Douglas News

Canadian tourists will see the ship's bridge, dine below-decks, and watch the engine pistons pounding in the hull of the old USS Keewatin.

On Monday officials from Saugatuck and Douglas will host a farewell ceremony two days before the SS Keewatin will set sail for Port McNicoll Canada.

State DEQ officials held a public hearing yesterday on a request by Douglas marina owner RJ Peterson to fill two and a half acres of wetlands on his property with around 30 thousand cubic yards of silt dredged from Kalamazoo Lake as part of getting the SS Keewatin out into Lake Michigan.

The 350-foot, century-old Great Lakes steamship -- a local tourist attraction for decades -- leaves in June to become a centerpiece for a new waterside development in Port McNicoll, Ont.

One-time US House Representative Pete Hoekstra of Holland will have four other men challenging him for the Republican nomination in the US Senate race.

The idea of a merger of the cities of Saugatuck and Douglas has appeal to resident Chris Raphael, largely because of the possible cost-savings of a single government.

Dredging was completed yesterday to loosen the vintage steamship Keewatin from its five-decade-long docking in Douglas and get the vessel out into Lake Michigan.

He served in the U.S. Army during World War II and Korea and retired from SIU Edwardsville as an operating engineer.

The two groups pushing to merge the governments of Douglas and Saugatuck cities now agree on a joint cost-analysis study.