About five miles west of Higgins Lake along N. 13 Mile Road is a wooden sign for the long gone town of Stratford. The town started in 1897 when the Thayer Lumber Company purchased 13400 acres of virgin red and white pine The railroad laid tracks to the lumber town and hauled the logs out for twelve years. The population of Stratford grew to about 1200 people and had a hotel, general store and several saloons.
By 1908 the surrounding trees were gone and the workers and citizens abandoned the town. The region was purchased by the state in 1937. Nothing remains of the town but memories and signs placed to mark the location of some of the buildings. Down the road about a quarter mile is an ORV/snowmobile trailhead parking lot. Location of the town is a nice place to check out and wonder what it must have been like living there more than a century ago.
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