Alex and Emma Anderson and their two children, Ivan and Scione, lived in the “farm house that came to Sister Bay over the ice from Marinette,” as it was known locally. The 1875 farmhouse was dragged up the hill after arriving in the Little Sister area of the Green Bay waters in 1895. It stands where it was originally placed, just south of Sister Bay where Hwy 57 intersects with Fieldcrest Road and Country Lane.

Our family and many of our neighbors have been fishing commercially in Green Bay and Lake Michigan from the time they arrived in Northern Door. My father, Harlow Nelson, fished with his uncle Stanley Voight and the Johnson brothers out of Sand Bay around Spider Island.

Herman and Marcheta Steebs opened Herman’s Market the week before Christmas, 1956, after long weeks of scrubbing, painting, stocking shelves and praying for a good turnout at our grand opening A half page ad announcing the event had already been picked up by the genial John Kopitzke, owner of the Door Reminder, who by buying a nickel candy bar had inadvertently become our first customer.

A good friend, especially to my aunts, Gretna and Elaine, Robbie Kodanko was a Norwegian bachelor who was a farmer and a fisherman. He had a big laugh and it rang out loud, along with Al Johnson’s, at the counter in Al’s restaurant. This was a common place for locals to gather for a coffee break and a time to shoot the breeze. Elaine could keep up with the storytelling and jokes without even trying.