Early photo of cows running free on Manistique’s West side
During the 1880s and 90s cattle were allowed to roam free in the city of Manistique. The Schoolcraft County Pioneer commented on the issue as early as June of 1884: “We hear a little trouble brewing in the county over the fact that cattle are allowed to run at large. Three years ago the Board of Supervisors voted to suspend the provisions of the cattle restraining law in this county; whether they have done anything since about it we have not found out but presume it remains the same.”
The issue came to a head in the mid 1890s when incidents of cows pilfering produce from local grocers skyrocketed and customers were driven from the boardwalks by gangs of free roving bovines. Complaints were brought to the city council and new ordinances were enacted. The cow issue in Manistique caught the attention of newspapers as far away as Pennsylvania—and in 1897 Harper’s Weekly did a satirical editorial about the town and its cows.
DOWNFALL OF MANISTIQUE COWS from Harper’s Weekly
One of the pleasing signs of the times is the marked increase in civic pride noted throughout the country. In different cities this has manifested itself in different ways. In New York it has shown in the formation of good government clubs and the partial, at least, purification of party politics. A widely different, though not less commendable example of it comes in newspaper reports from Manistique, Michigan. This is nothing less than the immediate demand of the leading business men and better citizens that cows be prohibited from running at large in the daytime or at least that they be put on the same plane with bicycles and kept off the sidewalks.
Abuse must of course precede reform, and, as may be naturally inferred, the cows have long enjoyed unusual privileges at Manistique. In fact cow’s rights have been more fully realized there than at any other place in the country, practically no distinction being made between them and other citizens, except on election day, when the cows have not been allowed to vote. There are not wanting persons in Manistique who maintain that cows have felt this unjust discrimination, and that they have been wont to get together on election day and bellow most dismally for equal suffrage. But this, of course, can only be idle fancy.
It is a fact, however, that the cows have long enjoyed all other civic privileges; and it must here be sadly recorded that they have abused these privileges shamelessly. Not content with being allowed to use the sidewalks, they have gathered in droves on leading corners and important crossings and compelled other people to take the street. They have knocked over clothing store “dummies,” upset cigar store Indians, broken plate glass windows with their horns, switched their tails against visitors, and impeded traffic on the trolley-lines by lying down on the tracks while they chewed their cuds. Another trick of theirs has been putting their heads in at open windows and either lowing mournfully or snorting in an alarming manner. It was a Manistique editor who one day had the unpleasant experience, while writing an article for his paper on the “Growth of Metropolitanism in Our Midst,” of suddenly becoming conscious of a brindle cow looking over his shoulder and unblushingly breathing in his ear.
But even these manifest outrages on the part of the bovine citizens brought out no protest from the other people. At last, however, the cows went too far, and their rights have been abridged. For years they had subsisted on the pasturage which the side streets, lawns of well-to-do residents, and the public parks afforded, and no complaint was made. No one else wanted the grass and it was generally recognized as belonging to the cows. Besides, the practice saved a man from owning and operating a lawn mower, always an obnoxious implement. But as usual with monopolists, the cows became dissatisfied, and began converting liberty into license. Last spring, though the grass was a foot long in Schoolcraft Park, and many fine lawns were practically untouched, they turned away and began to feed exclusively on vegetables displayed in front of the groceries and markets. Naturally, there was a protest on the part of the tradesmen.
In the past they had not objected to the cows occasionally sampling a squash or nipping a head of lettuce, or even making off with a new potato or a peach, but it got so the cows, in the words of the dispatch, “cleaned out the markets before the regular customers could get a chance.” There was, of course, a great outcry by everybody, except possibly a few of the more conservative citizens; but these were usually large owners of cows, and but little interested in marketing. It soon became no uncommon thing for a merchant to be summoned from his store to find two cows fighting over a cucumber which lay on the sidewalk between them; and often in attempting to rescue the vegetable he would be bunted over by a third cow, who would seize the fruit of contention, and bolt with it between her teeth like a cigar. One critical old black and white animal was one morning observed standing before a basket of locally grown onions and regarding them with a supercilious and disgusted air. A probable explanation offered was that she was waiting for the grocery man to bring out a crate of Bermuda onions. Of course this thing could not go on for long. A public meeting was soon called to devise ways and means for controlling the cows. Both extreme and moderate measures were proposed. The conservatives in the meeting were in favor of prohibiting the cows from walking on the sidewalks or gathering in the band stand in the park on Sunday. This was met by the radicals with the sarcastic inquiry if the animals would not be compelled to carry a lamp at night and ring a bell when approaching a crossing. Another man humorously suggested that a cow be licensed to eat two radishes in the forenoon, and one tomato and two bunches of local or one Kalamazoo celery in the afternoon, and to be entitled to one drink a day out of the fountain in Mayor Bushnell’s yard. The conservatives tried to rally, but were met with the enraged radicals and were defeated. It was decided that cows must be kept off the street at all hours, and it is now possible to buy fresh vegetables in Manistique and ambitious young heifers no longer put their heads in at the general delivery of the post office, to the consternation of the young lady in charge.
The cows of Manistique abused their privileges and lost them. Many very able politicians may learn a valuable lesson from this simple experience of the Manistique cows.
A GRIEVANCE IN MANISTIQUE – Warren Pa. Evening News, Oct. 10, 1895
The grocers in Manistique, Mich., are making a complaint. They waited long ere they did so, suffering in silence. Manistique is a very independent town. The spirit of liberty that perched upon the sails of the Mayflower still soars and spreads itself, especially over Manistique. All men are free there, and women are as nearly free as the law will let them be. The dogs, cats and pigs are free. Even the cows roam at their own sweet will and pasture upon the streets of Manistique. It is a goodly sight, the streets of Manistique, when the June grass is at its best, with shining, large-eyed Holsteins and Jerseys switching their tails and chewing their cuds in infinite comfort under the very shadow of the church belfries. But as the summer begins to wane and pasturage gets short, the pretty beasties are less content. They leave the streets and begin to pasture on the grocers’ layouts. Cabbages, apples, potatoes, and even peach butter are all one to them. They make a regular Thanksgiving dinner of the whole kit.
The gentle grocers could neither kick the cows, nor kick against them. Any indignity to Mrs. Jenkins’ cow and Jenkins would come no more for her weekly pound of sugar or bar of soap. But the thing grew serious. Even with piecing out with the little economies of weight and measure, the infinitesimal mixing of skim milk with cream, and the infinitesimal substitution of this for that which are the secrets of the grocer trade, the cows still ate up all the profits. Now the grocers beg the city council for relief.
We hereby extend to the grocers of Manistique our heartfelt sympathy.