Chassell Old Fashioned Christmas Celebration
Ice finally started forming on the lake last week on December 6th. With winter clearly on the way, I kept an appointment I had on the calendar for a couple of weeks to finally get the truck’s four-wheel drive rebuilt. We are definitely glad to get it out of the way as its weight without four-wheel drive can definitely be a liability when trying to get out of icy places.
Our Thursday morning was spent preparing the Chassell Heritage Center for its role the Chassell Old Fashioned Christmas Celebration along with several other members of the Chassell Historical Organization Board. The Heritage Center hosts Santa and Mrs. Claus on the second floor where kids can see them as well as decorate Christmas cookies. The Heritage Center also serves as a stop on the Home for the Holidays Home Tour where participants can stop for food, enjoy musical entertainment, and check out the exhibits.
I squeezed in a 4.7 miles run out to Halfmoon Beach and back after we wrapped up work at the Heritage Center.
After picking up the truck, we made our way to Gino’s in Hancock for the Dial Help Christmas party. We stayed for an hour and a half then headed back to Chassell where the planning commission had a meeting on the Chassell Township master plan final draft with our consultant Pat Coleman. I discussed the input I had pulled together during my review of the document the previous Saturday morning at Cafe L’Anse. We will seek approval from the Township Board to send the document out for public review and then a public hearing will occur in March. The meeting on the master plan rolled right into the 7:00 p.m. start of our regularly scheduled planning commission meeting. The big news I delivered was the progress DP Construction had made on the Historic Trail boardwalk. Construction was at 90% completion and the sign designs were in the process of being completed by Terri Frew’s art and design class.
My cousin Kristin Ojaniemi, who produces WLUC TV6’s Discovering which airs on Monday nights at 7:30 p.m., would be in town the next day to conduct interviews on the historic trail project as a follow up to the story she did in our effort’s early stages over three years ago.
Friday started with a beautiful sunrise over the lake.
Kristin and I started out on the MTU campus at 9:00 a.m. where she interviewed College of Social Sciences Department Chair Don Lafrenier who has been helping us integrate the Keweenaw Time Traveler into the project. Don shared how the 1908 Sanborn fire map of the mill had just been uploaded to the Time Traveler. We would have the opportunity to check it out later at the mill site where we pinged against this map on the screen behind Don.
We then headed down to Chassell where Kristin interviewed MTU art and design instructor Terri Frew who talked about the sign design aspect of the project and then Dan Palosaari from DP Construction who discussed the boardwalk construction.
Friday evening was the Christmas Tree lighting in Chassell as part of Old Fashioned Christmas. There was a group singing Christmas carols, a bonfire, and horse-drawn carriage rides. Superior Chiropractic served refreshments next door. We met up there with our friend Lisa who works remotely in a hybrid manner, splitting time between Chassell and Wisconsin. It was a beautiful evening to be outdoors,
Saturday morning started off with a run out to Halfmoon and back. I ran down to the boat launch as part of my run and noted quite a number of ice fisherman out on Pike Bay. I then ran into Mark Koski who redeveloped the former community center at the entrance to Centennial Park into five townhouses a couple of years back. I brought him up to speed on the progress with the historic trail. Mark would have the bus barn unit on the home tour.
We spent the afternoon on the home tour with fourteen of our friends. While at the Heritage Center we saw Jim and Rae who are two remote workers who recently came to Chassell. Jim is a chemical engineer and Rae teaches piano remotely. On the home tour we had the opportunity to talk with one of the hosts who works remotely from Chassell for a bank in the Twin Cities. We had a great time with our friends and meeting up with others we knew along the way.
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