Midwest Guest

Where I live: Michigan Glass Month celebrates 30 years

Glass artists across Michigan get fired up in April as they celebrate Michigan Glass Month.

Michigan Glass Month always brings a schedule of creative events and exhibitions geared to promoting Michigan artists, studios, schools, art centers, museums, collections, and galleries.

Stained glass artist Mark Talaba and Habatat Galleries owner Ferd Hampson conceived this celebration of glass artistry 30 years ago as a series of lectures, exhibitions, demonstrations, and studio visits.   

Today, the annual event promotes artists working with glass in many different forms at galleries, art centers, museums and businesses throughout the state and the greater Great Lakes region with shows, seminars, demonstrations and other celebrations of the art of glass. Over the years, the celebration grew to occasionally include events in March and May, and in other regional locations like northern Ohio and Windsor, Ontario.

This year's schedule includes events traditionally included in Michigan Glass Month like Habatat Galleries 38th Annual International Glass Invitational exhibition and auction in Royal Oak, Michigan. This event features over 90 artists from 16 different countries, and I've heard it described as the oldest and largest contemporary glass exhibition in the world. These pieces can run into five figures at auction, but enjoying the April 24 through May 25 exhibition is free.  

The schedule this year appears to include more events at venues in western Michigan as well.

The 4th Annual Battle of the Glassblowers, hosted by the West Michigan Glass Society in Kalamazoo, is a series of timed glass blowing competitions drawing participants from across the country. This event, billed by the sponsoring society as a "spectator sport", looks like a lot of fun and takes place Friday, April 2 and Saturday April 3.

Teens in Benton Harbor, Michigan, get "Fired Up!" this month as they exhibit their fused, blown and flame worked glass pieces at Water Street Glass Works. This organization is a non-profit, public access school, studio, and gallery that offers classes and workshops for teenage students and adults. Check out this show, and a metal and glass show from Kalamazoo metal smith Holly Fisher, April 17 through May 16.

One of the best places around town to watch glass blowers in action year round is at the 75-year-old "Sandwich Glass Plant" in Greenfield Village, where glass blowers demonstrate the process from start to finish, and you can purchase some of the finished items at the Liberty Craftworks Store or online at the Henry Ford site. Visit the glass studio Saturday April 17 through Monday April 19 when the Greenfield Village glass artisan team creates some special pieces highlighting their talents.

Check out the Michigan Glass Month brochure online, or drop by the organizers' Web site for late updates.  

 

Note: "Where I live" posts are part of a series of periodic stories about special events and people in, and around, metro Detroit. "Where I live" posts are stories I'll post in addition to my regular schedule of stories about attractions around the larger Midwestern region. I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I enjoy writing them.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Shooting Star from North Star, Ohio

Many people think Annie Oakley came from the wild west, and in a sense, they're correct. The shooting star known as "Little Sure Shot" was born in an area known as "the wilds" of western Ohio, near a little town called North Star, so perhaps it was pre-ordained that she become one of the world’s best-known shooting stars.

Discovering Annie Oakley's gravesite came as a surprise as we were driving Highway US-127 along Ohio's western border. I spotted a small sign along the side of the road pointing to Annie Oakley's grave, and I immediately turned off of the main highway to travel about a mile on a side road to reach the rather unassuming Brock Cemetery.

Annie Oakley was born in a log cabin about five miles east of North Star in rural Darke County on August 13, 1860 as Phoebe Ann Mosey. Spellings of her family's surname include "Mozee", "Moses", "Mauzy", and "Mosty" among other variations, but her living relatives at the Annie Oakley Foundation go with "Mosey" because that version appeared on her father's gravestone and military records from the War of 1812.

Her father struggled to provide for his family, working the farm and driving a wagon 14 miles into Greenville to sell corn and wheat. In 1866, he drove through a blizzard and arrived home with frozen hands and feet and unable to speak. He died from the overexposure to the cold weather

His death plunged the family deeper into poverty. Phoebe lived at the county "poor farm" for a while, and then went out to live with, and work for, an abusive family. The Mosey family reunited around the time Phoebe was 13 or 14.

Phoebe Ann began using her father's old rifle to hunt by the age of eight. Her shooting helped feed the family, provided meat they sold, and helped pay off the mortgage on the farm by the time Phoebe was 15.

