Saugatuck Fruit Exchange / Coghlin Park

Location: Culver Street at the Waterfront, Saugatuck
Date: 1917

An important part of the local economy, the Saugatuck Fruit Exchange was a large factory-like structure with offices, docks for unloading the wagons and trucks of local growers, fruit sorting and storage areas, shipping docks, and a spur connecting it to the Interurban train. Men and women working at the Fruit Exchange during the 1930s were paid the sum of 15 and 10 cents per hour, respectively. The building was owned by the local Cooperative Fruit Association and later became part of the Harris Pie factory; it was demolished in the 1990s to make way for a new development that did not materialize. Local residents Fritz and Thelma Coghlin donated the property to the City of Saugatuck several years ago for a new waterside park, now known as Coghlin Park.