Garden Island (Michigan)
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Garden Island, Michigan is an uninhabited 4,990-acre (20 km²) island located in the Beaver Island archipelago in northern Lake Michigan. It is almost wholly owned by the U.S. state of Michigan and is overseen by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR) as part of the Beaver Island State Wildlife Research Area. It is accessible by private boat. The Native American (Ojibwe language) name for the island is Minis Gitigaan, which has become Garden Island by direct translation. The Island's Native American cemetery was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in March 1978.
[edit] History
Garden Island's maximum length, from northwest to southeast, is approximately five miles (8 km). Historically, it was inhabited by Native Americans. A high proportion of the Ottawa and Ojibwa of the Beaver Island archipelago had concentrated themselves on Garden Island by 1847, where they could support themselves as fishermen and escape interference from the encroaching white Americans. The Natives also planted corn and squash on the Garden Island. This Native settlement shrank during the early 1900s as most of its members moved away. The last Garden Island resident, Peter Monatou, died in the 1940s.
Most of the old-growth timber on Garden Island was cut and sawn by a short-lived sawmill that operated on the island in 1912-1913. A small town, now a true ghost town, was built near the mill and named Success, Michigan.
[edit] Terrain
Garden Island is surrounded by relatively cool, shallow water, making the area ideal for sport and commercial fishing. The island itself is relatively low and spotted with many ponds and wetlands.
[edit] Religion
Garden Island is a place of great spiritual significance to many Native Americans of the Great Lakes, especially but not limited to the Ottawa and the Ojibwe. Although the island is currently uninhabited, a Native cemetery on the island continues in active use and contains more than 3,500 burials, most of them unmarked. There are, however, a number of "spirit houses" marking burial sites. Atop many of these spirit houses you can see evidence of visitors, in the form of gifts such as tobacco and small denomination coins. It is thought that these gifts would be helpful in the after-life. If you go, please do be respectful of the listed cemetery.
The island is well known as a place to gather some of the herbs and wetland plants used in the Native medicine and spiritual ceremonies of the Great Lakes.
