small towns Archives - Page 3 of 11

Finding Bliss in Northern Michigan

Posted on October 18, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in General Store, small towns .

If you are searching for Bliss in northern Michigan you will it find somewhere between Mackinaw City and Cross Village. It’s the name of a small town in the agricultural area south of Wilderness State Park. In 1878, the town got a post office, and the little community was named after Arron T. Bliss, a wealthy lumber baron in Saginaw. I assume he owned land and a sawmill in the area. He became the 25th governor of Michigan. There is not a lot of buildings in the small town, but the general store is still in business. If you are in the area you can stop for a moment of bliss in the town of Bliss.

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The Thing in Trufant

Posted on September 29, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

I drove through the small town of Trufant located in the farmland between Greenville and Howard City. I saw this massive thing standing in a park in the center of town and wondered what it was. The massive tripod made of logs the size of telephone poles was used for pulling stumps. Using ropes and chains a crew of men used the framework to pull massive stumps left over from the lumberjacks that harvesting the timber. The stumps were lined up along property lines to create “stump fences”.

According to the sign in front of it the stump puller was made in the 1900s and was used to clear farmland in the region. After it was no longer used Donald and Irene Gustavsen came to be the owners of this unique piece of history. They displayed it on their property in Six Lakes. After Donald’s death in 2000 Irene donated the stump puller to the town of Trufant because it has a Stump Fence Festival every Labor Day weekend.

P.S. I have removed a small stump from my yard and know how difficult it can be. I cannot image how much work it must have been to clear all of the stumps to create the farmland in Michigan.

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Hanging out in Sparr

Posted on September 13, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

When I was a teenager, the place to hang out was the Mall. Now that I am older I don’t go to the mall that often since the type of stores in the mall “ain’t my cup of tea” as they say, and the arcade is gone also. I did find the Sparr Mall northeast of Gaylord, in the town of Sparr, and that’s more my style of where I like to shop.

The town of Sparr was named after Philip Sparr who settled in the area in 1873. The town eventually got a station on the Gaylord & Alpena Railroad, but it’s gone now, although the mall is still in business.

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The Old Store

Posted on August 18, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in General Store, small towns .

I saw this old general store in the small town of Burnips. It’s located southwest of Grand Rapids and got its start in the 1850s when James Burnip settled in the area. He built a general store and the intersection that it sat on was known as Burnip’s Corners. In time the town became to be just Burnips.

This is probably not the store that James Burnips built but I could imagine back in the day getting an ice cold bottle of Faygo out of the cooler and sitting on the porch on a hot Michigan summer day.

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Carson City Michigan and How It got Its Name

Posted on July 24, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

Carson City was first platted in 1866 on land owned by R. M. Abbott, Delia Miner, and Hiram T. Sherman and recorded in 1871. The first lot was sold to Thomas Scott and two nephews, John and Thomas LaDue in 1867. With the corporate name Scott & LaDue, they built a sawmill in 1868 and a grist mill in 1870. The post office from North Shade in Gratiot County was transferred here on August 3, 1868, with Hiram T. Sherman as the first postmaster. The name Carson City was given to the post office by Thomas Scott, who had been in Carson City, Nevada, during the gold and silver mining boom days. Carson City incorporated as a village in 1887 and as a city in 1960. The first mayor of Carson city was John T Hallett.

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A Special Place

Posted on July 3, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns, upper peninsula .

A lookout on Brockway Mountain overlooks the town of Copper Harbor. It is located at the top of the Keweenaw Peninsula and is Michigan’s northern most town. It is along trip to the town from southern Michigan but traveling into Copper Harbor down a winding US-41 through the forest is like being transported to a magical place. Away from the busy roads hustle and bustle of the big city I find it peaceful and relaxing. I wish it was closer to home but the fact that it is a journey to visit the remote town makes it a special place.

If you love exploring the Upper Peninsula I hope you will take a look at my new book Lost In Michigan’s Upper Peninsula available on Amazon HERE

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Lost in Silverwood

Posted on April 18, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns, Thumb .

O.K., I wasn’t really lost in Silverwood, that would be hard to do since there are only a few streets in the town. The town sits in the Thumb between Mayville and Marlette. I found this building that looks like and old school house or a church, or probably both. There is an old store in town that I have tried to get a pic of a few times, but every time I am in Silverwood there was a truck parked in front of it, oh well, maybe on the next trip.

When the railroad was ran through the area in 1882, the residents applied for a post office. One suggested naming it something easy to remember, and the post office named “Easy” opened on April 13, 1882, with James R. Chapin as the first postmaster. The name changed to “Rollo” on March 27, 1890, and changed again on May 2, 1892 to “Silverwood”, after the nearby stands of white pine. For what it’s worth, I like the name Silverwood, it sounds like something from a Clint Eastwood western.

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The Water Tower in Elsie

Posted on April 14, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

I am not sure why but I like water towers, especially the old ones. Almost every town has one, and they usually have the name of the town painted on them. that must be an interesting job to pain water towers, but I digress. I really like this old tower in Elsie. The name of the town was derived from the first born child in the town, which was Elsie Tillotson in 1857. Her father was the first postmaster.

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The Small Town of Palms

Posted on April 3, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns, Thumb .

This old concrete building stands next to the railroad tracks in Palms. I am not sure what it was orginally used for but it looks as if it has been a long time since it was utilized.

You could possibly call Palms a ghost town but a few people still live in the small town located in the Thumb between Cass City and Lake Huron. I figured a name like palms it was named after the palm tree but as any astute Michigander will tell you there are no palm trees in Michigan. The village was settled in 1850 by Canadians John Smith & Michael Dyer. It was businessman Francis Palms who owned most of the land for timber, and when he brought the railroad to the little community in 1881 they named the town in his honor.

Palms owned the most land in Michigan in the mid-1800s in both the Lower and Upper Peninsulas. After harvesting the timber he sold the land but retained the mineral rights. He made a fortune off the copper that was discovered under the property he once owned. He was the president of the Michigan Stove Company and vice president of the Detroit, Mackinac and Marquette Railroad. At the time of his death, his estate and savings were worth over ten million dollars. The largest estate in Michigan at the time.

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Butternut

Posted on March 24, 2023 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Forgotten Places, Ghost towns, small towns .

The small town of Butternut, or what remains of it, stands in central Michigan west of Carson City. It was founded in 1888 and believed to be named after a butternut cheese factory. It was once a prosperous town with a population of over 200 people. The town’s prosperity came from its location on the Toledo, Saginaw & Muskegon Railroad, which allowed for the easy transport of lumber and minerals. However, the town’s fortunes declined in the early 1900s when the railroad was abandoned. By the 1930s, Butternut was a ghost town and today only a few buildings and a couple houses still stand in the area.

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