In 1875, she won a contest in Cincinnati, Ohio, against marksman Frank Butler. The two eventually married, and Phoebe took the stage name Annie Oakley from the name of an area near Cincinnati where she and Frank lived as she began touring in circuses with him as his assistant.

Frank Butler quickly realized that his wife was more talented and marketable, so he became her assistant and manager.

Annie and Frank joined Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show in 1885, where Annie was the star attraction for 17 years.

Annie's signature shooting tricks included shooting dimes tossed into mid air from 90 feet away, splitting a playing card in two edgewise with a shot from 30 paces away, and shooting the ashes from a cigarette her husband held in his mouth.

Annie Oakley taught many women to use guns. She felt shooting was good physical and mental exercise, and an excellent means of self-defense.

She offered to organize regiments of female sharpshooters during the Spanish American War and World War I, even promoting the idea of women serving in combat positions with the armed services. No one took her up on those offers, but Annie did demonstrate gun safety to servicemen during and raise money for the Red Cross during World War I.

Annie died of pernicious anemia on November 3, 1926 in Greenville, Ohio. Frank Butler died 18 days later.

As you can see in the photos here, the couple's gravesite sits among other graves and near the cemetery lane, with another modest sign.

A stretch of Ohio's route 127 in Darke County became "Annie Oakley Memorial Pike" in 2000, and it only seems fitting that a sign in the village of North Star identifies it as being near the birthplace of one of the world's best-known shooting stars.

 

Want to learn more? Check out some of these books about this fascinating woman and her life:

Annie Oakley by Shirl Kasper

The Life and Legacy of Annie Oakley (Oklahoma Western Biographies) by Glenda Riley

Annie Oakley (a DK Biography) by Charles M. Wills

Addendum: The State of Ohio erected a historical marker next to Annie's grave shortly after our visit there. You can see a few photos of the marker by the gravesite at the bottom of this page.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Things To Do
Greenville

Photo Friday-Driving Wilco Road in Empire, Michigan

I hope everyone enjoyed my posts about Empire, Michigan, these past couple of weeks. It is one of our favorite "Up North" destinations, and I've enjoyed sharing some of my favorite places in this cool little northern Michigan town.

The Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive in the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore is probably the area's best known scenic road, but another favorite of mine is the winding Wilco Road that snakes down the hill coming out of Empire and empties onto M-22.

I imagine that the name "Wilco" comes from the fact that the Empire Air Force Station sits atop this hill, and "wilco" is radio/signaling jargon used as a contraction of the phrase "will comply".

The Air Force Station was home to the 752nd Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron of the U.S. Air Force from 1950-1979, in other words, it served as a radar station during the Cold War that could alert the U.S. in case of foreign military threats.

You can check out the station (which always reminds me of an oversized golf ball when I spot it on the way into town) on the way down the hill.

I don't think Wilco Road is more than a mile long, but I just enjoy the winding drive through the woods.

There really aren't any places to stop along the most scenic stretch of Wilco Road, but I didn't let that stop me one sunny summer day. In a true don't-try-this-at-home moment, I stuck my left hand with my trusty little point-and-shoot camera out of the car window, snapping merrily away as I drove on down Wilco.

No, Tim wasn't there to stop such foolishness. But I got the photos I wanted!

Thanks to Debbie Dubrow of Delicious Baby for creating and coordinating Photo Friday to link travel photos and blog posts across the Web.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive at Michigan's Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore

Pierce Stocking learned to appreciate the beauty of the Sleeping Bear Dunes as a young lumberjack in northern Michigan. The self-taught naturalist's desire to share the wonders of the shifting dune landscape with its sweeping views of sites like Lake Michigan, Glen Lake, and the Manitou Islands inspired him to build a scenic drive that today bears his name.

The 7.5 mile Pierce Stocking Scenic drive loops through the dune area and includes several especially breath-taking scenic overlooks. This drive is the most accessible way to park and see a lot of these views without walking long distances, making it an ideal way to tour the area with young children or others who cannot walk long distances or who have mobility issues.

Stocking's background as a lumberjack gave him an expertise in building roads through difficult terrain. He began planning the process of building a road to allow others to share in the beauty he saw as he walked along the top of the bluffs during the early 1960s. The completed road opened to the public in 1967, and Stocking operated the scenic drive until his death in 1976.

Stocking's road became part of the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in 1977. Public opinion strongly supported naming the road for him, so it officially became the Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive several years after the visionary lumberman's death.

