Origin Stories: remembering our resorting history
By Rebecca G Carlson
Sun contributor
The first story in our series on the history of Leelanau County resorts and getaways.
“I wasn’t born on Beaver Island, but I got here as fast as I could.” I love this bumper sticker, and the idea easily applies to the Leelanau Peninsula as well. Everyone has an “origin story” for how their family arrived, found, or landed in this area. Which category does your family fall into: Campers? Resorters? Hotel guests? Fishing trips? Connections to the area?
DH Day “rustic” campground was the attraction that brought my family to the area. This Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore campground, located west of Glen Arbor, offered pristine Lake Michigan beach frontage and was the campground of choice for many years before my family bought property.
Our family made the leap from camping to owning when the campground kept filling up before we could arrive (there were no reservations at that time). My cousins recalled their overly-stuffed station wagon packed to the roof with six children, adults, and camping gear getting stuck on the Zilwaukee Bridge as they headed north for vacation. In the heat of July with zero AC, this hiccup would cost about an hour or more of lost time. They would finally arrive to the campground four hours later, and it would be full. Think Walley World in the movie Vacation when the Griswold’s arrive to hear, “The park’s closed folks.” It was devastating after a long, hot, four-hour drive when planning a two-week stay. What do you do? After a few more “the park’s full” experiences, my grandfather entered a local realty office, and the rest was history.
According to a 1933 article about travel to the Leelanau Peninsula from the Traverse City Record-Eagle (TCRE), “It is as if a Divine Being had fashioned by its own hand an ideal and perfect spot for humanity to play and enjoy itself in its vacation time.” Looking back at old issues of the TCRE from the 1890s into the 1950s, there is an increase in vacation and resort articles and advertisements from the 1920s into the early 1940s.
One such TCRE article from 1932, “Leelanau Beckons to Vacationers,” advertises the “Land of loveliness!” The article describes the Leelanau Peninsula as “washed on two sides by the rollers of open Lake Michigan and on the third side by the waves of Grand Traverse Bay.” The article continues to illustrate the peninsula: “rich in cherry orchards, rich in fruitful farms, rich in resorts attractions, [and] rich in outing joys.” When recommending on how to travel the peninsula, the article suggests, “Let us follow the Scenic Way, M-22, ‘Around the Horn.’”
A later article explains the path of “Around the Horn” of the Leelanau Peninsula. “A trip ‘around the horn’ from Traverse City, through Suttons Bay and Northport, with a stop at Leland for luncheon, and thence back to Traverse City, is a favorite diversion of hundreds of Traverse City families on any pleasant Sabbath day” (TCRE 1932). Digging further into more general vacation and travel history into The Great Lakes Region opened up a treasure trove of information.
In 2025, as in the earlier periods, travelers relied on guidebooks for advice and direction when touring. The travel guidebooks of choice in the 19th and early 20th centuries are The Appleton’s Travel Books, produced every few years. Published in New York City, The Appleton’s Guidebooks offered advice on every aspect of travel: clothing, number of trunks depending on conveyance, season of travel, money, tipping, locations, and length of travel. T. Addison Richards, writer for Appletons’ Illustrated Hand-Book of American Travel 1857 edition, explains the type of currency needed on travels. “Gold and silver…are always…current, while bank-notes…are not” (7). On luggage, Richards exhaustively advises the adventurer, depending on conveyance of stagecoach, steamship, or by rail, to pack “[a]s little baggage as possible is always a good rule…” However, when traveling by stagecoach, “[allow] sixty or eighty pounds…” (7), and even more baggage was allowed for steamship travel. Lastly, Richards advises on clothing choices for both men and women. For men have “a travelling suit equal to rude usage.” For women’s shoe options, “[l]eave thin boots…at home…[B]e well…and safely shod, in stout calf skin” (Richards 7). After reading this, the traveler was properly prepared for their journey.
In 1857, Richards offered this advice on touring The Great Lakes region: “A delightful tour, of a few weeks, may be made, in the heat of the summer, among the natural wonders of the region of The Great Lakes” (42). At the time, steamships from Buffalo, Detroit, Chicago were the main form of transportation for the early traveler to the Great Lakes. In the early 20th century, landing at various spots on the Leelanau Peninsula via steamship, the intrepid traveler would then need a conveyance to move inland to their resort destination. As the old Omena stagecoach road ran through my family’s cherry orchard, we would hear stories of the passengers landing at Good Harbor Bay, climbing into the stagecoach to travel inland to the Omena and Northport resorts. Thus began the early days of vacationing ‘Up North.’ In 2025, many of us take ‘vacations’ and ‘vacation time’ for granted. However, the early days of vacationing, while exciting, could be long, expensive, and arduous journeys.
People have traveled for centuries, mostly persons of wealth, as traveling by boat or overland was expensive, time-consuming, and not luxurious. It could be dangerous and seriously uncomfortable being cloistered in a small ship’s cabin for weeks and months before arriving to a destination. In the 18th and 19th centuries in Europe, the “Grand Tour” becomes a time-honored, tradition for the aristocracy and wealthy individuals (mostly male). These educational and cultural tours to Europe served as a rite of passage. For the average citizen, they could not afford to stop working to take a lengthy trip, because early travel times were in the weeks and months.
Many early vacations in the United States were for health and wellness. In the early 18th century, this travel was limited to horseback and carriage to areas within a few hours at most. Author Thomas Weiss explained in his article “How Tourism Went from an Uncommon Pastime for Elites to a Thoroughly Middle-Class Activity,” that an early “fashionable indulgence” were trips to spas and mineral springs. Travel options and locations evolved by the early nineteenth century as train, steamboat, and stagecoach services are available. Pre-Civil War, only about “1% of population visited a spa or other tourist destinations” (Weiss). However, tourism expanded post-Civil War thanks to the expansion of railroads. By the early 20th C “more than 5% of the U.S. population traveled to a…tourist attraction” (Weiss). Eventually, it was the brainchild of inventor and Michigan native, Henry Ford, where the work week shortened and the idea of the vacation took form.
Many people do not realize that the work week, at one time seven-days a week and up to twelve-hour days without time off or vacations, did not shorten until the mid-19th century with the Industrial Revolution. The work week shortened by one day, Sunday, for religious observances, although many still worked 12-hour days. It was not until the early 20th century when the work day shortened to eight hours, five days a week, resembling the familiar schedule that still exists in 2025. “[Henry Ford] noticed that rested workers who had a chance to enjoy leisure time with their families came back better rested and were more productive” (“The History of Vacations,” Medium). Once Ford set the standard for the five-day work week, many other corporations followed, and “the weekend” was born.
The question of how people arrived to the Leelanau Peninsula sparked this article series idea emphasizing the history of vacations, tourists, resorts, development of the towns and local attractions. In the following editions of the Glen Arbor Sun, I will highlight local resorts such as Fountain Point, The Jolli Lodge, The Leelanau Country Inn (now the Little Traverse Inn), Perrins Landing, Sunset Lodge, and many other vacation destinations that attracted many voyagers to the area. The focus will be on the history, owners, visitors, origin stories, and local connections to our cherished area. Every time I have questioned someone on how they arrived to the area, they pause, smile, and share their story on how they arrived to the Leelanau Peninsula. Finally, here are words of wisdom from consummate traveler T. Richards: “Go somewhere, if you can, all of you, wherever and whenever you go, God speed you on your way and send you duly back wiser, and better, and healthier, and happier men and women” (10). Be brave and travel well!
