Sprague's History of Grand Traverse and Leelanaw Counties Michigan
"Fife Lake township was organized in the winder of 1873.

The village of Walton is located at the junction of the Traverse City branch of the Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad with the main line, on section 33 of this township. It was located at the time of the building of the road and for a number of years was quite an important lumbering point. It is now a place of about one hundred and fifty inhabitants, and has a hotel, store and restaurant. The most important industry is the growing of cranberries by Hon. D. C. Leach, who has an extensive marsh under cultivation with this fruit.

There are three school buildings in the township outside of the village of Fife Lake.

Fife Lake village is located on the Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad, and takes its name from the lake on the border of which it is built. It was incorporatefd in 1889 and has a population of about seven hundred and fifty. It was once a large manufacturing point of pine lumber, and is now a very important shipping point.

There are three churches in the village, Catholic, Methodist Episcopal and Presbyterian. It has a graded school and a school building of four rooms, built at a cost of five thousand dollars. It has two hotels, the City Hotel and Fife Lake House, and a saw-mill and a wood bowl and stave factory. It has a town hall, built at a cost of five hundred dollars, and an Odd Fellows lodge, a Good Templars lodge and a Grand Army post. It also has a live weekly newspaper, the Fife Lake Monitor. It is a neatly printed six-column quarto, in its twelfth year of publication. It is ably edited and published by Will A. Kent, and receives a good advertising patronage from the business men of Fife Lake, South Boardman, Walton, Traverse City and Cadillac.

From Sprague's History of Grand Traverse and Leelanaw Counties Michigan Edited and compiled by Elvin L. Sprague, Esq. And Mrs. George N. Smith. Published 1903 by B. F. Bowen