Lake Michigan is one of the five
Great Lakes of North America and the only one located entirely within the United States. The other four Great Lakes are shared by the U.S. and Canada. It is the second-largest of the Great Lakes by volume and the third-largest by surface area, after
Lake Superior and
Lake Huron (and is slightly smaller than the U.S. state of
West Virginia). To the east, its basin is conjoined with that of Lake Huron through the wide
Straits of Mackinac, giving it the same surface elevation as its easterly counterpart; the two are
technically a single lake. Lake Michigan is shared, from west to east, by the
U.S. states of
Wisconsin,
Illinois,
Indiana, and
Michigan. The word "Michigan" originally referred to the
lake itself, and is believed to come from the
Ojibwa word
mishigami meaning "great water". In earlier maps of the region, the name
Lake Illinois has been found in place of "Michigan".