POINTE AUX PEAUX
MONROE, MICHIGAN
By Herb Reagan
with the kind assistance of Ada Mae Kuhn, representing the Sterling family
and Bill Burrer, representing the Burrer family,
who until recently owned and lived on the property
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Prologue
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Ellen Ware (Grannie), married her first husband, Joseph Sterling Goddard in 1905. The union produced the "Goddard" portion of this web site in the following children: Caroline, Elizabeth, Sterling, Lester, and Jaquelin. If you are a descendent of one of these five people, this article is especially for you. Mr Goddard's mother was Martha Sterling, the oldest daughter of Joseph Marvin Sterling, the principle man discussed here. The five children above inherited the Goddard cottage referred to, and benefited from its sale.
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In the mid 1800's a 17 year old man named Joseph Marvin Sterling arrived in Monroe, Michigan on the West end of Lake Erie, with less than five dollars in his pocket, and got a job clerking in a store. History doesn't record why he picked out Monroe, but it is obvious that he knew what he was doing.
In the next 20 years or so he became Monroe's leading citizen, developing boat and rail transportation on Lake Erie. In the process he owned a fleet of ships and railroad equipment, handling coal and goods to the East and the South. He owned a contracting business and built many homes and commercial buildings in the area. He was the Mayor of the City for a period of time, turned down a try for Governor, and just missed becoming the State Treasurer when he lost an election. I have only scratched the surface of his accomplishments.
In 1867, Mr. Sterling and several other men bought a 25 acre tract of land ten miles north of Monroe on Lake Erie to establish a vineyard and winery. This property was called Pointe Aux Peaux (Point of skins-French-pronounced Point O Po.). It was named by the Indians who had used it for years to dry their pelts in the sun on the flat rocks on the shore of the lake.
The vines had been started earlier and this was when they built the Winery building out of large stones with an interior wall of brick. Thus the temperature inside was maintained at a fairly constant sixty degrees. On the lower floor of the building a large room was used a storage area for casks of wine and as a dining area for visitors and employees. It isn't difficult to imagine it as the equivalent of today's tasting rooms.
From the start it appears that Mr. Sterling had arranged to hold title to the entire parcel. My guess is by a buy-out clause in his agreement with his partners. I believe he saw the parcel as a summer home area for his children. In any case the entire 25 acres became a single parcel under family control.
The portion facing the lake had been divided into a number of lots, and a portion of them were reserved for the family members. This was done to make sure that any building would leave adequate open spaces between houses. Set-backs from the lake were established to keep the view wide open for all. No fences were allowed and the entire area was treated as a large lawn. The entire "living" area was about 2000 feet along the lake front by 300 feet deep. A number of the family cottages were built by Mr. Sterling.
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The first homes that were built were the Goddard cottage in front of the winery building and three smaller closely grouped cottages built as a "single" housing unit next door for the Sterlings. A log was always a fixture in the Goddard cottage and still exists today.
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The first entry in this log follows: "Wednesday, July 1, 1885. J M Sterling, Walter Sterling, Sterling Goddard & L O Goddard arrived at the Pointe at eleven AM, found the buildings, vineyard &
grounds looking nicely. The day beautiful. After dinner- (JMS & LOG cooks) in the Pointe dining room. A plaster bed was made for plastering the sitting room of the Sterling Cottage, laid new platform in front of cottages and measure was taken of the two rooms and hall upstairs of Goddard cottage. After supper, prepared by Katie McNutt, the party left for Monroe at 6:30. Household goods brought out by Carl."
Names:
JMS = Joseph Marvin Sterling, The owner
Walter Sterling, his youngest son
Sterling Goddard, his teenage grandson
LOG: Lester Orestes Goddard, his son-in-law married to his oldest daughter Martha.
The reference to the Sterling cottages is to the three small units that were built next door.
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The winery flourished and became one of the best rated wineries in the area until Mr. Sterling's death in 1891. At that time the wife of one of his partners, a staunch abolitionist, was able to force closure of the business.
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The winery building was turned into a home on the second floor and a kitchen and central dining room on the ground floor. Since it was no longer a winery it took on a new name, probably simply by habit. It was known thereafter as the Stone House.
A caretaker and his family lived there. His wife cooked the evening meal for all the family in residence. A locomotive bell was mounted on a post outside the dining room. It was rung when the meal was ready. The man of the house had plenty to do. He had a golf course type mower to keep the lawn area cut. I believe there were water wells at that time. There were kitchen facilities in the cottages for other than the evening meals. With
the depression days of the thirties, the central dining room became too expensive for some of the residents and the "formal" atmosphere of the times was giving away to a more relaxed life style.
As late as the late Thirties there was one wall telephone in the dining room which did for everyone there and a lot more! It was a party phone for about five other subscribers and each one had a combination of short and long rings representing a "number." To call out you cranked the handle on the side of the box to get the
operator. Listening in to other conversations was a standard "occupation."
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The caretaker's other duties were to farm the rest of the 25 acres, slop the pigs (waste disposal machines!), empty the chemical toilets and tend the ice house, which meant that during the winter he cut and stored the ice house for the next summer.
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The cottages were not insulated at all and therefore were totally unusable in
the winter. Just as well. I understood that winters on that lake front were pretty fierce, and it was not a fun place to be.
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Over the years some of the homes were improved upon and turned into modern and nicely furnished summer homes, as opposed to "cottages."
Our family, the Goddards and Reagans spent summers, or in most cases, parts of summers at the Goddard cottage in the twenties and the thirties. After Mario died
there in a swimming accident in 1942, it was used very little and the cottage was sold in 1946. Starting about that time the "family" cottages were put on the market and by 1948 the Sterling descendants no longer had interest in the property.
