Happy Fourth of July from the present day owners of the property, once home to Camp Maqua. I thought it would be nice to hear a little history on the current owners and find out how they came to find their little piece of heaven in Hale. The lodge and the story behind the William and Kathryn Baker and Aaron and Blanche Starks families purchase was featured on June 18, 2018, entitled “In The Right Place At The Right Time”. https://www.girlsofcampmaqua.com/in-the-right-pla…t-the-right-time/
Charlie and Jane Johnson decided, they would like their three children to enjoy the same experiences they had as youngsters with cabins in the woods. “I searched the Free Press ads and found the ad for the Maqua land almost as soon as it started running in 1985, so we came up and selected our lot—Chapel Hill,” said Jane, who built their log cabin three years later.
“We had so much fun with the kids on the lake—tubing, waterskiing and just floating. When our kids were in cross country in high school, we had both the boys and girls teams up for 3-4 days of running camp. The boys slept in the loft and the girls in the basement with the coaches on the couches in between. They would run three times daily and play on the lake in between. Charlie was exhausted, because he ran with them and was also the boat driver, but it was a wonderful experience. Now as we are older, we don’t spend as much time up here, but I still love the peace and quiet and just the “aaahhh” moments when I sit on my deck.”
Neighbor Rick Baker, at the bottom of Chapel Hill, bought in the early eighties and his cedar home was built by his uncle (Al Baker) in the early nineties. His early years, as a single male, was spent camping on the property. After his first marriage to Aimee, he and wife and two children spent every summer weekend on the lake, next to his best friend from college, who built next door.
Kim and Laura Gorman’s cedar home, also built by Al Baker, utilized the senior brownie as their garage by turning the roof around and adding a home to the lakefront side of the building. Kim bought his property in 1984 and camped from one of the huts on the property until his home was built in 1994. Their only son grew up on the lake on the weekends and they now spend more time up here in their retirement.
The property with another lakeside hut belongs to Jim and Pat Fidler and (now deceased) brother John McConnell. While deer hunting in the area in 1987 or 1988, they spent many hours looking for a place to buy. Somewhere around 1989 they purchased their lot and built a log home in 2005, after camping many summers with their two daughters in the hut.
The farmhouse called Dutton was home to the Farmer family. The Dutton house became a haven for Carl, Marilyn and family, and their kids, grandkids and friends.“When we first became aware of the old YWCA camp in 1979, we were visiting friends on Loon Lake. While out for a boat ride, we spotted Dutton house, which was in pretty shabby condition, but we fell in love with it and the location was great! We checked with the realtors and found out the land was in the process of being divided, so we made a deposit on it and the rest is history.”
”It needed a lot of hard work. The upper porch was leaning out toward the lake, so it had to be pulled in and secured, painted. We added a new side porch, windows, doors, and a fireplace was added to keep us warm in the winter and a well was drilled by hand. Oh, if these walls could talk, what a story they would tell! Writings and signatures everywhere, cracks in the wood, so you could see outside, and the old metal bunks. And don’t forget all God’s little creatures! We had a lot of great times and memories in that place!”
“But, in 1993, with mixed emotions, we decided to build a new place. What a sad day when the old Dutton house had to come down, but now in its place stands a beautiful log home, where we still share and enjoy all the fun things. Swimming, fishing, tubing, boating, water play, waterskiing, and looking for mushrooms on rainy days, or board games, cards, arts and crafts or just enjoying the great outdoors or being lazy. These are memories we will cherish forever.”
The Farmers sold their log home to Steve and Julia Sigg, from Chicago, in 2017. Although not yet retired, they had purchased a small cottage on Long Lake in 2008, with no real intention of retiring there. They began looking for another place in the area, with the help of realtor Carole Wilson and began their search with a place near the Long Lake Bar, a second duplex near the same area and third choice on the Loon Lake property. A friend helped them with their “HGTV experience” by giving advice on their three choices and pushed for the log cabin in Maqua. With a grown son and retirement on the horizon, they hope to spend more time at their new home.
The property next to the campfire pit was bought by Bill and Sandy (now deceased) West. They bought their property in the early eighties with the intent of building a house in five years. They wandered down for a picnic with their two young children overlooking the lake. My husband and I happened to see them, (meeting them for the first time) and wondered who were these strangers who just showed up on Maqua property? We talked them into building right away, so our children could have playmates and within six weeks of starting construction, their beautiful log home was completed! (I might add that Bill West has a construction company and their crew, fed daily by wife Sandy, were up full time from suburban Detroit to complete the project.)
Thom and Lydia Engel own the property that housed the Infirmary and the nature hut. Purchased from someone they actually knew (the Haney family), they had no idea the Haneys owned the property! The Engels, along with their daughter, summered on Mullet Lake for three years, while looking for a cabin within a three hour radius of their home. A fellow employee suggested they try looking in the Tawas area, so they contacted realtor Carole Wilson in Hale and stayed in West Branch with plans to look in Cadillac the following day. They began their search on Long Lake, but Lydia had a vision of a summer home down a trail lined with tall trees and they found it in Maqua! Their search ended.
“I loved the lake access and it felt safe. When we walked to the beach, future neighbor Bill West was washing his windows on his new house and told us what a great community Maqua was and we had to buy here! We put in an offer that day,” said Lydia. “ The happy vibe of the place and the history just made it even more special!”
Year round residents Ric and Denise Braun bought their ten acres of Putnam roadside property in 1985 just as the Jim Sukenik family was dividing the Maqua property into ten parcels. They built their home in 1987 and raised two sons. “The reason I picked the road frontage and not lakeside was not only the price, but I knew I had lake access and I wouldn’t have to plow that long road in the winter,” laughed Ric.
The cabin that sat beside the fence along the Camp Maqua property belonged to the Williams family since 1957. They raised their two daughters summering on the lake, overlooking the activity of girl campers next to them. Their oldest daughter, Sharon Williams, was also a counselor in the sixties! The second daughter Denise, husband Joe and three daughters from Cincinatti, have summered here their whole lives, and purchased the Maqua property once owned by Dick and Judy Pfahl that bordered their cabin last year. The Clancy family recently remodeled the little cabin into a stunning lakeside home with two of the huts from camp being utilized for storage and for grandchildren’s campouts. They have come full circle!