IRONTON FERRY REGULATIONS

The Ironton Ferry pictured above was required to have a life boat. Since there was not room enough on board for it to be carried, the problem was solved by attaching the life boat to davits and floating it along side.

THE COW BARN OF THE LOEB FARM, 1922

THE COW BARN AS IT LOOKED IN 1972

(Both pictures were taken from the Loeb road near the old baseball diamond, looking south. The main highway, M66, is on the far side of the building.)

SAD STATE OF THE WATERFRONT

From about 1900 on there was a creeping deteriotation, a trend toward a harsh ugliness in Charlevoix-the-Beautiful, hardly noticable to the casual eye. Very few new homes were being built and the old ones were falling into disrepair. The waterfront on the west shore of Round Lake was especially bad, a terrible eyesore to anyone who would take the time to look it over. The docks had fallen into disuse, for the schooners, tugs, and small steamers that had formerly made use of them were rapidly disappearing. The large steamers of that day, such as the MANITOU, the ILLINOIS, the MISSOURI, and the KANSAS, used Wilbur's dock to the exclusion of all others. Even that busy dock, being privately owned, was maintained with a minimum of expense, and was in a sorry shape.

Trash in back of the stores on Bridge Street was allowed to pile up. There were tins of ashes in great heaps. Garbage was burned on the spot if disposed of at all and the stench seemed to permeate the whole area. Waist high weeds and junk of all kinds were mixed together. A walk on the narrow meandering footpath between the stores and the docks would leave one's clothes well decorated with murdocks. The wooden docks were literally rotting away. To walk on them without watching each step was to court disaster.