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Wilson, Michigan is in southwest Harris Township, Menominee County, in the Upper Peninsula.

The unincorporated community is situated along US-41, and the Canadian National Railway. Old US-41 runs east-west, paralleling US-41 in Wilson, Wilson Creek flows through the western portion of the community. The Cedar River is south of Wilson.

Incorporated cities and villages within twenty-five miles of Wilson include Powers, Carney, Escanaba, Daggett, Stephenson, and Norway, while the unincorporated communities of Harris and Eustis are within ten miles.

Sometimes referred to as a ghost town or a dot on the map today, Wilson is a small residential community with few businesses, most of them related to agriculture.

Like many Michigan towns, Wilson began as a railroad town when the Chicago and North Western Railway came through Spalding Township, and built a station at this location in 1872. The railroad station closed in 1950. The rail station served a charcoal kiln that was located here, and a small community grew up around these two businesses.

Originally, the community was known as Ferry Switch, but when a post office was established on February 24, 1881, with Daniel McIntyre as postmaster. The office was named Myra. Frank D. Wilson built a sawmill in the area and, in November of 1881, the post office's name was changed to Wilson, with Frank Wilson as postmaster. A school was built in 1881.

Other businesses were started, primarily those serving local farmers and other agricultural concerns, as well as a general store and some other commercial businesses. By the turn of the 20th Century, the town had an unofficial population of about five hundred, and a saloon opened in 1902.

In the early 1900s, a group of Seventh-day Adventists came to Wilson from Wisconsin to farm. They opened a church in 1908, where services were held in the French language. The church burned in 1948, and a new one was constructed the following year, which still stands and is operational.

Today, the larger buildings in the community are the Seventh-day Adventist Church and its K-10th-grade Junior Academy.

Serving the Hannahville Indian Community, the Hannahville Indian School and the Nah Tah Wahsh Public School Academy is near Wilson, and served by the Wilson post office.

The Hannahville Indian Community is a federally-recognized Potawatomi tribe whose reservation is southeast of Wilson, but within the Wilson postal area. Another small portion of the reservation is in northeastern Gourley Township, also in Menominee County, and another in Bark River Township in southwestern Delta County.

Residents of the Hannahville community are descendants of Potawatomi people who refused to leave the state in 1834. For a short time, they moved from Michigan to live with the Menominee people in northern Wisconsin, but they returned the following year, at which time they settled along the mouth of Big Cedar River at Lake Michigan.

This area of the Upper Peninsula was designated in 1870, and the reservation was officially established by Congress in 1913. In 1966, the tribe became founding members of the Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan.

This portion of our web guide focuses on the unincorporated community known as Wilson, Michigan. Governmental or tribal facilities and programs, businesses, industries, schools, places of worship, organizations, attractions, events, entertainment venues, and recreational opportunities within the community, or the Wilson post office serves, are appropriate for this category.

 

 

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