Qualla: St. Joseph Island

St. Joseph Island: Introduction

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kdorse, CC BY-SA 3.0. In November 1811, a shipment of greatcoats failed to arrive at the remote British garrison on St. Joseph Island. With winter closing in, the fort's storekeeper John Askin Jr. improvised: he cut up thick Hudson's Bay Company blankets and asked his wife and a group of Métis women to sew them into coats. Forty woolen garments were produced for the shivering soldiers. The following winter, more were made for troops at Fort Mackinac. The soldiers called them Mackinaw coats, and the name stuck. Two centuries later, the Mackinaw remains an icon of cold-weather clothing, but few people know it was born out of desperation on this island in northwestern Lake Huron.

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Image: Kdorse | CC BY-SA 3.0

St. Joseph Island: Place of the Hardwood Trees

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Public domain. The Ojibwe knew this island as Anipich, meaning 'place of the hardwood trees,' and the dense maples that earned that name still define St. Joseph Island today. At roughly 365 square kilometers, it is the third largest island in the Great Lakes, trailing only Manitoulin and Isle R...

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Image: Public domain

St. Joseph Island: A Fort at the Edge of Empire

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kdorse, CC BY-SA 3.0. When the Jay Treaty forced Britain to surrender Fort Mackinac to the Americans in 1796, officials chose St. Joseph Island as the site for a replacement garrison. Lieutenant Governor John Graves Simcoe argued that maintaining a presence on Lake Huron was essential for relations wi...

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Image: Kdorse | CC BY-SA 3.0

St. Joseph Island: Syrup, Settlers, and a Famous Architect

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Province of Ontario, Public domain. After the war, St. Joseph Island lay virtually uninhabited until Major William Kingdom Rains purchased over 2,200 hectares in 1834 to establish a colony he named Milford Haven, after a seaside resort near his Welsh hometown. The colony struggled, but settlement picked up when the...

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Image: Province of Ontario | Public domain

St. Joseph Island: The Bridge and Beyond

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit P199, Public domain. Until 1972, the only way to reach St. Joseph Island was by water. Cable ferries connected the island to the mainland starting in 1919, and a government diesel ferry called the St. Joseph Islander ran from Humbug Point beginning in 1953. When the bridge was finally built, it was n...

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Image: P199 | Public domain