Tag Archives: South Manistique

The Manistique & Lake Superior R.R. – The Haywire Line

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Engine No. 12, March 1932 Image. This locomotive was later renumbered 2370 and was destroyed in the roundhouse fire of 1952. It was scrapped in 1953. (Niles/Helmka Family Collection)

Engine No. 12, March 1932 Image. This locomotive was later renumbered 2370 and was destroyed in the roundhouse fire of 1952. It was scrapped in 1953. (Niles/Helmka Family Collection)

Early History

            Construction of the railroad line between South Manistique and Shingleton was completed in 1898 and was then known as the Manistique and Northwestern Railroad (M&NW). Passenger service from Manistique to Shingleton began on January 1, 1899 with a one-way fare costing $1.35. In 1902 the line became part of a new railroad known as the Manistique, Marquette and Northern (MM&N) offering passenger service between Manistique and Marquette. During 1907, the company relocated the railroad’s roundhouse and shop buildings from South Manistique to Manistique north of its Deer Street depot and offices. The company was reorganized yet another time in July of 1908 and briefly became known as the Manistique & Northern Railroad (M & N). Read More...

Southtown & Jamestown – Timber Boom Towns That Once Was

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The earliest reference to South Manistique or “South-town” is from the early 1880’s.  The town was developed around the Hall and Buell Lumber Company Mill.    The following description of Southtown is from Earnest Williams:  “Several houses in the town had four feet high fences around them to prevent the sand beach from blowing into the yards.  All the streets were sand and grass was basically nonexistent.”

Hall and Buell lad lumber rights around Southtown and on Indian Lake.  They cut the timber and floated it across Indian Lake to a “pull up” between Sunset and Harrison Beaches.  From there it was loaded onto their own railroad and brought to the Southtown mill (The railroad crossed old U.S. 2 near the current location of WTIQ and the gas pipeline). Read More...