Little Traverse Bay Exhibit Opening

[editor's note: The Clarke Historical Library will be suspending our Saturday hours for the next two weeks (March 3 and 10) because of CMU's spring break. We will be open our regular Monday through Friday hours during this time and we will resume Saturday hours on March 17.]


Little Traverse Bay Exhibit Opening

by Frank Boles

On February 29, Michael Federspiel spoke at the opening of the Library’s new exhibit, A Delightful Destination: Little Traverse Bay at the Turn of the Twentieth Century. Mr. Federspiel, who curated the exhibit, discussed the remarkable transformation that occurred at Little Traverse Bay between 1875 and 1925.

In the 1870s, Little Traverse Bay, like much of northern Michigan, was cut-over timber land. The Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad, in exchange for hundreds of thousands of acres of land, was rapidly laying track between Grand Rapids and Petoskey. The railroad’s plan was to make money selling the land to settlers who would engage in farming and need the railroad to both bring in supplies and take out harvested crops. However the GR&I quickly realized this business model had a problem; the land was barren. The sandy, rocky, cut-over timberland was of limited agricultural value. The plan wasn’t going to work.

However, the GR&I, as well as thousands of individual entrepreneurs, invented something to replace it – “Up North.” The land may not have been suitable for agriculture, but it was a tourist’s paradise. The air was clean and crisp. The beaches were lovely. And soon the railroad, as well as steamships, began to bring summer visitors by the thousands, who realized that because of “modern” transportation they could reach this paradise from homes in Chicago, Detroit or even St. Louis in a day or less. In 1906, between June 25 and September 30, 13,000 trains arrived in Petosky, averaging 134 per day, 12 per hour or one every five minutes.

To entertain the thousands of people brought by train and by boat, all sorts of entertainments arose. Some were natural; others were artificially created. One of the most popular natural attractions was the “Inland Water Route," a 35 mile chain of lakes and rivers beginning in Oden and ending at the mouth of the Cheboygan River. By 1900 more than thirty boats made daily trips over the Route, taking tourists on site seeing excursions.

In contrast to the natural wonders of the Inland Route, the GR&I Railroad invented “Wa-Ya-Ma-Gug.” A tourist destination constructed in an unpopulated area along the line’s tracks, Wa-Ya-Ma-Gug offered the usual range of activities, dining, games, swimming and the like, but with a Native American theme. Tourists could sleep in a teepee, watch Native American artisans create handicrafts (and of course purchase the same in the inevitable gift shop). Tourists were much more likely, however, to attend the site’s top attraction, the daily “Hiawatha” play, which featured an all-Native American cast re-enacting a version of Longfellow’s epic poem.

All this tourist activity required the construction and maintenance of an amazing infrastructure. By way of example, while in 1900 Detroit had the largest local transportation infrastructure in the state, second place went to Petoskey and the other communities near Little Traverse Bay.

Up North, and the tourism industry associated with it, was invented in Michigan at the beginning of the twentieth century. Michael Federspiel, and the exhibit he created, tells the story of how it was done. We hope you will take the time to visit the exhibit, which will be open in the Clarke Library through Memorial Day, and then will, like so many others of us, travel north for the summer to be shown at the Harbor Springs History Museum.

Changing Exhibits

by Frank Boles

Over the next few days the library staff will be changing exhibits. We will be removing an exhibit documenting the history of CMU and replacing it with a new exhibit opening February 29 documenting tourism in and around Little Traverse Bay between 1875 and 1925.

In the library’s cycle of activity, changing exhibits is a bittersweet moment. All of our exhibits are created by the staff for our exhibit space. Hundreds of hours go into developing an intellectual framework and narrative story, selection of material, preparation of exhibit items, and many other aspects of building and mounting the exhibit. A new exhibit, whatever the topic, brings with it new excitement and new challenges. All the preparation comes together in the last week and makes it possible for us to share a new story.

But at the same time, the “old show” that is being removed had at least as much blood, sweat, and tears put into it as the new exhibit being installed. It too had its moments of triumphs large and small, sudden, unanticipated problems, and in the end a sense of a job well done and a story well documented. As it comes down, and a show comes down much more quickly than it goes up, there is always a touch of sadness that the story told by the old show is being removed and that the hard work of so many people who made the exhibit possible is no longer available to inform, enlighten, and sometimes amuse.

Tuesday morning, knowing that the CMU exhibit would be gone by lunchtime, I took a final walk through the exhibit. I took one last look at the show, remembering what it took to bring the exhibit to life. I particularly recalled the generosity of various individuals who supplemented material found in the library with loaned items and the hard work of the library’s staff. Some might label the stroll a sentimental indulgence, but for me it was a moment to reflect on the talents and generosity of the people who make the exhibits possible and to remember all the hard work it takes to make exhibits happen.

