From an article appearing in the Blade/Crescent Sept. 24-30, 1991 by Mary Drier
Only the Elevator Remains of Colling's 'Great Promise'
In the early morning hours of September 17, sleepy-eyed fire-fighters scrambled to the community of Colling and the scene of a fire that drew eight fire departments to a blaze at the Agri-Sales branch office.
Colling has about 40 residents and the elevator is the hamlet's only business, but Colling was once a thriving community and a shopping center that drew people from Flint, Saginaw, and Bay City to the J.C. Colling General Store, according to a history compiled by the late Deborah Colling in 1975.
According to the locally written history, English immigrant Joseph Colling, for whom the community was named, purchased 225 acres in Columbia Township for $1.25 per acre in the 1890's. A few years later Joseph Colling's sons, George, David, William, Henry, and Emerson; and a brother, Thomas, moved to the area. Colling was granted legal status as a village in 1902.
Because Colling received railroad service, it showed more promise than the neighboring communities of Columbia Corners (one mile to the west) and Colwood (four miles east).
The community of Columbia Corners exists only in the vocabulary of local residents who still refer to the intersection of Dickerson and French Roads by the name that appears on no maps. All that is left of Colwood is the Colwood Bar, and the once prestigious structure of the C.D. Andrew Bank, which currently serves as rental housing.
The Michigan Central Railroad connected Colling with Caro and Owendale, and trains passed through the town twice daily. At one time, Colling had three general stores, a blacksmith shop, a grist mill, saw mills and had a post office.
From that era of great promise only the elevator remains in service.
Submitted by Sherrye Luther Woodworth, October 1999.
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