Big Bay de Noc School

Our Future Begins Now

The town of Cooks is located in Inwood Township, Schoolcraft County, and is the eastern most township in our district. Cooks is located directly to the north off Hwy 2, and like so many of the towns in the Upper Peninsula owes its heritage to the logging industry.

Today Cooks is mainly a small, close-knit farming community with rolling hills and features one of the highest points in the county. When entering Cooks from the north visitors are met with a beautiful scene from the top of “Cooks Hill”. Below the main road winds down through the town which boasts a handful of houses, a post office, town hall, a couple churches and a bar/restaurant.

Every summer, one Sunday in late August, this little town hosts the “Cooks Corn Roast”. For more than 30 years, volunteers throughout the community, work in shifts grilling corn, chicken, brats, running raffles and games for this popular and highly successful event.

The.town of Garden in Garden Township can be found eight miles south of the school on the historic Garden Peninsula. A small village with a deep-rooted history in the lumber and fishing industries the area has become a haven for those looking for a slower pace of life.

Retirees longing to return “home” and tourists hearing of the beauty and pristine land have become the new settlers on the shores of Lake Michigan. Just south of Garden lies the well know state park of Fayette. Fayette State Park,
www.michigan.gov/fayettetownsite with its limestone cliffs and haunting buildings, is a standing monument to the early white settlers of this area and is a must see for anyone traveling the road down the peninsula.

The.village of Fairport, in Fairbanks Township, is located at the southern most point on the Garden Peninsula. Surrounded by Lake Michigan on three sides, it is no surprise that fishing was the main industry for many years.

Like so much of the Garden Peninsula the original settlers were Native American and their ancestors still live on the peninsula to this day. Traveling by boat from the larger cities of the south, some immigrants of the 1800’s came across this land and settled alongside the Native Americans to start their own fishing legacy.

Although the fishing and population has decreased dramatically over the years, everyone still knows where to go if they want to purchase the best “fresh fish” around, right off the boat.

West.of Garden Corners on Hwy 2 is where one will find Nahma Township, (pronounced “NAY-muh”). The township consists of a farming community located on the north side of the highway named Isabella and to the south at the bottom of a small peninsula sits the small town of Nahma.

The town was created by a lumber company around the turn of the century giving the workers a place to live and raise their families. After the fall of the lumber industry many of the residents moved and the town closed up, falling into disrepair.

A revival has been started by those residents who still call Nahma home. Today a small but highly informative museum has been opened by the local historical society and a once dilapidated building turned into a beautiful and charming hotel/restaurant.