lower-quality dwellings for workers.