Town's story can be told through buildings / museum
LINDEN, MI -- We're traveling Mid-Michigan in historic Linden, first settled in 1835. Linden was once the home of the Beach Buggy works. It wasn't called that because the buggies were for the beach, but rather because it's creators were the Beach brothers. Local historian David Kincaide is the President of the Linden Mills Historical Society, and describes it as "...a buggy pulled by horses." He says the same company build wagons for the civil war effort, a war which occurred between 1860 and 1865. Linden's famous "Beach Buggies" preceded the first automomobile made here by over 50 years. Kincaide identified a local Coney Island restaurant as the original site of the Beach Buggy works, and identified two other buildings closer to the river as original buildings of the company, dating back to the mid 1800s.
The community here was originally called "Warner's Mills". Thus the name of today's museum, "Linden Mills" museum, located in the large and gorgeous old grist mill, right along the Shiawassee River. The museum contains local history, including the record of the 1903 fire. One of the main blocks here in Linden almost entirely burned in 1903, but is now home to what seem to be thriving local businesses. "Everything from the Masonic Temple to the corner of Bridge and Broad burned," says Kincaide. Mr. Walsh rebuilt the building on the corner, where you can still see his name on the top of the building. A shop sits there now.
The museum also features things like Linden band uniforms dating back to the 1940s, local history from both world wars, and other amazing features. There is even a Roy Rogers exhibit, a pride of the curator Barbara Kincaide. She is devoted to the museum and stresses that you can e-mail her at victorianbarbara@aol.com if you want to arrange to have the museum opened for a school or other group at any time.
