The railroad bridge crossing Center Highway has just been rebuilt.

THIS TICKET, good for a trip
from Suttons Bay to Omena,
was issued May 15, 1947.

It now supports hikers and bikers, instead of locomotives and railcars.

Two such bridges (the other, nearby, crossed Bingham Road) once carried trains running between Traverse City and Northport.

The Traverse City, Leelanau and Manistique Railroad was built 105 years ago, not to give Suttons Bay, Omena, and Northport rail service (which it did), but to tap the mineral and forest wealth of the Upper Peninsula, where connections were made with the Duluth, South Shore and Atlantic and the Minneapolis, St. Paul and Sault Ste. Marie (the “Soo Line”).

The Grand Rapids and Indiana, which was the first to reach Traverse City in 1872, had taken note of the success of the Ann Arbor Railroad in inaugurating car ferry service between Frankfort and Wisconsin and Upper Peninsula ports.

The Pere Marquette R.R., at Ludington, had also established, just a few years before, a similar service and had several large car ferries built within just a few years.

The G.R. and I. already had a one-third interest in a car ferry operation at the Straits of Mackinac, but a route from Northport to Manistique, Mich., would give the railroad an exclusive, more direct, connection with the Upper Peninsula.

Manistique was almost 90 miles from the Straits, but only about 70 from Northport.

A carferry might have operated from Traverse City to Manistique, but it was felt ice on Grand Traverse Bay would be too much to contend with in the winter months. There would be only a minimum of this encountered at Northport.

The G. R. and I. choose to create a new legal entity for the new operation, hence the “T.C. L. and M. R.R.” Perhaps it was concerned the new venture might fail – which it did.

The appropriate paperwork for the new rail line was filed with the Commissioner of Railroads in November 1901, and construction began the following summer, with Leelanau farmers doing some of the roadwork with their own horses.

Not only local labor, but money, as well, was obtained, to defray the cost of construction and the purchase of right of way.

“Money was pledged by property owners in Leelanau County, particularly from those farmers, businessmen and resort owners who stood to benefit most by the railroad,” local historian Larry Wakefield wrote.

When the first train arrived in Northport, it was like the Fourth of July with hundreds of people on hand.

Humor was interjected into the occasion. A sign near the waterfront read “free drinks” and another, on the bank near the water, read “City Bank.” A clothesline was strung and various garments were hung on it with a sign, “Washout on the Line.”

Car ferry service began in October 1903, but a month later, “the Manistique Marquette and Northern defaulted on its bonds and went bankrupt,” Wakefield wrote.

Control of the line went to the Pere Marquette, which diverted the car ferry (named the Manistique) to Ludington, where it continued to serve Manistique. In 1905, the P.M. itself went bankrupt and lost control of the M.M. and N. and the car ferry came back to Northport – but only for three more years.

But the tracks of the T.C. L. and M. would continue to serve the county for most of the 20th century.

The G.R. and I. gave up the little rail line in 1914 and it operated independently until 1917, when the U.S. government took it over as part of the war effort.

In 1919, it was locally purchased and reorganized as Leelanau Transit Company, which in turn leased the line to the Manistee and Northeastern.

The M.N. and E. was later absorbed by the Pere Marquette, which was itself taken over by the Chesapeake and Ohio 60 years ago.

Nevertheless, the line continued to be operated as the M. and N.E.

Depots, which still stand, were built at Suttons Bay and Northport.

At Omena, a railcar on a siding served the same purpose. An old postcard shows a Grand Rapids and Indiana boxcar, with the center door open and steps leading up to it and people in it. On the platform in front of it there are more people and a couple of bicycles. A horse and buggy is parked at the end of the platform.

The caption beneath the picture reads “Grand Central Depot, Omena, Michigan.”

In 1962, George Hilton wrote “this unpromising piece of trackage has survived to the present day, more than 50 years after the end of the ferry service that brought it into being.”

And Robert Burton also summed it up in Michigan History (Spring, 1967) when he wrote:
“The stories of the Traverse City, Leelanau and Manistique Railroad, and the Manistique, Marquette and Northern Railroad represent the story of many small U.S. railroads established near the end of the great period of railroad expansion. It was conceived with high hopes but some caution; it was beaten by inadequate support and strong competition; it was abandoned by its parents when it became a liability; it continues to lead a precarious existence only because it fills a marginal economic need.”

Burton’s article appeared under the heading, “Car Ferry from Northport: Broken Link to the Upper Peninsula.”