For some reason recently the CI The Man Without a Country came to mind. It was one of several of the more than 160 printed that it was a privilege to own back in the day. Until not long ago the connection between the story and the Civil War was not in the memory bank, perhaps because as years pile on top of one another a lot of memory seems to get squeezed out and falls back into the soil from which it originally sprouted.
It was a nice surprise, then, to find the text of the book (basis for the comic, of course) by Everett Edward Hale online and read the first few lines of the opening chapter and find, after the story begins with the author reading an obituary of one Philip Nolan, this:
"I happened to observe it, because I was stranded at the old Mission-House in Mackinac, waiting for a Lake-Superior steamer which did not choose to come ...."
A Michigan connection to this immortal story?! What was, or is, "the old Mission-House"? Was it a figment of Hale's imagination? According to the State historic sites database, "The Mission House is one of the earliest buildings constructed on Mackinac Island and is associated with the Mission Church, the oldest surviving church structure in Michigan. The building was constructed in 1825 by Martin Heydenburk under the direction of Presbyterian minister William Montague Ferry to board students and families with the Mission Church until 1837. In 1845 Edward A. Franks bought the building and converted it into a hotel ...."
Classic.
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