Bloomer State Park No. 2

On October 13, 1922, Howard Bloomer and his wife, Amy, donated 211 acres of land to the State of Michigan to be used as state parks. As chairman of the board for Dodge Brothers, Bloomer encouraged the automotive company to purchase and donate an additional ten sites. His donated land was divided into four state parks. This site, which was originally forty-seven acres, became Bloomer State Park No. 2. Bloomer continued to provide funding for park upkeep and improvements because he was concerned about the loss of natural areas for the public. Bloomer was also a member of the board of the directors of the National Conference of State Parks, the Michigan Conservation Commission, and the Huron-Clinton Metropolitan Authority’s Board of Commissioners.

[Back]: Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, the Civilian Conservation Corps conducted projects to improve the park. Their work included planting trees, paving trails, and constructing this fieldstone and timber picnic shelter. The shelter was completed in 1946 after World War II had halted the construction. The park is home to one of the most intact portions of the Clinton-Kalamazoo Canal. Stevens T. Mason, the state’s first governor, initiated the canal project in 1838 to connect the Clinton and Kalamazoo Rivers. The proposed canal would have spanned the width of the Lower Peninsula but needed to cross multiple changes in elevation that made construction difficult. The canal reached the land that became Bloomer State Park No. 2 before the funding ran out and the project was abandoned.