--Abandoned Places--

Sherwood, Mich.

 

It's the kind of town where if you're not a local, you stick out.

Erin and I drove down M-66 one afternoon near the end of winter 2001, headed for a town that all but it's 300 some residents has forgotten. It was hard to imagine a sleepier town that Athens, where we stopped for some film on the way, but a few miles farther and we would find ourselves in the middle of a once hopeful, but slowly dying town. Most of the businesses had been borded up, including the post office, with only a small general store and a motel making up the economy of the town. City hall, the library and the fire department were all housed in the same building, an unimpressive garage-looking structure, with metal signs hanging above each entrance to tell which door led to which civic institution.

 

       


The official population of Sherwood is listed at 320. It has it's own elementary school and boasts of being home to the oldest free built Methodist church in Michigan. The people of the town would make no claims to living in any sort of major or important town, but even as a commuter town for the Coldwater and Sturgis area, it seems to be struggling. 

 

                                        photo by E. Dorbin  

Erin spoke with the man running the general store, and he complained that distributers don't want to send trucks all the way out there to deliver products, and when they do, they charge an arm and a leg for it. He noted that his was the last store left in town, and even he was struggling to stay afloat. He pointed out a building across the street from his store that once housed an ice cream shop, but now lies empty.

                   

 

Times are tough all over the midwest right now I guess, which probably makes it nearly impossible for a town like Sherwood to survive. There are still a couple hundred people strying to stick it out though. They enjoy the quiet village lifestyle and apparently don't mind having to go elsewhere for their goods and services. We saw people coming and going and some kids followed us around on bikes as we tried to get some photos of the town. Out-of-towners were probably somewhat of a curiosity for them, or at least a break up in the monotony of a town that get's few visitors, I'm sure. It's an interesting place though, and I have a bit of compassion for those that choose to stick it out in a town from which many have apparently chosen to flee.

 

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