Alpena County is a county in the state of Michigan. As of the 2020 census, the population was 28,907. The county seat is Alpena. It is considered to be part of Northern Michigan.
The county was created by the Michigan Legislature in 1840 as Anamickee County, (meaning thunder in Ojibwe) then renamed in 1843 to Alpena County. Alpena is a pseudo-Native American word — meaning "a good partridge country." This was part of a much larger effort to rename a great many of the Michigan counties at the time. The Thunder Bay Band of Chippewa and Ottawa, the original indigenous inhabitants of the area, merged with the Mackinac Bands of Chippewa and Ottawa Indians in the mid-1800s under Chief Way-ge-maw-waw-be. The county was officially organized in 1857.
Also of interest, the 45th parallel bisects the county, meaning it is halfway between the North Pole and the equator.