You can just drive the road in a few minutes, but a series of overlooks and other designated stops along the route allow visitors to learn about the area's history, see the diverse vegetation in the park, learn how the landscape changed over the years, and take in some great views.

Maps for the self-guided tour of Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive are often available at the road's entrance, but it may be best to stop at the park's visitor center in Empire to pick up a map as they seem less likely to run out of the brochures during the busy summer season. You can also purchase the park pass required to drive the route at the visitors' center.

The road opens from 9 a.m. until a half hour after sunset, and closes pretty much entirely from late autumn through mid-spring. A 20 m.p.h. speed limit encourages drivers to slow down and enjoy the scenery. You can ride your bicycle along the route, but extremely steep grades, sharp turns, and sometimes heavy traffic make that something only the most experienced bicyclists should attempt.

One of the observation decks along the route sits 450 feet above Lake Michigan and atop a steep, steep bluff created by a mix of rocks and sand deposited long ago by melting glaciers.

The temptation to descend this dune is apparently too much for some visitors, in spite of the danger posed by the steepness of the slope and increasing concerns about erosion in the area. The scenic drive attracts over 200,000 visitors each year, and while a recent environmental assessment of the overlooks found no significant impact on the area, officials plant to more carefully monitor bluff and dune climbing activity with an eye toward safety and preventing future damage to the environment.

Stops along the way include two picnic areas and a covered bridge with a turn out where you can park and take photos.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Things To Do
Empire

Where I live: All aboard for Thomas the Tank Engine's annual visit to Michigan's Greenfield Village

Many families anxiously wait for spring when Thomas the Tank Engine travels to Michigan's beautiful Greenfield Village. I'd hate to see little train enthusiasts disappointed, so here's your heads-up for those popular Thomas dates so you can get in on advance tickets sales and not get left behind at the station!

Thomas visits the village April 24-25, May 1-2, and May 8-9. Riding the train will be the highlight for most visitors, when Thomas takes passengers on a 20-minute ride around the perimeter of Greenfield Village. There are also other activities like storytelling, arts and crafts programs, live music, and, of course, a place to purchase all of those must-have Thomas toys and gear! (Can't wait until then to pick up a Thomas book, wooden train engine, or Thomas flashlight--there's always Amazon!).

The Henry Ford has a detailed FAQ on their Web site about Thomas' impending visit, details about a new Railroaders' Breakfast offered each Saturday morning of Thomas' stay at the Village, and information about ordering Thomas admission tickets online.

We happened to snap a few photos of Thomas at Greenfield Village when we went out for one of our first photo trips of the season there a few years ago.

If you are going to see Thomas and ride the train, hopefully you can still make some time to tour the rest of Greenfield Village.

Even though we don't have kids and aren't into the whole Thomas scene, we found those days a good time to visit Greenfield Village. The arrival of spring meant the weather was starting to get warmer, there was a hint of green in the landscape, and once we got past the crowd of families waiting to board the Thomas train, it was nice for taking photos because the rest of the village was relatively less crowded.

Note: "Where I live" posts are part of a series of periodic stories about special events and people in, and around, metro Detroit. "Where I live" posts are stories I'll post in addition to my regular schedule of stories about attractions around the larger Midwestern region. I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I enjoy writing them.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Manning Memorial Lighthouse in Empire, Michigan

Robert Manning always wished that his hometown of Empire, Michigan, had a lighthouse to help guide him safely to shore after his many evening fishing trips, and his friends and family finally made his wish come true with the lighting of the Robert H. Manning Memorial Light at Empire’s Lake Michigan Beach Park in 1990.

I wondered about the little light tower when I first saw it at the park. The 35-foot-tall tower is smaller than a conventional light tower, but it is has a fully functional light beacon. The Coast Guard even included the light on their Great Lakes navigational charts.

Manning, a life-long Empire resident, died at the age of 62 in 1989. His often expressed wish for a lighthouse was sort of joke among Manning and his family and friends, but his family and friends made sure his memory and love of Great Lakes fishing lived on by raising the money to build one of just three memorial lighthouses in Michigan (the state’s other two memorial lighthouses are both in Detroit-the William Livingstone Memorial Light on Belle Isle and the small memorial lighthouse at the Tricentennial State Park on the Detroit River).

The white stucco-clad wooden Manning Memorial tower is capped by a green lantern room and railing. The structure’s design includes decorative features like grey-stained windows and a gold ball topping the peak of the light tower’s roof. The tower’s design also bears a passing resemblance to the nearby Point Betsie Lighthouse.

