Onominese School

1873 Map

The exact date that the Onominese School began is unclear. In 1856 Chief Onumumese removed from Leland to Onumunuse Ville.

From "A History of Leelanau Township", by Lawrence Wakefield, ed., page 45 "Abril and Abigail Stevens bought lots in Waukazooville in May [1856] and additional acreage later. Stevens served as Town Clerk in 1856 and represented Leelanau at the County Convention in September. He also was a teacher at the Onuminese School in 1856-1857."

From Rev. George Smith's diary "3 Oct 1856 went to Onumunese's had full & interesting meeting, appointed prayer-meeting to be conducted by Wasaequam next Friday everning. Mr. Stevens is teaching there. Staid through meeting, come home in com[pany], rode part the way."

From The American Missionary, vol. III #4, published April 1859, Rev. Geo. N. Smith writes "Half the Sabbaths of the quarter I preached at a village (Onumunese Ville) 3 miles distant, where a considerable proportion of our members reside." "A day-school is taught there by a teacher under Government appointment - he is not a professing christian."

Martin A. Melkild wrote in Log Cabin Tales of Leelanau that his parents took John Cobb "for a drive out to visit the old burial grounds at Onominese."

"Before leaving Onimonese, John Cobb pointed to where the Indian Government School building had once stood, and where as a boy he had gone to school. Nothing now remains but a scattered stone pile, or where other buildings of the village once stood. Near by was the spring which still flowed from its clay bank, its clear cool waters the only reminder of a past habitation of Onominese."

John Cobb was born about 1858 and died in 1944. His age matches attending the school that Rev. Smith wrote about.

Larry Wakefield in his book Ghost Towns of Michigan writes "The school opened in 1865, and Ann Craker Morgan, whose husband had died in the Civil war, applied for and got the teaching job. From what her then eight-year old son, Norman, later wrote about it, one gathers that it wasn't althogether a pleasant experience.

"The experience and suffering that we endured in getting over there was one of the hardest trips I ever made through the woods. The location was about 3 miles southwest of Northport. There was not ever the semblance of a road. A fee blazed trees marked the trail, but seemed as though those who did the blazing picked out the roughest ground they could find."

When they got there, Norman wrote, they were in almost as deep woods as those they had passed through.

"But Old Lake Michigan was on one side of us and the house was locate on the edge of the bank, which was nearly two hundred feet about the water and the bank was nearly perpendicular. Of all the wild places to try to exist, I don't believe a worse one could be found."

 Ann Morgan taught there for two years, until loneliness and isolation finally got her down. She had about twenty Indian pupils, ranging from seven to seventeen as near as anybody could tell. 

Arvid H. Craker wrote in Zechariah Craker and all his Children  [When Rev. Dougherty's school closed in 1865] "Ann was left without a job, but she had heard of a teaching job available in a small Indian settlement about three miles southwest of the village of Northport. She applied and was accepted. Ann had no idea of the remoteness of the place when she accepted the job. The trip getting there was a very difficult one, there was no road cut and only an Indian trail to follow. When she and Norman finally arrived they found no village. There were no other buildings in sight; only a bleak, desolate school house - - very small and not very comforting. The building sat very near a high, steep bluff about 200 feet above the roar of the waves on Lake Michigan. The school house had three rooms connected to it for living quarters, and though they were very small Ann and Norman soon moved in to make the best of it. She opened the school the following Monday by ringing the bell. A few Indian children came from all directions out of the surrounding woods. These Indian children were far less advanced than those she had been teaching at Omena and she found that she didn't need to study at all herself. She taught them slowly and patiently. They kept coming until she had about twenty regular pupils to teach. Rev. George N. Smith, the Indian Missionary and Congregational minister at Northport, came to the village called Onumunese, almost every other Sunday to hold religious services in the school house. Ann's signature is left on a few marriage certificates as a witness to the ceremonies performed there by Rev. Smith. The visits of Rev. Smith and his family were about the only chance she and Norman had to see other white people. Occasionally they saw people from the J. W. Ranger farm which was about one and a half miles from the school building.

After living there alone for one year, Ann invited Esther Ranger, an old maid, to come and live with them. The sound of her carpet loom in one of the rooms was comforting for both Ann and Norman during the second year at Onumunese. But in 1867 she decided not to return and made plans to stay in the village of Northport."

Picture from the Ruth Craker collection, Omena.

From the diaries of Rev. George N. Smith:

5 July 1868 - Wasaequam suggests that Seddie Powers start teaching at OnVille.

7 July - Took Seddie & her things over to OnVille - Willie with her - She expects to begin School tomorrow.

2 Oct - Seddie closed 1 quarter School

5 Oct - Freemont [ship] came 7 AM to UD & left 9 AM Annie [Rev. Smith's daughter] & Seddie went on her, Seddie is going home, Annie is going with her to visit

[Seddie Powers married George N. Smith Jr. on 23 Dec 1868 and didn't go back to teaching.]

13 Oct 1868 Mr Ranger is employed to teach at the school in OnVille.

It is unknown who the students other than John Cobb were, who the other teachers were, or when the school closed.