Fort Michilimackinac was an 18th-century French, and later British, fort and trading post in the Great Lakes of North America. Built around 1715, and abandoned in 1783, it was located along the southern shore of the strategic Straits of Mackinac connecting Lake Huron and Lake Michigan, at the northern tip of the lower peninsula of the present-day state of Michigan in the United States. The site of the fort in present-day Mackinaw City is a National Historic Landmark and is now preserved as an open-air historical museum.