Missing the Manitous

By Abby Chatfield

Sun contributor

With the Manitou Islands all but closed to visitors this year (unless you have a private boat)—as the National Lakeshore rebuilds the docks, we are reflecting on the Manitous with an ongoing series about experiences we’ve had on the islands.

A visit to the Manitou Islands requires focus and strategy to navigate abundant poison ivy, black flies, mosquitos, and ticks. Although many fall in love at first sight with this pair of remote islands in northern Lake Michigan, part of Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore (SLBE), some may wonder what the draw is, as they disembark onto either of these windswept, buggy, and vegetation-dense islands. After many trials, I’ve discovered the best path to joy is weaving between the forested interiors and sandy perimeters, rotating which biting insect to tolerate.

On her first visit to the islands, Emmie Koonmen took the Manitou Island Transit ferry to South Manitou Island (SMI). She caught a serious case of poison ivy and learned the hard way about micro-bears, the island’s nickname for chipmunks. Emmie recalls, “I remember being surprised that they were all over our stuff.”

Eight years ago, Cory Wade took his infant to SMI on the ferry for an overnight. Mosquitoes and black flies made the day challenging and uncomfortable for the family. Manitou Island Transit allowed them to change their reservation and take the afternoon ferry back to Leland that same day.

By introducing the islands in a negative light, I am definitely trying to persuade you not to visit, because it increases the possibility of keeping this treasured place less discovered. Although every return visitor I’ve talked with agrees that the island experience is more enjoyable when there are less people to share it with, this is not the point. As part of our national parklands that belong to all Americans, the Manitou Islands should be accessible to everyone. Despite poison ivy and chipmunk raids, Emmie’s overall island experiences convinced her to move to Leelanau County (as the Sun reported in a June story).

Cory Wade enjoys the solitude of the islands. “Right now, there’s nobody out there. It feels like you have the world to yourself,” he said.

With visitor access to the Manitou Islands limited this year due to National Park Service (NPS) construction projects and the suspension of ferry operation, which has faced several challenges since 2020, people are left wondering how to get there and what future island recreation opportunities may look like.

According to its website, SLBE hosts over 1.5 million annual visitors, with approximately 11,000 per year visiting the Manitou Islands in 2018. This year as the NPS relocates docks on both islands and replaces outdated infrastructure, all docks and facilities are closed to the public and will remain so until work is complete. The ferry cannot operate without a safe docking location for both islands, and the question remains what will happen once the new docks are in place.

“We took a private boat out during covid,” Emmie explained. “It was so much faster than the ferry but financially not realistic. We hired a charter boat to drop us off in the water by one of the islands. I wouldn’t do this with my kids for safety and financial reasons.”

Although Cory owns a boat and can get to the island without a ferry, he feels that “taking the ferry is a little more peace of mind. Anchoring your boat at the islands is a crapshoot. If the weather comes up, you’re stuck out there.”

For those who do make it, bathrooms and potable water are currently unavailable. Private vessels are not permitted to land at island docks. The park’s website advises against access via private boat yet also mentions that boaters can anchor offshore and use a smaller vessel to reach shore. There are no mooring buoys or protected anchoring areas according to the park’s website, and private boats are not permitted to land on the islands.

On one trip to pick up friends on the island when weather conditions were testy, Cory couldn’t get his boat any shallower than five feet.

So, what are the options this year to access the Manitou Islands? Either hitching a ride on a private boat or a reservation with Manitou Passage Boat Tours, the only charter boat with a Commercial Use Authorization to land on the islands. While this decreases the overall visitor numbers to the islands, it also means that potential visitors are looking at higher prices and less availability to get there.

As part of our national parklands, the islands should be available to everyone, regardless of their connections, pocket depth, or boat ownership status. For over a century now, a majority of visitors accessed the islands via ferry service operated by the Grosvenor family out of Leland’s Fishtown. Tracy Grosvenor established Manitou Mail Service in 1917, a time when people actually lived on the islands, delivering mail between the mainland and the Manitous. This eventually turned into Manitou Island Transit, as the Grosvenor family provided transportation for islanders and eventually recreational visitors.

In Algonquian, the language of the indigenous Anishinabek people, Manitou means spirit, mystery, or a supernatural force. Their ancestors must have sensed the life force flowing through this pair of islands so appropriately named.

According to historical references, the Anishinabek used the Manitou Islands as seasonal fishing grounds. Tending a ‘Comfortable Wilderness,’ an NPS report about North Manitou Island (NMI), mentions the perspective of an 1823 passerby, Albert G. Ellis, who remarked that the island appeared to have been a “great resort of the Indians.” He observed a line of mounds topped by wooden frames stretching half a mile down the beach and assumed these were a form of recreation for the Indigenous people. Eliis claimed that “evidently for a game of athletes at jumping…their tracks were abundant proof of the game, at which it appeared they had been exercising, only a day or two before our visit.” Although most likely not a resort of any type for the Indigenous people of the time, perhaps they did partake in some recreational activities as a break from their fishing duties.

White settlers inhabited the islands from the 1830s-1970s. Mostly isolated from the accoutrements of mainland life, island residents found many ways to entertain themselves despite the hard work it took just to survive out there. Historical records mention card games, parties, dances, recreational fishing, sailing, row boating, and baseball as favored pastimes.

In the early 1900s, island baseball teams competed against each other and mainland teams. The Leland Band also made visits to perform for islanders.