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As I remember it, at that time there were only two members of Mr. Sterling's family still living. Walter, .a lifetime bachelor, was called Uncle Pod. Why? The story is that he was small and looked like his brother. "Two peas in a pod." The other, his youngest daughter, was Emma. She was Aunt Em to all. They were both into their seventies or more and carried on a constant feud. Mostly it was all in fun and intended to amuse everyone else Aunt Em had one son who was married and lived on the East coast. His family came for a visit each summer.
Every evening about seven Uncle Pod would honk the horn of his big monster '20s coupe using a special beep-beep that meant it was time for "ICC" That means Ice Cream Cone. Every child in the area would come running and pile
in. The older ones rode the running boards and the whole affair took off at a subdued speed to the store about a mile away. There were usually eight to twelve or more kids every day.
Way back about 1900, Walter Wing, son of Aunt Em, and about 10 or 12, complained to his Uncle Pod that she was overwhelming him with too many chores.
Uncle Pod's response was, "We'll form a labor union and call it 47 Kibosh - 47 chores and then - Kibosh!" Thus was born a Union that lasted until Uncle Pod's death in 1933. 47 ended up everywhere. On flags. On banners. Carved in wet cement. And painted on walls. A special handshake was worked out. A cheer showed up. Announcements of the Annual 4th of July meetings
made the Monroe newspaper. All this to let Aunt Em know that they wouldn't buckle under!
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At every yearly meeting new members were voted in using a white ball or a black ball (pebbles). A blackball kept you out. Of course, Aunt Em never got in. Nor did three or four others that presumably had made nasty remarks. Of course the whole thing was a lot of fun and everyone got a big boot out of the shenanigans. Couldn't have been pulled off by anyone but Uncle Pod!
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For the children up to mid-teens there was lots to do; It seems to me that we spent all day in our bathing suits alternating between tanning and cooling off in the water. In front of the houses at Pointe Aux Peaux there was only rocks, just big enough to be almost impossible to walk on without shoes. Instead we walked down the shore
about a quarter mile to a public sandy beach and a pier that had taken a beating from winter storms, but was still good enough to dive and jump from...There were also lots of kids games, and lots of kids to play them.
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Mothers with babies and young children always seemed to have others in the same circumstances to pal with and the older people always had enough for a good visit or a game of cards. And there was always shopping trips into Monroe to keep one active.
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Croquet became the game of choice for almost all and there was a number of experts.
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The one group that seemed to be left out was the young single adults. But as long as there was a car available and a few bucks in the pocket, there were lots of movies, roadhouses and dance halls in the general area.
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You could almost always count on some screwball event when there were groups of teenagers around. One year my older brother Sterling, probably about 17, had a Modal A Ford Roadster convertible. He was playing around with it in the yard and drove it around in a tight circle. When he did this the steering locked in place and he had to turn it out of the circle himself. This caught his fancy, so he turned it into the
tight circle, set the manual accelerator and jumped out. The car must have circled for five minutes or more while he got everyone out to see it. Nobody seemed to worry that it might straighten itself out and plow into somebody or something!
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These were the days of Prohibition and there were a number of occasions when "Rumrunners" were caught trying to bring liquor into the States from Canada across the lake. For every one caught, I'm sure there were a number of them that weren't. On one occasion one of their boats capsized in rough waters and the bodies washed ashore at Stony Point just down the lake from us. Horses couldn't have kept us away!
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The Pointe was a wonderfully friendly and fun place to spend some if not all of your summer vacation. I've always felt that it qualified as the perfect personification of the hazy lazy days of Summer.
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Epilogue
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Bill Burrer, now living in Florida, caught up with us when he found references to Pointe Aux Peaux on the web site. His initial correspondence is in the visitor section. I asked him to add a few notes about the intervening years since the property was sold in 1946. Here are his comments, condensed somewhat for space reasons:
"My father, Gerald J. Burrer, bought the property in 1946." (Ed. Note -- the Stone House, Goddard cottage, Aunt Em's three cottages, and the game room on the shore line. No other buildings were involved in this sale.) "He was a chemist by trade and had his lab in the upstairs of the garage which was originally living quarters. The Stone House became the principal residence and the cottages were rented out or were used on the hot nights for the cooler screened porches.". The family was Jerry and Jenny and children, Bill and Bonnie.
"Jerry's two passions were sailing and antique car restoration. He sailed in races in Detroit, Toledo and Sister Island. He also hosted at least 50 VMCCA meets at the Pointe. Jenny hosted many reunions of her college sorority friends and their families over the years."
At the end of each summer, their Grandparents and friends from Sunbury and Centerburg, OH, would take over for a two week vacation.
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"47 is my favorite number for obvious reasons. I still have a few marbles that came out of the concrete which made the number 47 in a couple of places The 47 Kibosh bronze cast from the 3 car barn was always my prize possession. The flag pole area is still there. All the cottages were torn down by 1971, and none were replaced."
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After his Dad passed away, Bill was faced with disposing of the property. He maintained that any buyer would have to preserve the Winery Building (Stone House) for its historical value to the area. He was delighted to find a buyer who agreed to this stipulation and has since build a new house actually incorporating the original building inside. Although the area owned by the Burrers is still open lawn with no new buildings, the rest of the original lakefront has cottages and/or homes on all the lots in both directions, and some houses in a second row on the other side of the road all the way to the Pointe Aux Peaux Farms subdivision. "Not much room to roam anymore. but still friendly, fun, and a much sought after location."
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"I loved it. I miss it, and still go back. 44 years of the best part of my life."