County note shelf
Ingham County Porch Notes
Stories, practical details, outdoor places, tax quirks, and local history connected to Ingham County. This shelf has 6 practical notes and 33 local stories.
39 notes
Read the county shelf
- History and cultureLansing Township comes in five separate piecesAnnexation left Lansing Township as five noncontiguous sections totaling just over five square miles, all threaded between Lansing and East Lansing.
- Money and taxesEast Lansing's Income Tax Is Michigan's Newest, and a College Town Talked Itself Into ItEast Lansing's income tax, live since 2019, is Michigan's most recently adopted, a college town's swap of higher property taxes for a broader levy on paychecks.
- History and cultureBeaumont Tower stands where the first ag classroom in America once didThe carillon tower at the heart of MSU marks the spot of College Hall, the first building in the country built to teach scientific farming — and the lawn around it has its own legend.
- OutdoorsPotter Park Zoo started with a couple of elk somebody gave the cityThe zoo that calls itself Michigan's first grew out of a small herd of native animals kept in a Lansing park along the Red Cedar River, and it's still run by the county a century later.
- History and cultureThere was a roller coaster on Lake Lansing for forty yearsThe county beach at Lake Lansing in Haslett was once a full amusement park with a coaster and a dance hall — and the old carousel building still stands as a reminder.
- History and cultureYou can see the Mason courthouse dome from the farm fieldsIngham County's 1902-05 courthouse in Mason is a Beaux-Arts landmark with a clock tower visible from the surrounding farmland.
- History and cultureA whole pioneer village sits in the shadow of the Meridian MallMeridian Historical Village in Okemos gathers seven 1800s buildings — schoolhouse, farmhouse, chapel, and a rare plank-road tollhouse — moved to one park behind the mall.
- OutdoorsFenner Nature Center is 134 acres of wild glacier ridge inside the cityA 134-acre nature preserve on Lansing's east side, built around a glacial esker and maple groves, that a landowner sold to the city in the 1950s on the condition it stay wild.
- OutdoorsHawk Island was a gravel pit before it was a snow-tubing hillA 100-acre Ingham County park inside Lansing, built on the old Sablain gravel pit, with a swimming lake, a splash pad, and a winter snow-tubing run.
- History and cultureHolt is named for a man who never set foot in itHolt, in Delhi Township, started as Delhi Center but renamed its post office in 1860 after Joseph Holt — a U.S. postmaster general who went on to prosecute the Lincoln assassination plot.
- OutdoorsMoores Park Pool was the prototype for the Bintz poolLansing's 1923 Moores Park Pool was the prototype for Wesley Bintz's oval, above-ground municipal pool design. It is closed while the city restores it.
- History and cultureStockbridge built a town hall with a stage in it, and it's still standingThe 1892 town hall on Stockbridge's village square doubled as a theater and meeting hall, and the gazebo out front copies a bandstand that once sheltered the town pump.
- OutdoorsThe Brenke Fish Ladder is a working sculpture you can stand insideOn the Grand River in Lansing's Old Town, a set of curving concrete steps lets fish climb past a dam — and counts as public art at the same time.
- History and cultureThe Lansing Lugnuts named themselves after a car part, on purposeLansing's minor-league ballpark opened in 1996 as Oldsmobile Park, and the team that plays there picked the name Lugnuts as a nod to the city's car-building history.
- History and cultureThe mansion in Lansing's Old Town wears a 1903 face over an 1850s houseThe Turner-Dodge House began as an 1850s home for one of Lansing's founding families, then got a grand Classical Revival makeover that hid the original almost completely.
- OutdoorsThere's a 4,800-acre patch of public hunting land around DansvilleThe Dansville State Game Area, southeast of Lansing near the village of Dansville, is a roughly 4,800-acre block of state land open for deer, turkey, small game, and waterfowl.
- History and cultureWilliamston still has a one-screen movie house on its main dragThe Sun Theatre opened on Williamston's downtown street in 1947, sat abandoned for years, and was rescued by a couple who reopened it as a single-screen cinema in 1980.
- OutdoorsWilliamston's old mill-dam site is now a short run of rapidsWilliamston grew around a dam and mills on the Red Cedar River. Today, a short rapid at the former dam site sits between two public paddling launches.
