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DRUMMOND ISLAND
POINTS
OF
INTEREST
North Haven Rentals & Gifts. A good first stop on the island, this log lodge has an upscale gift shop, canoe, kayak, and pontoon boat rentals, maps, and advice ...
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Drummond Island Yacht Haven. A big marina with a variety of boat rentals (from fishing to pontoon boats), also guides, and lots of supplies and gear ...
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Drummond Island Historical Museum. Items include items used by Indians, Finnish farmers, Yankee settlers, plus displays of a British fort, the lumber era, ferry boats, and commercial fishing ...
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Drummond Island Resort & Conference Center. 2000 acres bought by Domino's Pizza magnate Tom Monaghan with a beautiful golf course, a lavish retreat, a splendid bowling alley, restaurants, a beautiful clay shooting range ...
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Big Shoal Township Beach. A tucked-away sand beach in a cove ...
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Back country adventures. 200-foot-high cliffs, a river connecting 4 lakes with wild rice and loons, a limestone outcropping with rare grasslands and alpine plants, a place rich in fossils, a protected bay with 30 islands ...
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Drummond Island Resort & Conference Center
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The resort and corporate retreat built by the various inspirations of pizza magnate Tom Monaghan are interesting even to people who don't stay there. In 1991 a group of mainly local people bought the whole place, 2,000 acres, for pennies on the dollar of what it cost to develop. The Rock, designed by Harry Bowers, is one of Michigan's most beautiful and unusual golf courses, carved out of the wilderness and studded with rock outcrops. Golfers can see deer, eagles, and an occasional bear. A driving range and the Halfway Shack are on Maxton Rd. almost a mile west of the lodge. Rates for 18 holes including carts range from $39 in spring and fall to $69 in summer. Call (906) 493-1006 for tee times.
Monaghan's longtime fascination with Frank Lloyd Wright shows itself off in the resort's most beautiful area on Potagannissing Bay. The expansive Monaghan originally envisioned Domino's Lodge as a retreat for his corporate families, where they could bond, relax, and at the same time think about pizza and Tiger baseball. Successfully imitating Wright's mature style, Monaghan designed (often on napkins) three of the cottages built here. One was for himself and his chief executives, one for former U-M football coach Bo Schembechler, then the Tigers' general manager, and one for Sparky Anderson, then the Tigers' manager. Many of these wonderful vacation homes can be rented (for not outrageous sums) by anyone who needs to accommodate groups from four or eight to 18. See "Drummond Island lodgings." Monaghan learned Wright's knack for creating alternately cozy and expansive spaces and integrating outdoors and indoors in a special way. It can be experienced in the beautiful Bayside restaurant, in the heart of the onetime Domino family compound. The restaurant is open to the public from June through September and weekends in winter. See "Drummond Island Restaurants." The main dining room's walls were built twice, after Monaghan changed his mind - something for which he was famous in these years (the 1980s). Many islanders have reaped the rewards of a trip to the dump, scavenging high-quality plywood and other building materials ripped out from projects Monaghan deemed unsatisfactory. Across the road down to the water is an outdoor chapel designed by well-known architect Gunnar Birkerts, which can be booked for weddings.
Monaghan's intense focus on the details of fast, hot pizza delivery had made him very rich and given him the time and money to indulge his passions, principally for architecture, and to treat his friends and business associates lavishly. But things quickly got out of control at Domino's Lodge. Some of his corporate family members wanted more to do than just fish and boat, which led to the golf course, which was way over budget, which lead to the idea to invite the public to golf there - while at the same time keeping outsiders well separated from the Dominoids. (Today Monaghan devotes his time, energy, and money to conservative Catholic projects in Nicaragua and in Ann Arbor, including the new Ave Maria Law School. He has radically simplified his life - his style always vacillated between poles of luxury and austerity - and is determined to die a poor man.)
On Drummond Island, Monaghan invited the late Charles Moore, once the prominent head of Yale's architecture school, to design a resort hotel up near the golf course. It was completed in 1990. Moore, known for his high-spirited and playful contextual approach to design, took his design cues from the northwoods sawmill that had been on the site. Woodmoor Lodge used massive logs accented with splashes of bright color and lots of metal details like rafter brackets and corrugated siding. It was a much more industrial look than the archetypical northwoods log lodge. Today the bright colors have been replaced with additional logs. The hotel building materials (logs, native sandstone, and corrugated metal) related to local building traditions. The lodge interior is an attractive, striking place, in a dramatic, decorator sort of way, with Navajo-style rugs, cowhide rugs, and other stylish rusticana of the day. Anyone expecting the characteristic Wrightian integration of outdoors and indoors will be disappointed. The asphalt parking comes almost right up to the hotel. Alluding to simple northern Michigan sawmill towns, the related areas (pool, bowling alley, tennis courts, gym, etc.) form a main street and town square linked by walkways.
The public PINS BOWLING CENTER, next to the lodge, was also designed by Moore. Its exposed rafters and posts are painted bright colors, intensifying the playful mood established by corrugated metal towers with wood decorations. (These were inspired by Russian churches.) Pins' eight lanes are open from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. in season. Call extension 1004 for lane times. Pins Bar and Grill (see Restaurants) is one of the island's recommended eateries.
THE CEDARS SPORTING CLAYS course is also open to the public in season from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. by advance reservation. It's about 3/4 mile from the lodge, by the golf course driving range on Maxton Rd. Call (906) 493-1006. The course "was built to simulate the countless types and angles of shots an avid upland bird hunter or waterfowler may encounter. . . 12 different stations [are situated along] a winding path . . . among Drummond Island's beautiful cedar and birch-maple woodlands." Rates are $20 per person per round of 50 targets, shells not included. Shotguns can be rented for $20 extra. Instruction available; groups welcome.
Most parts of Drummond Island Resort (lodge, golf pro shop, bowling alley, Pins restaurant) are on Maxton Rd. about two miles east of Drummond village. It's clearly signed from Johnswood Rd. and from Drummond Rd. Bayside Fine Dining is on Tourist Rd. on the water. (800) 999-6343. (906) 493-1000 Fax: (906) 493-5576. Handicap accessible: most of the resort, including the lodge.
Return to Drummond Island
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