Longtime Glen Arbor physician Matthew Houghton passed away early Sunday morning, his family confirmed. Details about a memorial service will be forthcoming. Houghton’s patients received the sudden and sad news in March that “Doc” Houghton was closing his practice, effective March 10.
Who: The Thatcher sisters, Becky and Cookie. What: Rescue a lost girl. Where: Alligator Hill in the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, a.k.a. the Park. When: Summer 2013. Why: It was their job. For now, though, suffice it to say there are a million stories in The Park. This is just one of them.
The Glen Arbor Township Board is working on a new Master Plan for Glen Arbor. Faced with burgeoning summer tourist crowds, national media attention, and a popular new bike trail, the time seems right for Glen Arbor to reexamine its identity, in what direction the town is going, and what changes are needed to keep the community safe, sustainable, beautiful and profitable.
Taking a stroll down Western Avenue in the village of Glen Arbor, you’ll come to a lawn that is beautifully landscaped in Michigan native plants. This is 6391 Western Avenue, the headquarters of Sleeping Bear Birding Trail (SBBT). What, you wonder, is a birding trail? That’s the most frequently asked question by both tourists and locals coming through the door, said operations director Mick Seymour. “What the heck is a birding trail?”
It was all about art in Glen Arbor, August 1-2, at the Glen Arbor Art Association’s sixth annual Plein Air Paint Out weekend. One of the largest plein air events in Michigan, attracting both artists and art collectors, the 2014 Paint Out featured 45 artists who participated for the Quick Draw on Friday afternoon and over 50 artists at the main event on Saturday.
The Glen Arbor Art Association is hosting an exhibition of acrylics by Michelle Jahraus August 29-30 at the Art Association, at 6031 S. Lake Street in Glen Arbor. “What color is it?” This has always been Jahraus’ first question in deciding on a bike, cat, sweater, car, house, etc.
Linda Beeman, an Owosso, Mich., resident specializing in Japanese woodblock printing, will exhibit her prints of the landscape and lakeshores of northern Michigan and Japan from Aug. 29-Sept. 18 at the Lake Street Studios Center Gallery in Glen Arbor. The show opens Aug. 29, 6 p.m. with a reception for the artist.
Glen Arbor merchants hold their biggest sales of the season on Labor Day weekend, as the traditional tourism season winds down. Sales usually begin around 9 a.m. on Friday, August 29, and line the sidewalks of downtown Glen Arbor until Labor Day Monday. Be sure to visit each store for some deals inside, too. Enjoy checking out your favorite places and some new ones too.
Photos of Lake Huron, taken during a family vacation, caused portrait painter Charles Pompilius to consider a new direction for his work. The Ferndale resident talks about how he explored this mid-career transition during his Glen Arbor Art Association (GAAA) artist-residency on Aug. 28 at 7:30 p.m. at the Glen Arbor Art Association, 6031 S. Lake St. in Glen Arbor.
What I did on my summer vacation: the age old cliché, the assignment for school children that both children and teachers dread, in part because it’s so often boring—both for reader and writer. Why is that? Or why is it that when we look at the hundreds of iPhone photos we took of the Sleeping Bear Dune Climb, we never get the rush of flying down the sand. What happened to that feeling of bubbling laughter when Uncle Jack fell through the inner tube into the Crystal River? We think, for example, we can keep the Leelanau County wine tasting alive with pictures alone, but even though pictures recall the image and some association, they don’t recall the narrative, the story of the moment. That’s the limitation of pictures, glorious as they are. So we need words too. We tell the story of the picture, sometimes ad nauseum, to our neighbors back home, but even that, over time, loses its power. That is, until the senses get involved.