The small city of Hamtramck, Mich. may be surrounded by the Goliath of Detroit, but it has always been an independent city of 22,000 people. Last week during the local elections that were held all over the country, the people of Hamtramck voted in three new city councilors. They are all Muslim, and that brings the council to a total of four members of the Islamic faith on a city panel that only has six members.

It is believed that this is the first time a Muslim majority leading a city council has happened in the United States, according to The Washington Post. This small city of mostly Polish ancestry and staunchly Catholic Christians shocked the country over a decade ago by giving the local mosque permission to call the Muslim faithful to their daily prayers over the mosque’s speaker system located on the roof of the mosque.

Ten years ago, the ordinance declared by the city council brought much controversy and outrage to the city. Many believed that it was a nuisance and an intrusion that the mosque was making calls to prayer over speakers that could be heard all over the city. Many felt that they were forcing Islam into the public sector whether people liked it or not.

The Poles had originally settled in Detroit but soon moved to nearby Hamtramck when the Germans and the Irish came to dominate the cultural and political nature of Detroit. The Poles found the city favorable especially after the Dodge brothers opened a car manufacturing plant in Hamtramck in 1914.

Hamtramck now has a majority population that is Muslim as they consist of about half of the city’s current population. The city also boasts seven mosques, which is the most per capita of any city or town in the United States. In the 1970s, over 90 percent of the city was Polish Catholic Christians. The Poles, however, began spreading out into the surrounding suburbs and Hamtramck became a magnet for Muslim immigrants from Yemen, Bosnia and Bangladesh.