The Song of Hiawatha of Longfellow's poem nevertheless led to the name "Hiawatha" becoming attached to a number of locales and enterprises in areas more historically associated with the Ojibwe than the Iroquois. The poem was published on November 10, 1855, by Ticknor and Fields and was an immediate success. In 1857, Longfellow calculated that it had sold 50,000 copies. Longfellow chose to set "The Song of Hiawatha" at the Pictured Rocks, one of the locations along the south shore of Lake Superior favored by narrators of the Manabozho stories. The "Song" presents a legend of Hiawatha and his lover "Minnehaha" in 22 chapters
The Song of Hiawatha Epic and transferred them to the American Indians'—it is absurd". Longfellow also insisted in his letter to Sumner that, "I know the Kalevala very well, and that some of its legends resemble the Indian stories preserved by Schoolcraft is very true. But the idea of making me responsible for that is too ludicrous." Later scholars continued to debate the extent to which "The Song of Hiawatha" borrowed its themes, episodes, and outline from the "Kalevala." Despite the critics, the poem was immediately popular with readers and continued so for many decades. The Grolier Club named "The Song of Hiawatha" the