Photos of the Old Cement Plant in Cement City, Michigan: Early 1900s

I've written about Cement City before, telling about how we used to go there as kids and explore the old deserted cement plant...climb the towers and go down into the dangerous underground shafts.

But this time, I have discovered some photos of the old cement plant, going back over 100 years, and thought you might like to see these yourself.

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Briefly, Cement City started out as a post office named 'Woodstock' in 1838, named after the township. Through a series of closings and re-openings, it was re-named 'Kelley's Corners', then back to 'Woodstock', and then to 'Cement' in February 1901. One month later, the name was changed one last time to 'Cement City', in recognition of the Peninsular Portland Cement Company and their plant, which opened sometime between 1889 - 1901.

Originally, the community was split in the bottom portion of Jackson County and top of Lenawaee. It became a railway station on the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern RR. Along with the depot and post office, Cement City had a general store, blacksmith, hotel, and a good handful of homes.

We had some scary stuff happen to us at that deserted old plant back in the 1960s & 70s. It's all been demolished and carted away so no one could ever get hurt there again (and there were a good many that did).

To read my original Cement City article, click HERE to check out more info. In the meantime, take a look at the old photos below of what the Cement City plant looked like, over 100 years ago.

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