Hunting on North Manitou Island

Researched & written by Susan Wasserman

A private hunting and fishing preserve; an exclusive 15,000-acre playground where friends and business associates could be entertained—that was the vision for North Manitou Island in the 1920s. By the mid-1920s, ownership consolidation, known as the Manitou Island Association, had purchased most of the island property, allowing this vision to become a reality. Both racoons (1924) and deer (1926) were introduced as game animals.

Island lore relates that the deer chosen were known for their large racks, presumably attractive to hunters. In 1926, nine fawns were acquired from the Munising (Michigan) State Forest and brought to the island—eight does and one buck.  Island farm dogs quickly killed three of the fawns when they tried to herd them and the deer did not behave as island cattle did. Their progeny thrived without natural predators and with abundant food.

By 1937 the herd, estimated at 700, had outgrown the available food sources and with the assistance of the State of Michigan, the first deer hunt was organized, and a winter supplemental feeding program was introduced.

Over the years the deer herd was studied by both naturalists and Michigan officials.  Reports counted the herd and made observations on deer health in 1939, 1954, 1968, and 1975, with recommendations for culling and care. By the 1950s, the herd was estimated to be 1,000.

Licensed as an official Michigan deer farm, the island hunt was allowed to extend beyond the mainland season.  Hunters were brought to the island for a three-day stay. Guests were divided into small groups and placed individually in places where deer were known to congregate.  Guides would then drive the deer toward these hunters. Each man was guaranteed a deer. Hunters would go out to the woods in the morning, come back to The Lodge for lunch and could return to the woods to hunt about 4 p.m.  After a sumptuous evening meal, there was drinking, visiting, politicking, and card games.

Hunters were generally guests of the island’s principal owner, William Angell, or corporate clients of Continental Motors, Shakespear Rod and Reel, government contractors or Defense Department big-wigs.  Arthur Godfrey, national radio and TV star, flew his own airplane to North Manitou for a 1951 weekend. In the 1950s and -60s, parties of Detroit mafia members were part of the picture. Hunts ran from October into December each fall and followed this same general pattern until 1978.

In 1977, serious negotiations began between the U.S. Justice Department and the Manitou Island Association over purchase of the island as part of the proposed Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. The purchase price was disputed and condemnation proceedings ended up in Judge Fox’s federal courtroom in Grand Rapids. This contentious case dragged on for seven years. The Manitou Island Association made the decision to remove their employees in the fall of 1978.  Apparently, no common ground could be reached about the 1,000 herd of deer, far more than could be supported without a winter supplementary feeding program. In the winters of 1978 and 1979, hundreds of deer and turkeys starved to death—a blight on the park takeover. 

Today, deer permits are available and there has been one hunt each fall.

The Manitou Island Association also made many attempts to introduce species of animals, fish, and game birds to the island.  The most successful of these was in the 1960s. With red fox as predators and harsh Michigan winters, the only flock to survive were wild turkeys.  The flocks increased to as many as 400 birds and as long as a winter deer feeding program was maintained, they survived, congregating near the deer feeding stations.

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FISH:  Island owners since the 1890s had stocked the interior, Lake Manitou, with fish and resort visitors reveled in summer trips to the 90’deep, spring fed, inland lake.  Perch and trout were abundant.  Naturalist, Gordon Charles, (a frequent island visitor in the 1960s and ‘70s) wrote that this was the finest small-mouthed bass fishing in the Midwest.

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