Joel Dinda's photos with the keyword: fishtown

Fishtown in Winter.... This ship is the usual transport to the Manitou Islands. She's named after the the bear in the local Legend of the Sleeping Bear . Leland, Michigan.

Fishtown in Winter... A closer view of the brand-new dam above Fishtown. Leland, Michigan.

Fishtown in Winter.... Last in this set. I promised Larry a picture of the Cheese Shop. (I've got another (better) picture of this shop in my scan queue. Early 90s, I think. In September. No snow. Tourists.)

Fishtown in Winter..... Leland, Michigan.

Fishtown in Winter.... Fishtown, generally speaking, looks a lot like this. Only usually you see it without the snow, and with tourists. Leland, Michigan.

Fishtown in winter.... One last view of the river, and the dam. This is similar to a photo I posted a few days back, but shows more detail on the buildings. Fishtown @ Leland, Michigan. Better large! There's a super-large (2800 pixel-wide) version of this pic , if you want to examine the details....

Fishtown in Winter.... Sometimes y' just gotta live with high contrast. Sorry 'bout the blown out beach behind, and the other odd effects.... This is the last building on the southern dock/boardwalk at Leland's Fishtown. Clearly the worst-maintained building in the set; it certainly looked abandoned when we were in Leland last week. A teensy bit of Janice Sue shows on the left. Tomorrow I'll show you that entire row of buildings, then we'll resume our tour of Fishtown proper.

Fishtown in Winter.... Another, more direct, photo of fishing boat Janice Sue, docked at Fishtown in Leland, Michigan. Although this is a brand-new photograph, it's pretty easy to find century-old photographs which don't look much different from this (for instance, inside Leland's Bluebird restaurant). Fishtown's a really remarkable place. Things change, over the years, but not enough that you notice.

Fishtown in winter.... We've turned around, and are looking down the river to where it empties into Lake Michigan. Leland's Fishtown is on the right; the breakwater shows in the background. The large boat is Mishe-Mokwa, the transport to the Manitou Islands. This photo is quite similar to one I posted a couple weeks back ; that one was taken by my father in 1973. Besides the sorts of insignificant details you'd expect to change in three decades, the most obvious change is the planking on the boardwalk.

Fishtown in Winter.... It was slippery . I'd just fallen on my rump, and was still sitting when I took this one. The odd construct on the immediate left is a fishnet, hung out to dry--actually a decoration, here, but you get the idea. Janice Sue's a commercial fishing boat--I presume she belongs to Carlson's. When she's out on Lake Michigan, she has a remarkable ability to attract gulls.

Fishtown in Winter.... Leland, Michigan. Sorry about the unintended sunlight effect.

Fishtown in Winter.... Carlson's still sells fish in Leland, Michigan's Fishtown. Looked like they were the only functioning Fishtown business last weekend; the other stores are quite tourist-dependent and apparently close down for the off-season.

Leland, Michigan; 1973. Photo by Roger Dinda.

Another of Dad's 1973 pictures of Leland's Fishtown . Camera: Argus C3

My family has a long tradition of vacationing in or near Leland, Michigan--for instance, my Cathead Bay pics were taken only a few miles north from here. Historically, Leland was a fishing village on Lake Michigan, and Fishtown was the village heart. While Leland's always been a tourist destination, tourism's become the town's mainstay in the past few decades. Fishing, correspondlingly, has become less important. More like unimportant, except to the few fishermen who remain, and to those tourists who come mainly to fish; there are charter boats catering to those folks. By 1973, Fishtown was already transforming itself into a commercial tourist attraction. As I recall, there were still some real fishermen selling fresh and/or smoked fish in the place at that time. I'm not sure you can find that, now. [Rich says you can; see below .] For the record: The look of this place was (and remains) authentic, rather than touristy, and it's well worth a visit. Camera: Argus C3. Roger Dinda photograph, scanned from a slide.

Fishtown in Winter.... Here's the Leland River, looking from Fishtown towards the brand-new dam. The hotel across the way is Falling Waters Lodge. This view just invites photographers to whip out their cameras. Compare with my Dad's 1973 picture to see how little the view's changed in three decades. We'll take a closer look at the dam in a day or two.