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Alleyton was located about one mile west of White Cloud on the Muskegon and Big Rapids Railroad and White River. The two towns Morgan (now White Cloud) and Alleyton,
grew rapidly and by the end of the 1870s had a combined population of nearly a thousand people, with Alleyton being slightly the larger.
Its main street coincided with what is today M-20 beyond the curve just after crossing the river headed toward Fremont. Doubling back to the left on this curve
would put one in what used to be the business section of town, and following the road on to the east and then south, crossing the old railroad beds was the depot on the right. Two hundred
yards or so can be seen an old road leading to the left (east). About a block east on this road was the upper Alleyton Bridge, the road over which led to White Cloud. Upstream
a hundred yards was the big mill. The lower bridge was at the flowing well. From here the road led off to the west and north to Pinchtown and Old Denver.
In its heyday, Alleyton was quite a fair sized place. An 1880 census showed that Alleyton, with a population of 464, was the third largest community in Newaygo county, only bested by Newaygo and Fremont Center, both of which have survived and prospered. Most of the people lived in the area of town opposite the mill. By comparison, Alleyton had the reputation of being a rough, tough, boisterous river town, while Morgan was the habitat of the sophisticates, probably there wasn't too much difference. Both averaged one saloon for each fifty inhabitants, Alleyton had more river men, Morgan more railroaders. Neither were pansies. Among other buildings there was the James Alley & Co. office, Boarding House, stable, saw and shingle mill. A fire in March, 1882 consumed 47 buildings. On December 8, 1873, the Federal Government established a post office there with Michael Keff as the postmaster. It was discontinued in 1891 with Horance Warren as postmaster. In its palmy days, Alleyton had a reputation equal to any lumbering town in the country. With more saloons than any other one kind of business, they were often not only the scenes of revelry, but of bloodshed as well. Louis Fuller, who was then a lad of 17, said that there was a dancing party in progress in the hall over McDonnell’s Saloon. A stranger entered the saloon below, shot another man there, escaped, and was never apprehended. His victim was taken to the Big Rapids hospital where he died the next day. He also remembered a fist fight in the street near this saloon when one lumberjack bit off his opponent’s ear and spit it out. A well-known character around town was "Lame Bob". He was in Sherman’s Saloon when a riverman entered and told the crowd assembled there that a free-for-all fight was in progress at McDonnell’s Saloon. These were so common that nobody thought it worth while to go over but "Lame Bob". He told the group that he was going over and get a ticket to the show. In a few minutes he returned with a black eye and a bleeding nose. The men asked if he got his ticket and he replied, "Yes, and I got it punched, too". Another story of Alleyton’s lumber days is as follows: One night a group of rivermen got partly intoxicated and became noisy. Two of their number were arrested and put in jail. The jail was a small building built of planks laid on top each other and spiked. When the other rivermen heard that their companions were in jail, they took their peavies and went to the building. They told the men inside to be careful as they were going to turn the building over. This they did, and then pulled out the floor and liberated their companions. They then rolled the building over and over to the river and dumped it in, saying they did not want anything like that around. In 1880, the population of Alleyton was 464. |