News History & Fun in Michigan
Hillman, Michigan, grew from Brush Creek into a village shaped by timber, railroads, farms, fire and Lake Avalon. Its story includes department stores, hotels, grain elevators, service stations, resort cottages and a late-arriving railroad that changed the town, but did not define it.
Caro, Michigan, became more than a county seat. Its growth came from sugar beets, railroads, hospitals, public offices, electric power and the Caro Fair. This look back shows how one Thumb town became a working center for farm families, merchants and travelers.
The 1908 Metz Fire destroyed the village of Metz, Michigan, and killed 37 people. Hundreds were left homeless. The most painful chapter came when a Detroit & Mackinac Railway relief train derailed after intense heat damaged the rails near Nowicki’s Siding.
Rives Junction helped define Michigan’s land system in 1815, then became a busy rail crossing that never grew. This story explains why a place so important stayed small.
Copemish, Michigan began as a railroad stop and logging town in Manistee County. These early photos show a busy small town built on timber, railroads, and local businesses that served the people who lived and worked there.
Fenton was more than a lake stop. Rail lines, cement plants, and one 1914 factory fire shaped the town’s early years. Here are the scenes that explain what changed—and what stayed.
Ortonville’s early 1900s video show a working Main Street, a depot on the Detroit United Railway line, and a hotel called the Yolande House. A federal crash report from 1929 adds the hard edge: progress came fast, and it came with risk for local riders.
Michigan once supplied nearly all of America’s chicory. This report traces how farms, factories, and railroads built a quiet but profitable coffee industry across the state.
