County note shelf
Benzie County Porch Notes
Stories, practical details, outdoor places, tax quirks, and local history connected to Benzie County. This shelf has 5 practical notes and 14 local stories.
19 notes
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- History and culture Gwen Frostic's studio: a swamp she refused to give up Gwen Frostic built her press-and-studio on 40 wooded acres near Benzonia in 1964, and her Heidelberg presses still print her linocuts of Michigan nature there today.
- Outdoors The Honor hatchery where Great Lakes salmon began The Platte River State Fish Hatchery near Honor raised the first coho salmon stocked in the Great Lakes in the 1960s and still produces all the DNR's coho today.
- History and culture The Pulitzer-winning historian who grew up on Benzonia's hill Bruce Catton, the Pulitzer-winning Civil War historian, came of age at Benzonia Academy, whose last surviving building is now the Mills Community House.
- History and culture Frankfort's Garden Theater, a century of one screen Frankfort's Garden Theater has shown movies on Main Street since 1924; a community group bought and restored its Art Deco interior in 2009 and runs it still.
- History and culture Frankfort's pier light, the tower that moved by barge Frankfort's North Breakwater Lighthouse was built in 1912 on the old pier, then floated by barge to the end of the new breakwater in 1932, where it still guides the harbor.
- History and culture The Cherry Bowl, a 1953 drive-in still glowing on US-31 The Cherry Bowl Drive-In in Honor opened on the Fourth of July, 1953, and remains one of only a handful of drive-in theaters still running in Michigan.
- History and culture Watervale: a ghost lumber town that became a summer resort Watervale, a 1890s lumber village on Lower Herring Lake in Blaine Township, was nearly abandoned before a Chicago doctor bought the whole town in 1917 and ran it as a resort.
- Money and taxes Does Frankfort have a city income tax? Frankfort, Benzie County's only city, levies no city income tax — and neither does Traverse City, where many Benzie commuters work.
- Outdoors Point Betsie: The Most-Photographed Light on the Lake One of the most photographed lighthouses in the country, tucked in the dunes south of Sleeping Bear — and the last light on Lake Michigan to be tended by hand.
- Outdoors Arcadia Dunes and the southern corner Arcadia Dunes, Watervale, orchards, and quiet farm country define Benzie's southwestern corner.
- History and culture Frankfort and Elberta Frankfort and Elberta share Benzie's Lake Michigan harbor, beach-town life, and a railroad car-ferry past.
- History and culture Honor, Lake Ann, and the Platte River country Honor, Lake Ann, the Platte River, and inland lake country anchor north-central Benzie County.
- Outdoors Point Betsie and the south end of Sleeping Bear Point Betsie, Platte Bay, and the lower Platte River anchor Benzie's wild Lake Michigan shore.
- Home and property Sleeping Bear's Moving Shoreline: Bluff Erosion and Coastal Landslides The bluffs at Sleeping Bear Dunes are glacial moraines that erode continuously and can slide suddenly — and Lake Michigan's cyclical water levels mean the risk rises and falls over the decades.
- Outdoors Crystal Lake Crystal Lake is Benzie County's clear, deep centerpiece, with prized shore property in Benzonia, Crystal Lake, and Lake townships.
- Outdoors Thompsonville and Crystal Mountain Crystal Mountain, the Betsie River headwaters, and wooded resort country shape southeast Benzie County.
- Home and property Well and septic in Benzie County Benzie County has required well and septic evaluations at property transfer since 1992.
- Money and taxes Buying in a township? Watch for special assessments on top of your taxes Michigan township buyers should check for special assessments that can add separate road, sewer, water, lighting, sidewalk, or drain charges.
- Money and taxes In Michigan, you get two property-tax bills a year — not one Most Michigan property owners get separate summer and winter tax bills, with local rules deciding what lands on each bill.