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My grandmother sitting on front porch of cottage (undated). Note the fish hanging on the tree.
keep small animals from getting into the downstairs and nesting in the furniture. The rafters supporting the roof were 2x4’s spanned by trapezoidal 1x12’s, which were placed near the peak and nailed in place to brace the thin rafters and keep the roof from sagging inward. Small windows front and back provided scant ventilation but a beautiful view across the bay from the front.
The front half of the attic was used for sleeping and the back half for storage. There was where an amazing amount of stuff stored there, ranging from tackle boxes and other fishing equipment to tools to clothes and blankets in old suitcases, inner tubes, games, boat anchors and even two old tent poles used by my grandfa- ther in the 1920’s to pitch his tent. Clothes could be hung from clothesline strung between nails hammered into the rafters.
Beds were made of old, cotton-stuffed mattresses sagging on flat metal springs, which were balanced on sawhorses, or canvas army-surplus cots, which is what I slept on as a child. We were usually so tired when we went to bed that it didn’t matter what we slept on. At some point, old iron double-bedsteads were installed in the attic (perhaps salvaged from the Elliott Hotel after it closed). The old, cotton-stuffed mattresses could then rest on sagging wire grids that were no longer precari- ously balanced on sawhorses but were connected to wobbly iron bedsteads. We put large pieces of plywood under the mattresses to reduce the sagging.
There was no electricity. After the sun went down, the attic was a dark, scary place to go to bed in. We kept flashlights at hand, which we used to locate bats that might have gotten in and could be heard fluttering around in the dark. Behind the head of one of the beds in the attic was a small cupboard with a wooden door that swung down on hinges. In this cupboard were stored old magazines, like the Saturday Evening Post and Collier’s, as well comic books, which could be re-read year after year. After electrification, light bulbs with pull-cords were installed over the beds so we could read in bed.
The “siding” of the cottage consisted of heavy strips of overlapping tarpaper coated with semi-reflective crystalline material. It had the consistency of roofing but was heavier and must have come in long rolled-up strips. It had a saw-toothed lower edge, which gave it a bit of a decorative touch. The stuff was ugly but lasted forever, although it had to be nailed back down once in a while with roofing nails when it loosened. The main problem with it was that it did not lie completely flat against the side- boards, and the places where it bulged out
created dark crevices that warmed in the sunlight, giving them all the characteristics of a good bat house. It didn’t take long for the bats on the island to figure this out and roost under this siding. They could be heard squeaking and scratching as they entered and exited at dawn and dusk. The same material was used for the roofing.
A porch was attached to the front of the house. Its roof was nailed to the outer wall of the cottage through the tarpaper and supported in the front by hand-hewn cedar log posts. A decorative log railing with a diamond- shaped pattern in the middle on each side (not well seen in photo above) encircled it. Rocks were piled under the front edge of the porch to give it a more substantial appearance and discourage small children from crawl- ing into the dark, damp, dirty space under it.
Eaves on each side of the roof drained into 55-gallon rain barrels placed at the back corners. These provided soft water for washing clothes and people. The barrels had to be turned over to drain before winter, lest they freeze and split. If you were the first family up in the summer, you turned the rain barrel upright and prayed for rain. Otherwise, you would have to haul buckets of water either up the hill from the lake or from a hand pump at a well an 8th of a mile down the path toward the hotel.
There was no bathroom, needless to say, given that there was no electricity and no running water. The outhouse was located mostly out of sight in the trees about 70 feet or so behind the cottage. Technically speaking, it was not on our property, but on the empty lot behind us; no one gave that a thought; that was where
20 Washtenaw County Medical Society BULLETIN WINTER 2021