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Category Archives: small towns

World Famous Eau Claire Michigan

Posted on March 23, 2020 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

So I am hanging out at home flipping through the five hundred channels of nothing on TV. I get to ESPN2 and they were showing the World Championships of Cherry Pit Spitting. Living in Michigan I have spit a few cherry pits in my lifetime so I had to check it out. I figured it would be someplace like Traverse City but it was in the small southwestern town of Eau Claire.

Normally I would be scratching my head and looking up on google where Eau Claire is located, but I remembered taking a pic of this old building in downtown Eau Clair. I guess when sports are on hold, ESPN has to show something and I will say it was much better than the world championships of sign spinning and the hamburger eating competition. I can only imagine what they are gonna show next weekend.

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If you are wondering the world record distance for cherry pit spitting is at 110 feet 4 inches.

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Applegate

Posted on December 24, 2019 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

Traveling the back roads I go through many small towns like Applegate which is located in the Thumb between Sandusky and Lexington.ne year before Michigan officially became a state George Pack built a sawmill in 1856 where Applegate stands today. The town was named after Jesse Applegate who lead the party which opened up the southern route to Oregon.

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The Ghost Town of a Ghost Town

Posted on December 9, 2019 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Ghost towns, small towns .

Believe it or not this small town in southern Michigan got its unique look from the invention of Kitty Litter. In the 1940s people used sand for their litter boxes and one day Ed Lowes neighbor asked him for some sand for her litter box. He gave her some dried up clay granules instead for her to try. She was amazed at how well it worked and that was the inspiration that created Ed’s multi-million dollar business Kitty Litter and Tidy Cat.

In the 70s Lowe had the idea of converting downtown Jones into a wild west looking ghost town for a tourist attraction. It seems like an odd location located between Cassopolis and Three Rivers. I am assuming he thought it would flourish with Swiss Valley Ski Resort being only a few miles away. Sadly the town did not attract the business Lowe was hoping for and slowly the buildings faded away. The town of Jones has several residents  and is not a true “ghost town” but the buildings along Main Street still have the remnants of the former tourist attraction facades

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Getting Lost In Millville

Posted on November 16, 2019 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

Zig-Zagging through Lapeer county, around the ponds and rivers, a few miles north of Lapper, I came across this old church that looks to be converted into a house on Millville road. Nearby was an old schoolhouse and more houses along with the Plumb Creek flowing through the countryside.  I found out it was on this creek that Horace Lathrop built a sawmill in 1837. It was the start of the town of Millville. Like many sawmill towns in Michigan, the timber around it was all cut down. The sawmill moved, leaving the little town’s population to dwindle. I was still intrigued to find this beautiful brick church in the Lapeer countryside, I guess that’s why I continue to take the long indirect way to get to where I want to go.

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An Old Sawmill

Posted on November 6, 2019 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Mills, small towns .

While driving through the town of Blanchard this old barn looking building caught my eye. Because it’s next to a dam on a creek and it has Dewitt Lumber Co on the side I can only assume it was a sawmill. According to its website, Dewitt Lumber Company is the oldest family-owned lumber supplier in Michigan. It was started in Blanchard in 1890. It is interesting the things you find and learn on a road trip to somewhere you have never been to before.

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The Old Building in Eau Clair

Posted on October 14, 2019 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in Grain Elevators, small towns .

This old building with the peeling red paint stands in the center of Eau Claire. I am not sure what it is or was but I am thinking some sort of granary. The name of the town is French for “clear water” and is named after a nearby spring.

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The Town That Moved

Posted on August 22, 2019 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

The town of Thompsonville does not consist of a lot of houses or buildings these days. It was originally by the Betsie River when it was founded by Sumner S. Thompson who operated the Thompson Lumber Company. After the railroad bypassed the town the buildings and houses were moved next to the tracks. I am guessing if they had not done it, that it would not show up on the map today.

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Downtown Montague

Posted on July 17, 2019 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

Noah Ferry founded the city at the northwest end of White Lake across from the town of Whitehall. He named it in honor of his father, William Montague Ferry, who founded the cities of Grand Haven and Ferrysburg in neighboring Ottawa County. The town is also home to the worlds largest weathervane but that is a post for a different day.

P.S. I am still working on getting comments to work since I switched over to a new server. Thank you for your patience.

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The Real Coopersville

Posted on April 22, 2019 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

A while back I posted about a small one-man town near Grayling called Coopersville. Many people let me know that there is an actual town called Coopersville. Since I was near it recently I had to take a trip through the town of Coopersville between Grand Rapids and Grand Haven. I thought it was a beautiful town, but I did not have much time to explore it, so I guess I will have to take a trip back to it sometime now that I know where it is.

You can check out my post on the other Coopersville HERE

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Palms: Almost A Ghost Town

Posted on April 18, 2019 by Mike Sonnenberg Posted in small towns .

You could possibly call it a ghost town but a few people still live in Palms 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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