The First of Centerville

The Legislature of 1856-'57 authorized the building of a State road from Bridgeport, in Saginaw County, to Forestville, in Sanilac County.  The road extended through section 3, in the township of Indian Fields, and that part of it was opened late in the fall of 1857.  The work of brushing and clearing was done by E. P. Randall, J. Blakely, Alexander Belmer, Lewis Richards, and his two sons, and Horace Parsell.  This work was done in December and the first team over the road was driven by Mr. C. R. Selden, present treasurer of the county, who was at that time hauling supplies for a lumber firm.

In 1858 Melvin Gibbs, who had been keeping a hotel in the old log house built by Samuel P. Sherman, put up a frame building, still standing at the corner of Almer and Frank Streets, and used it as a hotel.  It was known as the Gibbs House, and was the first hotel built on the site of Caro.

In 1859, William E. Sherman, who had been living in Juaniata, removed to this point and built a hotel near where the post office building now stands.  There was a small building on the ground, built the year previous which he enlarged, making a building 30 x 40 feet in size and two stories in height.  He gave his hotel the name of Centerville House, and from that the locality took its name.   Mr. Sherman reasoned that being near the center of the county, this point was a good location for a town that would have more than an equal chance of securing the county seat.

At this time, S. P. Sherman, Melvin Gibbs, Charles Austin, Chester Briggs, William E. Sherman, Peter D. Bush and N. G. Alvord, were about all the residents of the neighborhood.

Mr. Sherman purchased a stock of groceries and calico, amounting in value to about $50, and kept them for sale in the bar-room of the Centerville House, and thus started the first store in the place.  He also used to handle the mail, carrying it to and from Vassar and Watrousville, until the Burnside post office was established.

The first blacksmith shop was started by L. D. Welch, who is still carrying on the same business in the village, and is consequently the pioneer blacksmith of Caro.  Mr. Welch came her in the spring of 1861, and built a temporary shop about where D. A. Horner's drug store now stands.  During that summer he built a permanent shop on the State road.  He is still hammering away on the anvil chorus begun in the solitude of Centerville.

In the spring of 1861 Mr. Sherman put up a small frame building, about where the Wilsey Block now stands, and moved his stock of goods from the hotel into it.  A man named Bates purchased the hotel, and it was kept for a time by a Mr. Foster, and in the spring of 1868, Alfred Weldon moved here from Saint Clair County, and kept the hotel a year.  He then moved to Richland, in Almer, and built a mill that had been begun by E. P. Randall and J. Blakely.  In the spring of 1864, S. R. Cross took the hotel property and rebuilt the hotel and kept it for several years.

The second store in the place was started and kept by Joseph Gamble.  The building was put up in 1861, and it is now part of a bakery building on State Street. 

The first physician in the village was Dr. Palmer, who came about 1862.  Prior to that time Dr. Dickinson, of Almer, had been the only physician in this part of the county.

The first church building in the place was built for Universalist worship, by Samuel P. Sherman, in the summer of 1861.  It was used for religious worship by other denominations.  Its mission has long since changed, and it is now part of a saloon building on the corner of State and Burnside Streets.

Among the early preachers who ministered to the spiritual wants of the community, was a young man of fiery zeal and demonstrative inclinations.   At times during his labors here strange sounds would be heard issuing from the poplars scattered throughout the burnings back in the village.  The villagers were puzzled to account for the cause, and finally a delegations of boys visited the locality from which the unaccountable racket proceeded.  Approaching the thicket with caution, they discovered the young preacher threshing wildly about among the underbrush, and delivering the sermon for the coming Sunday to the nodding poplars.  The curiosity of the people was appeased, but the minister finding that his sanctuary was invaded, discontinued his rehearsals, and the eloquence of the young divine resounded no more through the burnings.