Biohazard and Crime Scene Remediation in Hamtramck, MI

Hamtramck is a city in Wayne County, Michigan, that is almost entirely surrounded by the city of Detroit, with only a small border shared with Highland Park, about 5 miles north of downtown Detroit.

Hamtramck is named after Jean François Hamtramck, a French-Canadian soldier who was the first American commander of Fort Shelby in Detroit; the township bearing his name was established in 1798.

Hamtramck was incorporated as a village in 1901 and then as a city in 1922, a move made largely to prevent annexation by neighboring Detroit.

The opening of the Dodge Brothers' Dodge Main plant in 1914 transformed Hamtramck: its population exploded from 3,559 in 1910 to 46,615 in 1920, a 1,266 percent increase in a single decade.

Hamtramck became famous in the 20th century as a center of Polish-American life and culture, earning the nickname 'Little Warsaw'; in 1970, about 90 percent of its residents were of Polish origin.

Pope John Paul II, himself Polish, visited Hamtramck during his 1987 U.S. tour, and a statue commemorating the visit stands in a city park.

In 2013 Hamtramck reportedly became the first Muslim-majority city in the United States, and in 2015 it elected the first Muslim-majority city council in U.S. history; following the November 2021 elections it became the first U.S. municipality governed entirely by Muslim Americans.

Hamtramck had a population of 28,433 at the 2020 census, living in 8,139 households, and it was by far the most densely populated municipality in Michigan, at over 13,600 people per square mile in just 2.09 square miles.

Hamtramck's population grew 26.8 percent between 2010 and 2020, the second-highest increase of any community in Michigan, driven by immigration.

According to the 2020 census, the largest ancestries reported in Hamtramck were Yemeni (25.5 percent) and Bangladeshi (14.5 percent), and about 41 percent of residents are foreign-born, making it Michigan's most internationally diverse city.