- OutdoorsWoldumar Nature Center grew out of the estate R.E. Olds built for his daughterThe 180-plus-acre nature preserve on Lansing's western edge began as a riverside estate auto pioneer Ransom Olds built for his daughter, who later gave the land for a nature camp.
- History and cultureLeslie carries the name of a New York familyWhen Leslie Township was organized, legislator J. A. Cornell proposed the name in honor of a respected family he had known in eastern New York.
- OutdoorsWilliamstown's community park grew through volunteers and 520 young treesWilliamstown Township turned 139 acres along the Red Cedar River into sports fields, trails, prairie, and a young woodland shaped by grants, donations, and volunteer work.
- History and cultureWhy Mason, not Lansing, is the county seatMason remains Ingham County's county seat, making Michigan unusual because Lansing is a state capital that is not a county seat.
- History and cultureWhy Doesn't Michigan Have the Death Penalty?Michigan was the first English-speaking government in the world to abolish the death penalty for ordinary crimes, back in 1846 — and it's the only U.S. state with a constitutional ban.
- Money and taxesHow Michigan State University shapes East Lansing — including your taxesMichigan State University defines East Lansing's economy, housing market, taxable land base, and city-income-tax story.
- Rules and licensesRenting out a house in East Lansing? The rules are strictEast Lansing tightly licenses rentals, limits unrelated roommates in single-family neighborhoods, and uses rental overlay districts.
- History and cultureWhy Does the Upper Peninsula Belong to Michigan and Not Wisconsin?Michigan Territory already included the eastern U.P. in 1805. The 1836 statehood compromise added the rest after Michigan gave up its claim to Toledo.
- History and cultureThree MSU Campus Stops Worth KnowingBeal Botanical Garden, the Broad Art Museum, and the Dairy Store make an easy, mostly free introduction to Michigan State's campus.
- History and cultureLansing, birthplace of Oldsmobile and REORansom E. Olds made Lansing an auto town, from Oldsmobile and REO to today's R.E. Olds Transportation Museum.
- History and cultureThe Michigan State Capitol: a domed landmark you can tour for freeMichigan's 1879 State Capitol is a free-to-tour National Historic Landmark and the working center of state government.
- History and cultureMichigan's Capitol Looks Like Marble and Walnut — but a Lot of It Is PaintMuch of the marble and walnut in Michigan's 1879 State Capitol is actually paint — over nine acres of hand-painted surfaces designed to fool the eye.
- Cars and drivingThat '80s Rock Band? Named After a Michigan TruckThe band REO Speedwagon took its name from a Lansing-built delivery truck — named, in turn, for auto pioneer Ransom Eli Olds.
- Cars and drivingThe 'Michigan Left' — Why You Turn Right to Go LeftMichigan's oddest turn makes you drive past your street and U-turn back — and it cuts crashes by 30 to 60 percent.
- History and cultureThe Olive Burger: Michigan's Love-It-or-Hate-It SandwichChopped green olives and a tangy mayo sauce on a burger — mid-Michigan's love-it-or-hate-it specialty, born in the old Kewpee chain.
- Money and taxesLansing and East Lansing both have a city income taxLansing and East Lansing both charge a local income tax, with 1% resident and 0.5% nonresident rates under Michigan's city-income-tax system.
- History and cultureMagic Johnson: From Lansing to HistoryFrom Everett High to a 1979 national title at Michigan State, the kid from Lansing helped change basketball forever.
- History and cultureThe MastodonBefore robins or white pines, Michigan belonged to the giants — and the mastodon, the state fossil, still turns up in farm fields where it browsed 10,000 years ago.
- History and cultureThe capital they built in the woods: Ingham's great gambleIn 1847 Michigan moved its capital to a township wilderness in Ingham County — a decision mocked statewide that built Lansing and made the county the seat of state power.
- Money and taxesBuying in a township? Watch for special assessments on top of your taxesMichigan township buyers should check for special assessments that can add separate road, sewer, water, lighting, sidewalk, or drain charges.
- Money and taxesIn Michigan, you get two property-tax bills a year — not oneMost Michigan property owners get separate summer and winter tax bills, with local rules deciding what lands on each bill.