In 1903, the Bournique family of Chicago developed a private retreat at the southeastern tip of NMI. According to Rita Hadra Rusco’s book, “North Manitou Island ~ Between Sunrise and Sunset,” Colonel Alvar Bournique was a professional dance instructor. He and his wife used the upstairs of their horse barn as a ballroom and hosted dances, spanning ballroom to square dances, for fellow islanders and visitors.

By 1894, an exclusive resort colony known as Cottage Row was underway with the first cottages constructed and a U.S. Life-saving Service Station converted into a dining hall and inn. According to Tending a ‘Comfortable Wilderness’, a retired Chicago banker “in search of health” acquired substantial property on NMI with a goal to create a summer resort for wealthy Chicagoans to escape the city’s summer heat and pollution. Plans included private cottages, a private park with boat houses, and other recreational buildings. Also included was a private parcel on Lake Manitou for boating on the inland lake. By the early 1900s, NMI was a well-established summer resort with reports sharing that oftentimes there were 40-50 people in the dining hall who enjoyed picnics, plays, parties, and hayrides.

The resort colony flourished for over 50 years. By the 1920s, the Manitou Island Syndicate took over Cottage Row and a lot of other property on NMI. The Syndicate oversaw farming to accommodate resorters’ needs with plans to continue expansion. By 1928, one of the Syndicate partners, William Angell, began buying up more land and, within just three years, owned the majority of NMI, transferring property from the Syndicate to his new corporation, Manitou Island Association. Angell planned to develop the island into a hunters’ retreat with a hotel and golf course.

Rita Rusco’s book tells that, prior to 1925, there was no record of deer inhabiting either of the Manitou Islands. Angell introduced nine deer to NMI that year, and by 1959 there were over 1,200 deer on the island. Other animals and birds were introduced for hunting, with the raccoon one of the few to survive, still a problem today for campers.

On SMI, tourism and planned recreation began in the 1940s. Coming Through With Rye, an NPS report about South Manitou, stated that longtime residents were leaving the island and selling their land to a developer named William Boals, triggering what became the tourist era on the island. Boals’ Lee Island Associates (LIA) development group planned to turn SMI into a resort community for summer visitors. LIA created a lodge for visitors and converted many village buildings into vacation homes, building additional cottages at inland Lake Florence.

In the 1950s, LIA owned the lodge and 243 acres of land with plans to build a marina, lunchroom, driving and putting range. The developers advertised sand dune climbing for “hardy mountaineers,” a “healthful” environment, a “fine bay of refuge for yachtsmen,” and “deep sea and small lake fishing.” Ferry service was to be provided by the Grosvenor family of Leland.

The Burdick family, one of the first families to settle on SMI, also attempted to profit from island recreation. In 1959, they began a small tourist operation offering cottage stays at Lake Florence. Their guests enjoyed jeep transportation and burro rides around SMI.

Since the 1970s, land use on the Manitou Islands has been dominated by recreation and the preservation of natural resources. SLBE was authorized by Congress on October 21, 1970. It encompasses a 35-mile stretch of Lake Michigan’s eastern shoreline and North and South Manitou Islands. The Park was established to preserve the “outstanding natural features, including forests, beaches, dune formations, and ancient glacial phenomena…for the benefit, inspiration, education, recreation, and enjoyment of the public.”

NPS eventually took over ownership of both islands with the exception of a few privately owned cottages. The park’s intent was to return the islands to wilderness, with the exception of a designated zone to preserve cultural history. In 1974, the Riker Family, SMI’s last residents, were forced to leave the island. Tending a ‘Comfortable Wilderness’ reported that the NPS purchased NMI in 1983 for $11 million from the Angell Foundation. Angell held its final deer hunt during the 1977-78 season. The NPS still allows hunting in order to control the deer population, with its first sponsored hunt taking place in 1984.

Besides the deer hunt on North Manitou, present day recreation commonly includes hiking, backpacking, camping, swimming, relaxing on the beach, and visiting cultural sites. Leland Public School utilizes the islands for field trips and student retreats, such as cross country and soccer team training camps.

Cece Chatfield has visited the islands at least a dozen times as a camper and as house guest of an island property owner. She has utilized both private boat rides and the ferry. One of her favorite trips was in 2011 when Cece, her 90-year-old mother, and two young daughters took the ferry to join her friend for a two-week stay at the last private residence on NMI.

“Being out there gave me the feeling I had as a young child in the early ’70s on the Leelanau Peninsula. They were carefree, easy days.” Her crew picked wild apples from deserted orchards and rolled pie dough on the cottage’s tin countertop. They enjoyed picnics and plays put on by her children and swam under the starry night sky. Her friend insisted they greet the ferry each day, a longtime island tradition. Her young girls ran free, playing, creating, and relishing in this simply magical place. Cece shared that, “Getting away and not having those everyday distractions that exist on the mainland forces you to be present out there, in the moment.”

Her girls were initiated as honorary volunteers by the nonprofit Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear (now known as Sleeping Bear Forever) and helped collect beach rocks for a foundation renovation at the Katy Shepard Hotel, a Cottage Row dwelling converted into a hotel in 1908.

This summer, Cece and her friend are returning to NMI, her first time back to the island cottage in 15 years. With the ferry out of service this season, they reserved roundtrip transportation with Manitou Passage Boat Tours.

“To be out there on an island and looking back at the mainland, there’s something about being separated from the hustle and bustle, a new perspective on where I come from,” Cece said.