The walk gave me a chance to reflect upon the debt of gratitude I, and everyone who enjoys the exhibits in the Clarke, owe to the people who plan and execute the Clarke Historical Library’s exhibits. They all have my deepest thanks.

American Presidential Elections

autograph of President Eisenhower
autograph of President Washington
autograph of President Franklin Roosevelt
[editor's note: The Clarke Historical Library News and Notes blog has a new way of delivering our postings to you via RSS feeds or e-mail subscription. Please take a second to look at the subscription options on the right side of this webpage. If you already subscribe to the blog, please resubscribe using our new options.

Thank you from the Clarke Historical Library staff]

American Presidential Elections

by Frank Boles

The Clarke Library celebrated President’s Day, February 20, with an exhibit of presidential autographs, lent to the library for the celebration, and a presentation by myself about presidential elections.

A few points made during the presentation included:

• Going negative, whether by the candidate or more likely the candidate’s surrogates be it a partisan newspaper or a well-funded super-PAC, is an old game first observed in the election of 1800. It may not be a particularly uplifting part of presidential campaigning, but its presence does not necessarily indicate the hopeless downward spiral of the nation.

• Sometimes both the candidates are seriously flawed, such as in the election of 1884, but the system has coped with the problem before and survived. If in the end voters aren’t thrilled with either alternative, there will be a next time.

• There is no magic technology to improve elections. When pundits suggest that somehow the internet will renew the process, it probably isn’t true. In the twentieth century the nation has been there and done that with both radio and television, and it didn’t work.

• Primaries may be endless exercises in trivial retail politics and these days with more debates than even the most committed political junkie can listen to, but they have become the indicator we use to test the viability of each person who seeks the job and, in however clumsy a way, to pull the selection of presidential candidates away from party professionals and place it into the hands of the voting public.

In conclusion, I offered the audience two quotes that sum up how one can look at presidential elections. A pessimist might agree with E. B. White who wrote in 1944 that,

“Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half the time.”

However, an optimist is more likely to listen to the pragmatic if slyly phrased wisdom of Winston Churchill, who in 1947 said,

"Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others that have been tried.”

Presidential Signature Exhibit and Lecture

Original signatures of America's presidents will be on exhibit in the Baber Room from the evening of February 20 through February 22. Tonight, on President's Day, Clarke Historical Library director Frank Boles will discuss the history of presidential elections at 7:00 p.m. in the Baber Room. A reception with light refreshments will follow. Below is brief sampling of what you can see in the exhibit.


document with George Washington's autograph


document with Theodore Roosevelt's autograph

Clarke Historical Library Upcoming Event Schedule

With the Spring Semester in full swing, the Clarke Historical Library is gearing up for several exciting events.

This is the last week of our Student Life and Learning at CMU exhibit. If you haven't seen it, make sure to stop in before we close on Saturday to see this exhibit.

In honor of President's Day, the Clarke Historical Library will be sponsoring an exhibit of presidential autographs and an accompanying presentation. These autographs, from our first 43 presidents, will be available for viewing in the Baber Room of the Park Library from February 20 - 22. On the evening of the 20th, Clarke Historical Library Director Frank Boles will discuss the history of presidential elections. The founding fathers probably would not have been pleased about how the process played out. The presentation and reception will take place in the Baber Room, with the presentation beginning at 7:00 p.m.

Finally, we will soon be welcoming our new exhibit, A Delightful Destination: Little Traverse Bay at the Turn of the Century. In 1900 tourists and season residents flocked to waterfront communities around Little Traverse Bay including Petoskey and Harbor Springs. Luxury hotels opened serving fresh oysters and lobsters. Railroad and steamship companies created elaborate advertising campaigns that rival the current Pure Michigan program and an economy and way of life still visible today were created. Through vintage maps, photographs, books and postcards, A Delightful Destination: Little Traverse Bay at the Turn of the Century explores the region’s transportation, cultural, and economic growth during this colorful period between 1890 and 1920. This exhibit will run through May 31.

To open the exhibit on February 29th, award-winning author Michael Federspiel will discuss the history of tourism in the first years of the Twentieth Century in and around Little Traverse Bay. This event will take place at 7:00 pm in the Park Library Auditorium with a reception following in the Clarke Historical Library.

For a list of all of our presentations and exhibits, follow this blog or download our schedule of presentations via this link (scheduled events may change, so please check the schedule to stya up to date).