Very near to our school house east Mr. J. K. Gunton built the house
which bore the name of "The Gunton House," and was run with success by
himself and wife for a number of years. There was no steamboats coming
to Traverse City in those days. The lumber was shipped by vessel to
Chicago. The schooner "Telegraph" made regular trips every two weeks.
The "Telegraph" brought all the supplies for the Company. At the opening
of navigation it was a pleasant sound to hear someone say for the first
time, "Here comes The Telegraph." Our mails were brought by a mail
carrier from Grand Rapids. An Indian and sometimes a white man carried
the mail. It was brought down along the shore, it being considered the
safest way to travel alone. Sometimes the rivers had no bridges and the
mail carrier had to swim across. Mr. Hugh McGinnis carried the mail on
that long lonely route for a long time while we lived there.
No farms were yet cleared about Traverse City at that time. Mr. Lyman
Smith being the only family living out at Silver Lake, seven miles south
of this city. Soon Mr. Alvin Smith took some land on the west side of
Silver Lake with Mr. West. More people moved in, and soon the Bohemians
came in, settling on the east side of Silver Lake and made nice homes
for themselves. Mr. Rice's family came the next year after we came.
There were five girls in their family. The two eldest soon married, the
other three entered school. Mellisa, Emma and Annie. They lived very
near to us and we girls were always fast friends. We walked to school,
picked berries in summer time, played, sang and worked together. And of
all the places we liked best to go was out to the "Company's Garden."
There we waded the brook, picked the flowers and wild strawberries, and
sometimes we caught the horses that belonged to the Company, and
climbing on their backs we rode around the field, for it was only a
garden in name. It was used for a pasture field for the Company's cattle
and horses. Those were days to be remembered. The little water mill, as
it was called, had a horse car track laid from it down to the west dock
where the lumber was put on the car and the horse drew it to the dock
for shipment. Then what fun we all had to run down the track and get the
ride back on the car.
The huckleberry plains, as they were called, were between east and west
Bay. There on Saturdays, when there was no school, almost everybody went
picking and took their lunches with them. Mrs. and Mr. Garland, one of
our neighbors, moved to Old Mission on a farm and new people took their
house.