Kids got time off for ‘potato vacation’

The following is an excerpt from “A History of Leelanau Township” by the Leelanau Township Historical Writers Group.

When the white man came, they found the Indians raising potatoes. A few days after the Rev. Smith arrived in 1840, he wrote in his diary: “Bought three bushels of potatoes $1.50 pd. cash.”

Smith cleared some land the first season he was here and raised a number of bushels of potatoes. In 1850 he wrote “I have dug my potatoes 50 bushels.” He stored potatoes in hold in the ground and also in his cellar.