Michigan's County Courthouses

Emmet County

52 PetosKey—the only constant for emmet County is change. originally part of mackinac County, lansing in 1840 carved out tonedagana County. It was named in honor of an ottawa chief who signed a number of treaties ceding parts of michigan to the united states. the name was changed in 1843 to emmet. the namesake is robert emmet, an Irish patriot who led a revolt in 1803 resulting in the assassination of the lord Chief Justice. britain tried him, and he was hung and then beheaded for treason. though independent on paper, emmet County did not organize until 1853. robert strang, the mormon leader from beaver Island, convinced lansing to fold Charlevoix into emmet County that same year. Its first elections were in 1855, and the mormon vote carried the day. Non-mormons on the mainland did not approve of the situation and soon got the legislature to create a different county for beaver Island. though emmet’s county seat was formally in mackinaw City, county business was transacted in little traverse (which in 1881 was renamed harbor springs) until 1867. on april 1 of that year, Charlevoix lost a vote of ninetynine to eighty-five to move the county seat to Charlevoix. bitter feelings lingered, and the politics got dirty. County records and the county seal mysteriously disappeared. suspicion centered on the county clerk, and a warrant for embezzlement was sworn out against him. but before the court could do much with the case lansing granted Charlevoix its own county and declared that little traverse would be the seat of what remained of emmet County. the records suddenly reappeared. Emmet County emmet CouNty several years later a growing population in Petoskey and a decade of agitation finally persuaded little traverse to allow a public vote on moving the county seat. only when Petoskey offered offices in its new city hall for fifty years for one dollar a year did little traverse assent. Charlevoix campaigned against the idea because it feared losing some of its northern townships to emmet County if the seat moved to nearby Petoskey. the vote carried on april 7, 1902, and the county seat officially moved to where it has been ever since: Petoskey. the name originates from“Pe-to-se-ga”—a native word for “the rising sun.” Neyas Petosega (1787–1888) was born to his ojibwa mother as his father, an employee of the astor Fur Company, saw shafts of light from the morning sun penetrate the sky. his name changed to Ignatius Petoskey after he became Catholic and Jesuits convinced him that Ignatius, the name of the founder of their priestly order, was the same as Neyas. Petoskey was among the first to settle on the west side of traverse bay, and the settlement that grew around him came to bear his name. Petoskey’s first courthouse was completed in 1902 for $40,000. It was brick and stone with an angular roof and an imposing square tower capped with a four-sided clock and a cupola. Private money purchased the clock at the 1902 buffalo exposition. though the building was razed in 1968 to make way for its modern replacement, the clock was put in storage before it was placed atop the historical museum and former depot building. the 500-pound clock and liberty bell replica weighed down the top of the old depot and threatened structural damage. a new home was found for it when the county 53 emmet CouNty designated space on the bayfront and acquired a steel tower for the clock in 1996. standing sixty-two feet tall and weighing in at thirteen tons, it is quite the landmark. It stands near the harbor that saw emmet County grow explosively once the land opened up to private acquisition in 1874. by 1882, Petoskey was a booming lumber town of 2,500. the third lawyer to set up shop in Petoskey was Charles J. Pailthorp, age twenty-seven and a graduate of the law Department at the university of michigan,on april 23,1875. he had a distinguished career that ended when he argued his last case in 1940 at the age of 92 before the michigan supreme Court. In the 1890s he was the circuit judge for emmet and three neighboring counties. he reportedly enjoyed telling how he would hold court at tim rafferty’s saloon in st. James on beaver Island. the bar was his bench, and the jurors, witnesses, attorneys, parties, and public sat on beer kegs...