Fort Algonquin & More

I have two random slides for you today, along with a few vintage postcards to support each scan. 

First up is this 1955 photo of "Fort Algonquin", located in St. Ignace, Michigan - on the Mackinac Trail, not far from the shores of Lake Huron. After a little research, I discovered that the fort was built to commemorate the site of an old Huron trading post, established north of St. Ignace. St. Ignace is the third oldest community in America, behind St. Augustine, Florida and Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. The outpost was easy to pinpoint from the Mackinac Straits by aiming between the Rabbit's Back ridge and Castle Rock Peak.

This vintage postcard is so similar to my slide! More history: H. Vaughan Norton purchased the property in 1926, and it opened for business in 1927. The tourist trade boomed after WWII, and Vaughan decided to display his collection of “fully intact skeletons, a medicine bag, a huge collection of muskets, and a full sized Eagle Feather head-dress from out west”.

Apparently the roadside attraction experienced some hard times, and a number of the museum's displays fell victim to thieves, who even took finger bones from the skeletons. "Mom will love this!". I found an online article announcing the reopening of Fort Algonquin in 2016, but Google Maps marks the location as “closed”, which is always sad to see.

Next is this scan that was a mystery to me, but after scanning it, I could read the words " Rockerville Stage Line" on the Stagecoach. This is Rockerville, South Dakota, about five miles southwest of Rapid City! It was originally established as a gold mining camp. 

It was a tourist town in the 1950s and 1960s because of its key location on US Highway 16 between Rapid City and Mount Rushmore National Memorial. It had a variety of tourist attractions, including a "Mellerdrammer" (Melodrama) live theatre, a "Ghost town" of various buildings with tourist shops and small amusements, "It's a Small World" Museum (featuring an 1880 Tiny Town model and other miniature collections), a motel, campgrounds and RV parks. 

However, in the conversion of US Highway 16 to four lanes in the mid-1960s, the original townsite was placed literally between the two separate roadways, as there was no way to widen the original highway through the town without completely destroying it. With construction of at least three exits into the town from both directions, the town continued to be a vibrant tourist attraction in the 1970s and 1980s. The tourist could take in daily wild west shows, shootouts, stagecoach rides and gold panning. Fine dining was and still is available at the Gaslight Restaurant. Travelers could stay in town at the local Trading Post Motel, buy groceries and gas up their cars at the Rockerville Trading Post.

Here's a vintage postcard featuring the same Stagecoach that is seen in my slide. In the 1990s, the town virtually died, as a lack of visibility to tourists zipping down the highway at 55 miles per hour sent the local economy into a nosedive from which it never recovered. The only remaining business within the generally accepted city limits is the Gaslight Saloon, which was recently rebuilt after a devastating fire. Virtually all the older tourist-era businesses have long since closed, fallen into decay, and been demolished.