There is a smaller replica of the Manning Memorial Lighthouse at Lake Havasu in Arizona. That 20-foot-tall tower is part of a collection of more than 15 small scale replicas that allow the Arizona community to lay claim to having more lighthouses than any other city in America. Lake Havasu, incidentally, is also home to a recreation of an 1831-vintage London Bridge that spanned the River Thames until 1967, when Lake Havasu officials brought the original bridge’s dismantled pieces to America and reconstructed it.

The view from the Manning Memorial Light would be far more difficult to replicate, though. The light tower’s location on Lake Michigan, along the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, overlooks scenic dunes, bluffs, and white sand beach.

The Village of Empire owns the Manning light, and the light’s location in the village park is just two blocks north of the junction of Michigan highways 22 and 72 in Empire.

Check out earlier Midwest Guest stories about Empire, Michigan, including Empire, a quintessential and quirky small northern Michigan town

Curious about Arizona’s Lake Havasu? Check out Lake Havasu City: Images of America by Frederic B. Wildfang

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Photo Friday: Michigan says “Keep your swimsuit on!”

You might imagine my surprise when I spotted this sign on a beach near Empire, Michigan, advising visitors to remain clothed.

A stretch of beach about one mile north of Esch Road near Otter Creek in the Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore is relatively quiet and undeveloped, apparently making it popular as a sort of “unofficial nude beach”.

We’ve wandered around this area for years, and we’ve yet to see any nekkid folks. But kayakers out paddling along the scenic coast have apparently discovered a bit more scenery than they bargained for in some cases.

This sign reminds visitors that Michigan laws prohibit clothing-optional sunbathing, although some sources say enforcement of the law in this particular area is pretty casual and most normally consists of a park ranger politely requesting that sunbathers opting to forgo clothing put their clothing back on.

Consider yourself forewarned if you wander too far down a deserted beach in the area with the family!

Thanks to Debbie Dubrow of Delicious Baby for creating and coordinating Photo Friday to link travel photos and blog posts across the Web.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Eat at Joe’s in Empire, Michigan

What’s a great northern Michigan small town without a great northern Michigan bar like Joe’s Friendly Tavern in Empire, Michigan?

Much as Empire is one of those quintessential northern Michigan small towns, Joe’s is one of those quintessential small-town joints where you immediately feel at home the moment you walk into the door and belly up to the bar. And people have been making themselves at home at Joe’s for about 70 years!

We’ve loved going to Joe’s for years. I remember it being one of the first places Tim and I went out to eat when we started going “up North” years ago.

It’s a great place to stop for a cold beer on a hot summer day, and it’s an equally great place to go for a hot bowl of soup on a cold winter night.

When I finally conquered the Sleeping Bear Dune Climb a few years ago, the first place I went after coming back down from the top of the dune was Joe’s—to enjoy what I considered to be a well-earned beer and cheeseburger.

Summer brings a lot more tourists and family groups out to Joe’s. The pace slows down during the cold winter months when you might only have to share the place with a regular or two who wander into the bar to pluck their personal mugs from a rack on the back wall to help themselves to coffee. Our most recent trip to Joe’s was during the winter, when we had the place to ourselves, and I shot these photos. 

Joe’s Friendly serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but visitors may best know the place for its burgers. Joe’s burgers come from meat freshly ground in their own butcher shop each day, and the humble patties earned coverage in the New York Times, the Flint Journal, the Lansing State Journal, Traverse City Record-Eagle, Traverse Magazine, the Detroit Free Press, and the local weekly, the Leelanau Enterprise.

Check out the appetizer menu for a real northern specialty, fried smelt with tartar sauce. Order these little fried fish to share with your table mates. Smelt are so small, they aren’t boned before cooking, so be sure to eat them quickly as bones harden as the fish cools.

If you want to have a more swanky dining experience, try Joe’s version of “surf and turf”, a burger with grilled onion accompanied by a half pound of fried smelt.

Other menu favorites of mine include: grilled cheese sandwiches (one of my pet peeves are restaurants that have grilled cheese only on their kids’ menus and don’t allow adults to order them), corn-meal dusted lake perch or walleye, whitefish cooked campfire style (steamed in tin foil after a quick marking on the charbroiler), or tater tots as a side dish with your meal.

