The Real McCoy

Norma Stevens (1922-2008) was born in Indiana, but raised in Buchanan, Michigan. She attended Buchanan High School, where Earl Stevens kidded her about her lisp. She decided he was the most insufferable man she'd ever met. By graduation they were going steady, and early in WWII they were married (and at some point she overcame the speech impediment). After the War they settled on a farm west of town to raise kids, corn, and sheep.When most of their four offspring were safely in high school, Norma took a job as reporter for the Berrien County Record. She also wrote a weekly column, called "Inklings," in which she celebrated the foibles of small town life, the changing of the seasons, and small vestiges of local history. Her interest in the past led her to research McCoy's Creek, the old mills, and the beginnings of Buchanan itself. The resulting book, The Real McCoy, was published in 1975 with an initial run of 518 copies.Norma passed on in 2008, but interest in her history of Buchanan remains. We hope that you will enjoy this reprint, and that it will, in some small way, become a foundation for future progress in the area she so loved.

Written with a newspaper columnist's eye for human interest, this is a colorful historical narrative about small town Buchanan, Michigan, and its once-vital resource: tiny McCoy's Creek. A waterway all but forgotten in the 20th century but essential to the first white settlers, the book is also a poignant (and ultimately successful) plea to save the neglected creek from ecological damage.
Culled from old newspaper records, letters, and stories of pioneer days preserved by family descendants, the book details the "acquisition" of land from Native American tribal chiefs, the arrival of the first white settlers and businessmen, the critical role of the creek in supplying water power for its mills, and the growth of Clark Equipment Company as the town's mainstay for much of the 20th century.
Written in the late 1960s as a series of newspaper columns, rewritten and published in book form in 1975, The Real McCoy quickly sold out its initial run of 518 copies. But it also spurred many of the town's subsequent efforts to restore the creek and build parks and trails in its honor. The 2010 edition by Jolibro Publishing is a facsimile reproduction of the original, which was hand set in the newspaper's lead type.
As the author wrote in her introduction, "It is hoped that the serious student of history will find in these pages enough detailed information to be of research value, and that the casual reader will find herein an easy, readable story that will enable him vicariously to hear the creak of water wheels and gears, to smell the fresh sawdust and the sweet flour aroma of a dozen mills, to sense the drama of good times and bad in a fledgling community, and to see in the mind's eye the people and environs of 'those good old days.'"