The tourism industry began to take hold in Sister Bay in the late 1800s when steamships delivered tourists escaping the summer heat of the big Midwest cities.  The first tourist hotel in the Sister Bay Area was the Liberty Park Summer Resort, built in 1898, and it remains open today as the Liberty Lodge.  In the 1910s, the owners built twelve cottages, ten of them on the shorefront.  Most of the cottages were torn down in 2006, but three were saved, including the Birch and Balsam cottagers that were brought here.  The Birch Cottage has been restored to look like what it might have In the 1940s or 1950s, when summer cottages were in their heyday.  The Balsam Cottage serves as the Sister Bay Historical Society office.