Downtown Newberry, Michigan.
Courtesy of The Newberry News
Dear Newberry, South Carolina:
Hello from your northern cousins in Newberry, Michigan. We are situated toward the eastern side of the middle of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and it’s cold here right now.
We are meeting because the editor of The Newberry Observer, Andrew Wigger, contacted me after receiving an obituary that seemed like it was intended for us, The Newberry News, instead. Turns out it was meant for us, and we printed it last week.
The Newberry News is a 135-year-old newspaper in a town of about the same age. We’ve been a logging town, a hospital town, a prison town. We have been watching our population fall for a couple decades now, and we remain a town trying to find our footing.
Our town and county have not been too terribly ravaged by COVID. Newberry, Michigan is in Luce County, which has a population of 6,631 people. We’ve had 127 confirmed COVID cases and no deaths.
As you’ve noticed, there aren’t a lot of us up here. But we are strong and we like it here. We begin prepping for winter as soon as the last winter has ended. We like land and nature and are closely connected to the seasons – hunting, gardening, picking berries, making maple syrup. We love to be outside, and we love visitors, but almost none of us wish we lived in the city.
We are technically a village. Newberry is under the care of a village manager and our seven-member village council, which currently only has five members. It’s hard to attract council members, who are unpaid except for a per diem for each meeting. The council recently opened up a discussion to see if we really need seven council members after all. We printed that in the paper, and no one protested.
There was a time when we probably did need seven councilmembers, when Newberry was bigger and busier. When we had a bustling downtown and a lively school scene.
Downtown is quieter now. The school population is smaller. But the people who love this place love it like they always did.
A lot of our retired residents spend their winters in Florida or places closer to you. The lack of snow is the main factor, but the ocean is obviously a big factor, too.
We have Lake Superior just up the road, and it is an ocean to us. Colder, with no dolphins, but it gives us agates and glow-in-the dark rocks. We are still in awe of it.
Andrew Wigger and I are looking forward to getting these Newberry towns better acquainted. We will talk to you soon!
Sincerely,
Carol Stiffler
Newberry, Michigan