Grand Trunk Depot

Constructed in 1902, this castle-like building with its square tower was the Lansing station for the Grand Trunk Western Railroad until 1971. For decades passengers streamed through its doors. Here servicemen left for and returned from military duty. Children and adults alike associated this depot with the excitement of travel and vacations. The city’s joys and sorrows were reflected in this rail station; greetings and goodbyes were its most vital ingredients. But gradually rail travel ebbed. Renovated as a restaurant in 1972, the building’s exterior remains unchanged. Gerald R. Ford from Michigan, the thirty-eighth President of the United States, dined here during a “whistle stop” campaign tour on May 15, 1976.