The Big Wild-Michigan's Pigeon River Country State Forest, Part 1: Ernest Hemingway & P.S. Lovejoy

Conservationist and Forest Advocate P.S. Lovejoy called the Pigeon River Forest "The Big Wild." It is one of the largest contiguous forest lands in Michigan at now over 118,000 acres. Like much of the forests of the Great Lakes, it has had its rebirth in the 20th century after the success of the 19th century lumber industry and the subsequent wildfires that followed. Ernest Hemingway summered with his family in Northern Michigan while he was growing up. Born in Oak Park, Illinois in 1898, Young Ernest Hemingway and his family traveled to Petoskey every summer where they had a cottage on nearby Walloon Lake. Ernest loved fishing and his fishing adventures took him as far a field as "the pine barrens" east of Vanderbilt that was the home of the Black, Pigeon, and Sturgeon rivers, along with fishing trips in the Upper Peninsula. The pine barrens were the cutover and burned over land that had once hosted great forests of white pine and hardwood and would soon become the Pigeon River Country State Forest. Another visitor to the area was P.S. Lovejoy, a forester and conservationist, who would first see the land in 1919. Although it was still recovering from logging, fire, and failed attempts at afgriculture, he saw in his mind "The Big Wild," a roadless area of forests hosting a wide variety of wildife, including the newly reintroduced Rocky Mountain Elk. His idea was for a wildland that contained no conveniences for visitors. It was wilderness in it's truest form. While his idea was not matched by reality, it became the basis for one of Michigan's unique state forest lands. What began as a 6,500 acre forest reserve (like Higgins Lake and Houghton Lake Forest Reserves), grew over the next century to 110,000 acres.In December, 2025, a new land purchase of the 8,500 acre Black River Ranch grew the forest to now more than 118,000 acres. This episode of the North Country History with Rob Burg podcast shares some of the history of the creation of this state forest and covers the newest addition to the forest in the 21st century.Resources used for this episode:Franz, Dale Clarke. Pigeon River Country. University of Michigan Press. Ann Arbor, Michigan. 1985/revised edition 2007.Heckman, Kerry. Showcasing the DNR: A Landmark Investment in Public Land. Michigan Department of Natural Resources, Lansing, Michigan. December 10, 2025. https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/MIDNR/bulletins/3ff3542Kates, James. Planning a Wilderness: Regenerating the Great Lakes Cutover Region. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, Minnesota. 2001.Websites with Further Information:Official Michigan Department of Natural Resources website: https://www.michigan.gov/dnr/places/state-forests/prcWebsite for the Pigeon River Country Association, the non-profit 501c3 organization that partners with the DNR, and the Pigeon River Country Discovery Center, and educational and visitor center housed in the historic former forest supervisor's home: https://pigeonriverdiscoverycenter.org/To leave a comment, send me a text here.Support the show