Bob and Ruth Elliott had been classmates at East Lansing High School, 50-some years before they began a late life friendship that would become a wonderful marriage. They had known each other, but only slightly, in high school. “Bob had been president of our student body his senior year,” Ruth says as the two of them sit talking at their cottage on Lake Michigan on a heady blue-and-gold September day.
A studio artist (that would be me) walks into a Traverse City Goodwill store looking for used clothing to repurpose (I cut up T-shirts into a knittable yarn). And as I stand there, rifling through the 25-foot long floor rack full of T-shirts, I think, and not for the first time, “There are enough T-shirts in this one store that no one needs to make or buy a new T-shirt ever again.” It seemed as though there were thousands.
Danish friends Anders and Birthe Munksgaard, almost 40 years later, finally came to visit this summer. It was a wonderful two-week reunion during which we swapped stories about the good old days in Vegger and about our happily grown children, and cruised around Leelanau County, even taking a trip up to our cabin in Canada near Sault Ste. Marie to visit Lake Superior Provincial Park and Tahquamenon Falls.
Iron Fish Distillery opened over Labor Day weekend on a 119-acre farm on Dzuibanek Road, a dirt road that is three miles from Crystal Mountain Resort and five miles from downtown Thompsonville, just south of the Manistee-Benzie county line. Nearby meanders the tranquil Betsie River. The rural property is so beautiful that you might sip a spirit and stay all afternoon, and it is so remote that you would slip into the 19th century if it were not for the buzzing of the smart phone in your pocket.
Debbie Ellis had no idea her life was about to change until a student at Glen Lake School, where she works in the kitchen, called out to her as he went through the lunch line this past May.
Kasson Township resident Debbie Ellis may lose her home of 25 years in a sale that occurred unbeknownst to her early this summer. The house of stone was built in 1930, according to Kasson Township assessor Susan Baatz, after the original home burned to the ground. Now it is in danger of being torn down to make way for an encroaching gravel operation.
Five rental homes may be leveled as a result of a massive business deal between the Noonan family and Rieth-Riley Construction, Inc., headquartered in Goshen, Indiana. Rieth-Riley’s services include road and bridge construction as well as earthwork and building site preparation. The deal, which closed on July 1, centers around the sale of Kasson Sand and Gravel, which began operation under Peninsula Asphalt Company of Traverse City in 1959. In 1982, it was sold to Robert Noonan and has been family operated ever since.
The League of Women Voters Leelanau County (LWVLC) announces that it will co-host the Sept. 29, Oct. 4 and 6 Leelanau County Board of Commissioner candidate forums with the Leelanau Peninsula Chamber of Commerce and the Sept. 21 101st State Representative, County Prosecutor and County Treasurer candidate forum with the Leelanau Horticultural Society. The LWVLC is also co-hosting an Oct. 10 candidate forum for the 1st U.S. Congressional District in Traverse City with the League of Women Voters Grand Traverse Area, the International Affairs Forum, Interlochen Public Radio and UpNorthTV. The LWVLC is in the preliminary stage of planning a candidate forum for the Northport School Board race on Oct. 17. The current co-host for that event is the Northport Women’s Club. All events are open to the public.
The League of Women Voters Leelanau County (LWVLC) and the Leelanau Horticultural Society will host a candidate forum on Sept. 21 for the 101st State Representative, County Prosecutor and County Treasurer races. Dan Scripps (D), Curt Vanderwall (R), Joseph Hubbell (R), Jeffrey Slocombe (I), John Gallagher (R) and Jennifer Budd Zywicki (D) will be in attendance and answer audience posed questions. 86th District Court Judge Michael Stepka will moderate the forum. The 7 p.m. forum will be held at the Leelanau County Government Center in Suttons Bay. A meet and greet with the candidates will begin at 6:15 p.m. Light refreshments will be served. Open to the public.
Photo by Anne-Marie Oomen: Kayakers protest the Mackinac Straits pipeline on Labor Day weekend. Canadian company that owns Mackinac Straits oil pipeline responds to “shut down Line 5” campaign By Jacob Wheeler Sun editor The Canadian oil company that owns the Mackinac Straits pipelines — and was responsible for the 2010 Kalamazoo River spill — […]