Jennings: the lumber town that all but disappeared

On the wooded west shore of Crooked Lake, just west of Lake City, sits a quiet little community called Jennings. It’s hard to believe now, but a hundred-some years ago this was one of the biggest, busiest towns in the whole county.

Jennings began in 1883 as a company lumber town built by the Mitchell brothers of Cadillac — they named it “Mitchell” at first, then “Jennings” once it got a post office. At its peak it had something like two thousand people, with sawmills running on the lake, a charcoal-chemical plant, stores, churches, a hotel, and a school. But it was a town built entirely on timber, and when the big pine ran out in the early 1900s, the mills shut down and the people left. The most remarkable part: a lot of Jennings’ houses weren’t simply abandoned but literally jacked up, loaded onto rail cars or skids, and hauled off to Cadillac, where some of them still stand today.

What’s left is a peaceful scattering of homes and cottages around Crooked Lake, ringed by state forest — a fine spot for fishing or a quiet drive, and a reminder of just how fast a lumber boom could rise and fall.