Biohazard and Crime Scene Remediation in Manistee, MI

Manistee is the county seat of Manistee County in Michigan's northwestern Lower Peninsula, and with 6,259 residents at the 2020 census it is the fifth-largest city in Northern Michigan.

Manistee sits on a narrow isthmus between Manistee Lake and Lake Michigan, with the Manistee River bisecting the city on its way to Lake Michigan along US 31.

The name Manistee comes from an Ojibwe word first applied to the county's principal river.

Much of the Manistee River valley, including the city itself, was an Odawa (Ottawa) reservation from 1836 to 1848.

The first permanent European-American settlement began on April 16, 1841, when John Stronach and his son Adam arrived at the river's mouth in a schooner with fifteen men and set up a sawmill, and the town took the name Manistee in 1846.

During the late-1800s lumber era, enormous quantities of white pine logs were floated down the Manistee River to the port and shipped on to the lumber markets of Chicago, Milwaukee, and Grand Rapids.

Manistee's lumber wealth produced a notable collection of Victorian homes and buildings, and the city still markets itself as a Victorian Port City.

Vast underground brine deposits turned Manistee into a salt producer after the lumber faded, earning it the nickname Salt City of the Inland Seas, and salt plants still operate on Manistee Lake today.

Manistee has about 2,880 households, about 73% of its homes are owner-occupied, and the median home value is roughly $164,100.

The Ramsdell Theatre, which opened in 1903, remains the cultural centerpiece of downtown Manistee.