56. Summertime Tent Village

“Uneeda Rest” is a pun on the name brand of a popular soda cracker, the Uneeda Biscuit. Chicagoans John Quincy, spouse Mary and daughter Idessa Annable tented in Saugatuck until they built a family cottage in 1908.

Starting in 1884, campers began pitching tents in the “Park Lands” at the new Mount Baldhead Park. By the early 1900s, the wooded dunes between the Kalamazoo River and Lake Michigan were dotted with tent villages. (There was similar activity along Lakeshore Drive.) The heavy canvas structures were erected each spring on top of wooden platforms. The campers brought all the comforts of home including furniture, iron stoves, and even their bird cages. Tenting sites were often used by a particular family year after year and many of the platforms later became the floors of a permanent family cottage.