Greilickville

This village was first known as Norristown, in honor of Seth and Albert Norris, who opened a gristmill here about 1853. In the mid-1850s Godfrey Greilick and sons, natives of Bohemia, built a small, water-powered sawmill. The steam-powered Greilick Brothers mill replaced this in a few years. Until its destruction by fire about 1907 the mill was one of the most important on Grand Traverse Bay, cutting in 1883 8.5 million feet of hardwood lumber. Other industries in the nineteenth century included a brickyard, brewery, and tannery. When the Manistee and Northeastern Railroad entered town in 1892, the station was called Greilicks, and soon the village also took this name. Population peaked at about two hundred, and in 1902 the post office was discontinued.