Adventure

The Old Mission Historical pot-luck ended early the other night, and left me with a few hours of daylight left in the heart of the old village.  The Legion hall is across the street from the place where the missionaries landed nearly two hundred years earlier.  I walked down to the shore, where the water laid flat and still like glass and only the sound of a small craft gurgling out some ways from shore could be heard.  

I tried to squint at the opposing shoreline, where the whites of houses peaked over the tops of young trees, to see what it must have been like so long ago to stand in the same place and see nothing but the tall, dark greenery of trees breaking up the space between lake and sky.  A strange calm fell over me and for a moment, time stood completely still.

Walking back to the car, I decided to follow Swaney around the bay to see what side-road I might venture down and found a small dirt path leading into the woods where old houses, boarded for the season, stood watch over a silent sea of hovering gnats and floating ferns.  It was not a county road, nor was it private, so I turned down this path and followed it for some time.  It was a long, narrow road, lined with ancient trees; shadowy hemlocks and leaning white pines.  I wanted to walk through those woods, but thought better with nightfall coming so soon.  

At the end of the road was a small turn around circling a tree, so I stopped the car and got out to see what was beyond the rough foliage of the wooded bluff.  I stood on the very lip of the bluff and saw the great height, the soaring, uninterrupted blue of the bay and traced it all the way to Elk Rapids, my hometown only a few miles East.  I caught my breath and squatted beside a stump suspended precariously by a few stubborn roots.  Beneath, arched in perfect splendor, was a circle of large stones.  A mystery discovered and yet, the primitive nature of the natural environment is what awed me most.  

How many years, I had sat on the opposite shoreline, looking out at this very place; curious, contemplative.  And now, I sat at the pinnacle, amid the sensation I knew even less, and revelling a little in it.

100 Years: Old Mission Time Capsule

May 6th marked the one hundredth anniversary of the time capsule buried at the original Old Mission Schoolhouse in the village.  The capsule itself has not yet been officially located, but an article in the Traverse City news paper reports the sealed leaden casket was buried beneath a maple sapling.  We’re hoping to discover the location of the capsule sometime this summer.

Look about you

Old Mission’s north end was a stopping point for people long before the Egyptians constructed the first pyramids in Egypt; back to a time when mastodons, giant elk and musk oxen roamed Michigan; in a post-glacial era when the peninsula looked very different than it looks today.  We tend to think of Old Mission’s first people being the Anishinabek culture, but there were other cultures who came before and left evidence of their presence here.  This summer will be spent examining these artifacts and trying to piece together the story of Old Mission’s earliest residents.  And you can be a part of the search.  

The history is written in your own backyard.  Keep your eyes open and look about you – you’ll see both the spectacular peninsula (as our license plates suggests) and the subtle markings of a history spanning thousands of years.

samantha@parcelpost.org

Seeking stories of settlers from Old Mission

If you are interested in leaving contact information or other information you feel is pertinent to the book, please leave a comment in the comment box below.  Your comment will not be made public without your permission and your contact information will not be shared with others.

Thank-you!

Hotel Neahtawanta

We are seeking more detailed information of the involvement of the Cincinnati Universalist Church in the building of the resort community at Neahtawanta. According to the Record Eagle, the Hotel Neahtawanta was built in 1896 by EA Stowe, EA Treadway, Mrs. Rood of Grand Rapids, and the Mulikin Family of Detroit.  

Any assistance with dates (the opening of the hotel, change of ownership, etc) would be of the upmost value, as we can then trace back the story to earlier articles written about the hotel.

Thank-you kindly!

Seeking information on…

• J.C. Howe and the “Ridgeway” house which burned in October 1913.  
• Information on the Hotel Neahtawanta which burned in November 1913.  (Neah ta Wanta)
• Circuit Court Judge Jonathan G. Ramsdell (Old Mission)

Please feel free to respond.  Your responses will only be posted at your request.  Thank-you!

Old Mission School

I thought it would be fun in the spring, to ask the children of Old Mission School to submit one-page essays about how they perceive the significance of Old Mission within the larger community.  We will include a few of these or a sampling of a larger group.  Fun!

Progress

The book is still in the beginning stages, but already we’ve seen a wonderful outpouring of support for the project.  I’ve been working primarily in the last few weeks on understanding the Paleo-Indians who ventured across our peninsula over ten millennia ago to the Hopewellian people and Anishinabek people who welcomed Rev. Doughtery to their shore.

I’ve also been working with some of the  folks with the Underwater Preserve to better understand our primitive shorelines and how the peninsula has changed over time.

We’ve collected some beautiful images of early settlers and I will be bringing copies of these to the Historical Society meetings for display.  If you have images you would like to see included in the book, please keep these on hand and at some point in the summer, we will meet to scan all the images in at once.  This way no one is without their originals, as I know these photos are well loved by families.  

Be well, Samantha

Historical Society Meeting

It was wonderful meeting everyone at the meeting last night.  Firstly, if you’ve never attended a meeting, the OMHS invites speakers to come present on a different topic each month relating to area history.  

Last night, Mark Thompson of the Maritime Heritage Alliance, gave a talk about local maritime history and how the alliance is working to involve people locally in the restoration of schooners and other wooden crafts as well as educating them on the basics of sailing.

Prior to and following the meeting, I had the pleasure of being introduced to several members of the society who shared their enthusiasm for capturing and preserving the historical narrative of the region for future generations to reference and enjoy.  

What an honor this has been already to work with Erick’s family, local historians and archeologists, and now members of the society, to hear first-hand accounts of events as they unfolded at Old Mission so many years ago, and best of all to meet the people who today, continue to represent the spirit of what is now Old Mission Peninsula.  

Thank-you.