Yankee Springs Inn

Near here once stood one of the most famous inns west of Detroit. It was run by “Yankee Bill” Lewis, a New Yorker who came here in 1836. His establishment, located on the main road from Grand Rapids to Battle Creek and Kalamazoo, was an unimposing collection of log cabins, but the fame of his hospitality was such that as many as one hundred people often stayed at the tavern for a night. Sixty teams of horses could be stabled at a time. Stagecoaches stopped there to rest passengers and to change horses. After Lewis’s death in 1853, new roads bypassed Yankee Springs. His inn soon closed.