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Otsego, Michigan
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Otsego, Michigan
Otsego is a city in Allegan County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 4,120 at the 2020 census. The city is within Otsego Township, but is administratively autonomous.
Otsego is situated on M-89 about three miles (4.8 km) west of Plainwell and US 131. It is about nine miles (14 km) southeast of Allegan, seventeen miles (27 km) north of Kalamazoo, and the Kalamazoo River flows east to west through the city.
Otsego was established in fall of 1831 by the Samuel Foster family from Vermont, called Pine Creek by its initial settlers: Giles Scott and Hull Sherwood. A post office was established in 1832 under the name of Allegan. With the organization of Allegan County, the name was changed in 1835 to Otsego, spearheaded by Otsego resident Dr. Samuel Foster; the name is after Otsego Lake in New York, and originally from an Iroquoian language, probably Mohawk or Oneida. A school was established in the town in 1833, and a hotel, the Tompkins House, followed in the 1860s.
On June 6, 1863, at Aaron Hilliard's house Ellen G. White, a founder of the Seventh-day Adventist church, experienced a vision about health and disease, and it showed vegetarian food, as was described in Genesis 1:29, was the proper food for humankind. Her vision led to the creation of many vegetarian foods and vegetarian food companies, including the Battle Creek Sanitarium and Loma Linda Foods.
In the 1870s, visitors from all over the Midwest journeyed to Otsego to experience the "medicinal" waters at the Otsego Mineral Springs Bath House, which remained a regional draw until 1887 when George Bardeen's paper mill operation depleted the town's mineral springs.
The 1880s saw some big advances for Otsego. In 1883, Otsego High School held its first commencement ceremony, graduating three students; a home-delivery milk route was started up in 1885; and 1886 brought the establishment of the volunteer fire department, which initially used horse-drawn water-wagons. The decade closed out with the formation of the city's Republican Club in 1888.
In 1881, Wilson C. Edsell built the town's first bank and opera house. Edsell's Opera House was the primary entertainment venue in town for many years until the opening of the Nickelodeon (Irv Nichols's theatre venture) in 1909. An Uncle Tom's Cabin troupe played the Opera House stage on an annual basis. Native American vaudeville shows, called medicine shows, were popular. Maro the Magician, stock theater groups, minstrel shows took the opera house stage on a regular basis, with the minstrel shows led by the town's one African American resident Jim Smith.
The city's baseball park was sold to the area Catholics as a site for a church in 1890. The Russell Buggy Company came to town as well, making popular ironclad carriages. The Bardeen Mansion was completed in 1894, which was razed in 1962–63. A smallpox epidemic swept the town in 1894, as well.
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Otsego, Michigan
Otsego is a city in Allegan County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 4,120 at the 2020 census. The city is within Otsego Township, but is administratively autonomous.
Otsego is situated on M-89 about three miles (4.8 km) west of Plainwell and US 131. It is about nine miles (14 km) southeast of Allegan, seventeen miles (27 km) north of Kalamazoo, and the Kalamazoo River flows east to west through the city.
Otsego was established in fall of 1831 by the Samuel Foster family from Vermont, called Pine Creek by its initial settlers: Giles Scott and Hull Sherwood. A post office was established in 1832 under the name of Allegan. With the organization of Allegan County, the name was changed in 1835 to Otsego, spearheaded by Otsego resident Dr. Samuel Foster; the name is after Otsego Lake in New York, and originally from an Iroquoian language, probably Mohawk or Oneida. A school was established in the town in 1833, and a hotel, the Tompkins House, followed in the 1860s.
On June 6, 1863, at Aaron Hilliard's house Ellen G. White, a founder of the Seventh-day Adventist church, experienced a vision about health and disease, and it showed vegetarian food, as was described in Genesis 1:29, was the proper food for humankind. Her vision led to the creation of many vegetarian foods and vegetarian food companies, including the Battle Creek Sanitarium and Loma Linda Foods.
In the 1870s, visitors from all over the Midwest journeyed to Otsego to experience the "medicinal" waters at the Otsego Mineral Springs Bath House, which remained a regional draw until 1887 when George Bardeen's paper mill operation depleted the town's mineral springs.
The 1880s saw some big advances for Otsego. In 1883, Otsego High School held its first commencement ceremony, graduating three students; a home-delivery milk route was started up in 1885; and 1886 brought the establishment of the volunteer fire department, which initially used horse-drawn water-wagons. The decade closed out with the formation of the city's Republican Club in 1888.
In 1881, Wilson C. Edsell built the town's first bank and opera house. Edsell's Opera House was the primary entertainment venue in town for many years until the opening of the Nickelodeon (Irv Nichols's theatre venture) in 1909. An Uncle Tom's Cabin troupe played the Opera House stage on an annual basis. Native American vaudeville shows, called medicine shows, were popular. Maro the Magician, stock theater groups, minstrel shows took the opera house stage on a regular basis, with the minstrel shows led by the town's one African American resident Jim Smith.
The city's baseball park was sold to the area Catholics as a site for a church in 1890. The Russell Buggy Company came to town as well, making popular ironclad carriages. The Bardeen Mansion was completed in 1894, which was razed in 1962–63. A smallpox epidemic swept the town in 1894, as well.
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