GARDEN PENINSULA

Region: Manistique and the Garden Peninsula

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Before Europeans settled the U.P., Native Americans moved to the Garden Peninsula , when the hunting season was over to raise crops and fish. "Garden" refers to its fertile soil and moderate (for the U.P.) climate.
The 21-mile peninsula is well-suited for farming and orchards. The temperatures are more like those of mid-Michigan 150 miles to the south. The microclimate is akin to the wine regions of Leelanau County and the Old Mission Peninsula. Farmers Andy and Janice make wines from grapes grown on their Garden farm. They are the U.P.'s first commercial vintners to grow their own grapes locally. The moist air alao makes Garden well suited to growing red kidney beans, which are processed and bagged here.

As Garden's trees were being logged off, the village boomed. Once it was a logging town. There was a sawmill in Van's Harbor, and 14 bars. "This town used to be hoppin'," said a native. Logging formed the basis of one of the region's great fortunes, that of BILL BONIFAS, a tight-fisted lumberman loathe to squander his money on useless entertainment. A penniless young man from Luxembourg, he started out in the wetlands cutting timber for railroad ties. Here he built up a series of lumber camps, aided by his brothers. Here he met his wife, Catherine, an Irish maid in a boardinghouse; her bequests continue to shape life in Escanaba. (See Escanaba.)

Lake Michigan is hardly ever visible from the Garden Peninsula's paved roads. But some beautiful public beaches are close to the highway. For people who really like to poke around, the peninsula has been a relaxing, congenial place..

Bonifas invested the money he made from Garden logging in Upper Peninsula pine farther west. When that timber was cut, he bought more land out west. By 1936, when he died, he had invested in automobiles, paper, and oil and made fortunes several times over. Escanaba, Bay de Noc Community College, and various Catholic institutions gained immensely from the Bonifas fortune, for Bill and Catherine left no heirs.

Not all the Garden Peninsula’s evocative “ghost town” scenes are within the confines of the Fayette Townsite. This cemetery is just off the road to Fairport.

Escanaba's grateful city government posts the Bonifas story, author anonymous, on its web site, www.escanaba.org/history/bonifasstory.htm. "Unlike Big Bill," it says, "Catherine was shy and retiring, a homebody who, even with millions, scrubbed her own floors and darned her own stockings." Visitors mistook her for the maid, she was so completely unassuming. A trusted advisor and civic leader investigated worthy projects so she wouldn't be hounded by requests for donations. The Bonifas legacy pops up throughout the area. Marygrove in Garden was one of its first fruits.

Lake Michigan is hardly ever visible from the Garden Peninsula's improved roads. But some beautiful public beaches are here. For people who really like to poke around, the peninsula is a relaxing, congenial place — the kind of place where you could be happy for days without going to a town big enough to have a sizable supermarket.

Return to Manistique and the Garden Peninsula

PLACES AROUND GARDEN PENINSULA TO

Eat Sleep Camp