Take a little bit of Joe’s home with you by purchasing a T-shirt, sweatshirt, or a jug of Joe’s own draft root beer at the bar before you leave.

I can’t wait for my next trip north because writing this definitely makes me hungry for to visit Joe’s Friendly for a burger or some fried smelt!

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Empire, a quintessential and quirky small northern Michigan town

We love visiting the Village of Empire, Michigan, not only because it is right in the middle of the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore area and home to the national park’s headquarters and visitor center, but also because it is just one of those cool little northern Michigan small towns.

The wide Front Street running through the village looks pretty serene in this wintertime view, when about 400 year-round residents pretty much have the place to themselves, but come summer, this village about 25 miles west of Traverse City teems with tourists. Visitors come for the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore and Empire events like the annual Dunegrass Festival in summer, which has a full bill of folk and bluegrass music plus displays by local artisans.

I always eagerly await Michigan’s late spring/early summer asparagus season because asparagus is one of my favorite vegetables. Several farms around Empire grow asparagus, and the little town embraces the veggie in a big way with an annual Asparagus Festival.

Producers at the MSN Travel site even took note of this quirky festival, naming it one of the ten weirdest festivals in the world last year.

I hope to get up to Empire during mid-May one of these years to attend the Asparagus Fest. The festival, now in its seventh year, features asparagus, plenty of parties, music, a parade, asparagus theme costumes, asparagus eats at restaurants and stores around town, recipe contests, and cook-offs. One area brewery even offered asparagus beer last year!

Empire also has a great free, public park on the shore of Lake Michigan. The Lake Michigan Beach Park offers an excellent view of the Empire Bluff, which you can see in these summer and winter views. The northwest winds and wide sand beach make it a great place for kite-flying in the spring, while summertime visitors like swimming in the big lake, crossing the parking lot to swim in the smaller and warmer South Bar Lake at the park, or picnicking with friends and family.

Park visitors can also learn about Empire’s history and the importance of the logging industry in the village’s early development by checking out a state historical marker at the former site of the Empire Lumber Company. Plus, geocachers can log another find at this site.

Settlers first came to Empire in the mid-1850s. The community supposedly took its name from a schooner that went aground nearby in 1865, and the vessel served as a village school that winter.

Lumbering came to Empire in a big way in 1887 when the T. Wilce Company established the Empire Lumber Company to provide hardwood for a Wilce-owned flooring business in Chicago. The lumber company quickly became one of the largest hardwood mills in Michigan, making Empire a lumbering boom town in the 1890s and early 1900s.

The village population soared to 1,000 by 1900. The last Empire lumber mill burned down by 1917, spelling the end of the village’s busy lumbering era.

In 1972, the local historians established the Empire Heritage Group to preserve the area’s past. A museum complex that includes a main building, old schoolhouse, fire house and a barn is open during the summer and early autumn.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

Photo Friday: Retro repro sign at Michigan McDonald's

I always loved the vintage sign that stood in front of a McDonald’s in Madison Heights, Michigan, until that restaurant modernized their signage and donated the old sign to The Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan.

That vintage Micky D’s sign made an appearance in one of my very first posts here at Midwest Guest in 2008, and it made a cameo appearance in my 2009 story about a vintage diner at The Henry Ford.

McDonald’s ceased using the Speedee character featured on the vintage signs in the early 1960s, so, you might imagine my curiosity when I spotted this sign earlier this winter in front of a Micky D’s in Dearborn Heights, Michigan.

It turns out that the Dearborn Heights sign is a retro reproduction in front of a McDonald’s that bills itself as the “world famous 50s McDonalds”. A closer look at the sign shows it marked as a “50s” restaurant in the spot where the vintage sign at The Henry Ford features the 15-cent burger price.

Franchisee Eric Bardha spent $500,000 and one year to create a 1950s themed McDonald’s to replace an aging McDonald’s, opening the retro restaurant in 1988.

The restaurant’s 1950s theme is particularly well-suited to its location on Telegraph Road, a major metro Detroit cruising route throughout the years that still draws classic car owners for the annual Telegraph Tomorrow Car Cruise each summer. The 50s McDonald’s is popular among classic car owners who show up for classic car nights at the restaurant.    

There is a similar retro reproduction sign at a Lapeer, Michigan, Micky D’s.

Thanks to Debbie Dubrow of Delicious Baby for creating and coordinating Photo Friday to link travel photos and blog posts across the Web.

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved