Looking Back: Restrain yourself, gentle reader
CHARLEVOIX — In the March 31 Looking Back appeared an item regarding the editor of the Cheboygan newspaper who, lacking enough content to fill up one issue, resorted to cribbing items from the Charlevoix Sentinel without asking. A regional newspaper called the Progressive caught this, reported it, and Sentinel editor Willard A. Smith gleefully reprinted that opinionated item with no commentary.
But apparently the incident continued to rankle him, and on April 11, 1873 Willard let fly as only he could do, in the first issue of Volume V of his own weekly. Willard was, as of that week, celebrating the fourth anniversary of his highly successful newspaper, and he was in rare form.
“The Thief Speaks.--- After three weeks of careful study, the Cheboygan Independent man can’t find a reasonable excuse for the little matter of four weeks ago, and as silence, under the circumstances, is painfully embarrassing, he takes refuge behind a breastwork (temporary fortification) of silly invectives, at the same time acknowledging that he purloined the article ‘for want of time to write something better.’ No degree of bravado or pretended unconcern can convince his readers that he is not a sneaking thief. His harangue last week resembles the chattering of a thieving monkey under the lash, and a poll-cat (skunk) driven to bay taints the atmosphere no more than this jackass headed biped in the last issue of his insignificant sheet.” Attaboy, Willard.
Fifty years later, the April 11, 1923 Charlevoix Courier reported on the history of one corner of the Bridge/Clinton streets intersection.
“BUILDING RECENTLY MOVED AN OLD TIMER. W. J. Weikel Remembers It On County Bank Site in 1867. The old building formerly occupied by Ray Ashdon’s barber shop, moved to East Lincoln Street last Friday, was one of the first houses built in this town. It was originally erected by Alden Chamberlain on the corner now occupied by the County Bank (today the North Seas Gallery). Chief of Police, W. J. Weikel, remembers this old building and how, in the fall of ’67, having come with his parents and his brothers-in-law, ‘Doc’ Brown and N. A. Jones and their families in a couple of ‘prairie schooners’ from Chickasaw County, Iowa, they camped in front of it on the greensward that then flourished where the pavement of Bridge Street now extends. The party arrived by way of Milwaukee on the old steamer ‘Idaho,’ landed at Fox’s dock (now the city/Beaver Island Boat Company dock), and came ashore with their covered wagons, two span of horses and two cows. They were on their way to East Jordan by the way of Antrim City.”
The only way to get to that destination by land at that time was to head south to Antrim, then swing east and travel up and over the roller coaster hills to the tip of Lake Charlevoix’s South Arm and East Jordan. By the way, if updated Michigan Department of Transportation statistics can be believed, the greensward area that once was our midtown intersection saw around five million vehicular passages in 2022.
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In the same issue, it was reported that prominent summer resident David May of St. Louis, who built the large house at 429 Michigan Ave. in 1913, was about to spread his retail empire, May Department Stores Company, from the Midwest to the Pacific Coast.
“ADDS TO HIS VAST HOLDINGS. David May Leases Big Los Angeles Store. New Establishment When Enlarged Will be Largest Department Store West of Chicago.” May and company bought the Hamburger store business in L.A., with a reported $25 million, 50-year lease on the property. “With the transaction completed and the transfer of millions of dollars in property and leases made, . . . no mention has been made public as to the actual price of the firm itself, its good will, fixtures, stock and office equipment, but the figure is said to set a new record on the coast.”
Los Angeles was on the brink of transformation into the sprawling metropolis it is today. Brilliant retailer David May, one of the most prominent and highly regarded members of Charlevoix’s summertime community, sensed what was about to happen, and got in on the ground floor. But David May had only four more years to enjoy the fruits of his labors, because he passed away, in Charlevoix, in July of 1927.
Speaking of California, again in the same issue appeared a poem right next to the front page article on May. It was written by local resident King Saunders (yes, that was his middle name, which he used), who wished to needle everyone here because he was basking in California sunshine, and they weren’t. “NOT FAIR TO CROW SO LOUD. Restrain Yourself, Gentle Reader, As You Scan This. King Saunders and Other Californiacs May Have the Bulge On Us Now, But—Wait. King Saunders, one of the lucky ones who have been basking under California skies, takes it upon himself to chortle over us poor miserable sinners in an original poem. The title of this aggravating composition is ‘Michigan Versus California.'”
A few selected verses: “Each week I read my Courier thru,/Each page from front to back,/But the one best bet (take your honest due/Are the stories of your cough and hack. I get quite a thrill from the lines I see/Of the trains that never get in,/How the mails get piled clear up to your knee/And make the office force swear like sin. How the ice in Pine Lake (Lake Charlevoix) is solid and green,/Out in front of the old Belvedere./The prettiest ice you have ever seen/Being twenty-four inches and clear. I don’t have to worry about freezing my feet,/Or wearing my big overshoes,/For ‘tis summer out here and all the winter we have/Is what we read from your good weekly news.”
The Courier went on to say, “Now, fellow sufferers, what about it? Should we submit to this gloating affront tamely or shall we appoint a lynching party to meet King at the train next summer when he returns to this despised and much maligned region, as he surely will—they all do.” King need'nt have worried. He was one of the most well-liked fellows in Charlevoix, and his return would have been met with open arms.
This article originally appeared on The Petoskey News-Review: Looking Back: Restrain yourself, gentle reader
