Northville, Michigan History Notes

In progress:

Having done a bit of the history of Salem and Plymouth, I have begun to look into the things of Northville, in a way between these two towns where I have spent time inquiring. Before there even was a Salem, a village called Summit was there at Currie road and 8 mile, settled as we learn from Hoffman by Robert Purdy. A road older than the present Eight Mile went from Summit to Northville just south of the base line, and must have been an old trail. An old Salem Messenger magazine printed an 1839 map, and we have a map from 1850 recording the owners of each property, as in the 1874 County map of Plymouth and Northville. On the 1874 map, on both sides of Chubb on the south side of Eight Mile, that house and land are owned by John Stark, and he appears on the 1850 map in the second property West of Chubb. A Yerkes- John- was the first owner of the property on the south east corner of Eight Mile and Napier, John Yerkes and Sarah Thornton lived there in the 1830's (Hoffman, p. 38) Of Sally Thornton, Hoffman writes:

Her daughters, Elizabeth and Sarah, were married and lived miles away. Sarah and her husband John Yerkes were a good hour's rough ride away- living near what today is the intersection of Napier and Eight Mile Roads...

Joseph Phillips was the first owner of the south west corner, on the 1845 Salem map. There is no house indicated there until the 1874 map, with Merrit Mathews as the owner, and he sold this to Taschke by the time of the 1915 map. Rakestraw bought this land from Taschke, and sold it to Blake, who died here about 1970, just before we came. The house burned in the 30's and was rebuilt using the old basement. Two Maple trees in the front are over 120 years old, likely planted by Phillips or Mathews. A cast iron pot, possible Civil War era, still sits in the front by the surviving Maple tree, for whom we have planted 3 now grown sugar maple offspring. J.H. Phillips owns land around the Rouge just east of the Old Village of Plymouth and the Wilcox or Phoenix mill. He is likely the son of David Phillips, one of the 3 first pioneers with A. B. Markham and G. P. Benton, and the father of Oscar Phillips, the first white child born in the area. There is an ancient well and old foundation that may be the 1874 house. Machinery in the well may be related to a windmill, which may have sat there on a foundation, as wind power was used by Van Sickle just up Eight mile A Wm. Van Sickle farm is just up the street, and a very ancient foundation at Chubb and 8 was recently buried for a telephone tower. Near this is what looks like a well lined with stones, and some rocks or foundation stones, a "cistern," they call it, which may have been the first well there.

I have found the beginning of Northville History, in accounts of the area of Main and Center streets by A.B. Markham, recorded in the history by Jack Hoffman. Markham himself settled where the new High School has just been located along 6 mile road. Markham, in 1877, read his recollections before the State Pioneer Society, and Hoffman selects the entire account for his first chapter on Northville History. Markham ( p. 15) reports:

I think it was in the month of March (1826) that Mr. Lovejoy Cady came to my shanty and requested me to go with him to get the dimensions of some lots of land. These lands were the lands whereon the village of Northville now stands. We looked for an hour to get a starting point. We followed the line to the river and started to cross on a log, when it gave way and in we went, thankful that the water was only 2 or 3 feet deep."

One imagines that this scene occurred very close to Main, Cady and Center streets. The Creek might be any of 3, though in most places these are not 2-3 feet deep, at least anymore. A likely place is near the park, just South of 7 mile, East of he fish hatchery, or else along the part of the river that was underground until just this year, 2025. Cadys are buried there on Cady street at the Oakwood cemetery, and I am looking for anything that is known about any of them. Daniel L. Cady "pioneered much of the land bounded by East Main and Seven Mile and South Center to Northville Road."

Northville was the north village of Plymouth or Plymouth Township. In the spring of 1826, Gideon Benton, Markham and David Phillips set to "cutting out roads, making causeways, etc. The Yerkes party would have their first meal near Eight Mile Road in May of that year, while Mr. Miller, the miller, "had come here in 1825, clearing the land on the east side of what is now center street north of Dunlap street. He built a log house 12 x 16, "on the high point of land south west of the junction of the Tafft Creek (Randolph drain) with the mill creek (Hoffman, p. 6)" At first I thought he meant the High School hill at 8 and center, but this is down east of Ford Field, maybe where the drugstore is- the drain seems to have come out then near the bleachers. I found a very old ceramic something, at least 100 years old, near there one day examining the hillside erosion. Captain Dunlap bought 160 acres from John Miller near the center of the North half of section 3 (where the city of Northville is now located). So the Cady, Dunlap and Miller properties make up what is now the city of Northville.

There was a Cady hotel on the South west corner of Main and Center. Hoffman notes, Daniel L. Cady lived from 1788 to 1860; his wife Eliza Ellsworth from 1800 to 1849. Hiram Robinson (1800-1832) is also buried in the Oakwood cemetery on Cady street. Robinson- who was to die within 5 or 6 years, "took up the land on the west side of South Center, south of Main street to the section lines." A Cady had a house down by the mill, apparently the first to live in the Beal street neighborhood. Another Cady appears on the 1874 map that includes Meads Mill, with a home where the mansion now sits along Bradner road.

David Clarkson, in an article from the 1874 Northville record, collected by Hoffman p. 5, wrote of when he came with the party of Captain William Dunlap in the spring of 1831, already 4 or 5 years after Daniel Cady settled. Born in 1796, Dunlap was elected Captain of his New York militia. The Dunlaps were the main settlers of Northville north of Main street on both sides of center, and occupied a log cabin near the mill. Clarkson writes : In the Spring of 1832, Mr Dunlap laid out the first plot of the village, and sold off lots from his recently purchased farm, which extended to the Base line and from Griswold Road to beyond Rogers street (to Linden). He then build the first frame house in Northville on the Northwest corner of Center and Dunlap streets (Where the American Legion now sits).

Appendix: Letter to Northville regarding Northville history archaeology

Dear Mayor Turnbull: Hello! I have missed your recent speech on Northville history, and wish there were a video of this published on line. I am reading Hoffman's fine book, and studying in the library history room. In a book on Meads Mill, Julie Fountain tells of going with Helen Gilbert to look for an iron door thought to be involved in the Underground Railroad.I have seen this door, and if it is still there, can find it. I did some searching in this area looking for the ancient stone that stood atop the hill at Plymouth road, and think I can find this as well- or at least a good hypothesis. I have shown this to Chris Sheckter, whom I think you know. Soon I will make it to your history speeches. It has been difficult to communicate the significance of the stone and the two thousand + year old burial ground behind the Pearl Street cemetery, but I will keep trying! No one cares, and they will build a condo over it, as has occurred with other mounds in South East Michigan. Thank You, Mark A. McDonald, Ph D (politics)

Thank you- I just saw your reply, 8 days later! Chris and I were about to go Saturday to show him the iron door. I am learning a lot from Hoffman about 8 mile, where I live at Napier. I love the 1830's and 40's for some reason, and have written a play offered to the Tipping Point theater about the famous (or soon to be famous) Dixboro ghost- it is free on my website. I have other plays brewing, a comedy on the Toledo War, and keep getting snags for a Meads Mill play. Did THE Winfield Scott really live here? AI says no!

I will be in town in March, hoping to explore around the historical park, doing local history archaeology. Hopefully Chris will get some time, and I will show him foundations in the park, of Benton and Gonsolly- he has a metal detector! I found a 1903 half dollar behind Pearl and York which I would like to give to the museum. Do you know the picture of the stone that hangs in the Plymouth museum? That is the stone told of by Sam Hudson...