FISHER LAKE
“It’s early morning, and the sun is just peaking over the tops of the trees on Mahnke’s Point. A lone fisherman in an old green flat-bottom wooden boat is immersed in a cloud of smoke from his ancient one-cylinder Evenrude. He is hunched over the center seat with a cane pole out one side of the boat and what looks like a spinning rod out the other. The Lake is absolutely still – not a ripple to be seen. The frogs just went silent after singing all night, and a bass rushes to shore next to me to catch a “minny”. I can see the “Stake” marking where someone rolled a really big barrel onto the ice many years ago and didn’t roll it back to shore before the Spring thaw. Junior Dean is said to have hit that Stake from shore with his slingshot.[i]More about Slinghots. For a moment, I could see the “Drop-Off” through the wisp of early morning fog, but now the sun’s reflection on the glassy water blinds my eye.
A gentle breeze has come up, and I’m feeling the sun’s warmth on my face. Standing up, I feel my swimsuit sticking to my butt from sitting in the morning dew on the dock. I suppose it’s too early for a 10-year-old to be up, but I woke up thinking about the TV show last night, where someone climbed a mountain just to watch the sun rise over a lake. Hell, I got a lake right here in my backyard.”
Fisher Lake is known by some locals as Fishers or Fisher’s Lake because it is reported to have been named after Jonas and Leonard Fisher, who established a settlement along its eastern shore in 1834. It’s in Southwestern Michigan, abouthalfway between Detroit and Chicago.
A couple of hundred years ago, what is now Detroit was known as Fort Wayne, and on the southern tip of Lake Michigan, where Chicago is today, was Fort Dearborn. The Potawatomi Chief Wahbememe (White Pigeon) learned of a planned attack on his settlement, now named for him, and he ran 150 miles to deliver the warning. He collapsed and died from exhaustion upon reaching the settlement. The site is now part of the National Register of Historic Places. Those soldiers would eventually drive away his people who lived around The Lake and the thousands of other lakes like it in these beautiful countrysides.
This Google Map is from 2025[ii]High Rez pdf download. The annotations are as I remember things from the 1950s. The stories are mostly true as I recall them – exceptions included in the footnotes. Readers are invited to help me fill in the blanks.
From the time we moved here in 1947, at the age of 6, until I went off to college, my entire life revolved around The Family, The House, and The Lake. I return here as often as I can, most recently in September 2025. I suppose my final resting place will be Riverside Cemetery in Three Rivers because I don’t know of any cemetery closer to The Lake.
The Island
Little Lake
The Outlet
Portage River
The Landing
Rosalie
Dr. Fluke
Dead End
Little George
Wyatts
Willis Earl
Atkinsons
Mrs. Warner
Ernie Zerlie
Jurgens
Carlsons
.
1947 Rental
Sand Bar
Little Store
Gas Station
Happy Truckers
The Tavern
Ice Fishing
Mahnke’s Point
Turtle Tree
Rocks
Cottages
The Swamp
The Stake
The Raft
No-Name Guy
Everett Dantz
The Shanty
The House
By: Jim
Written: mid-1980s
Published: July 30, 2025
Revised: October 10, 2025
footnotes
| ↑i | More about Slinghots. |
|---|---|
| ↑ii | High Rez pdf download |