St. Wenceslaus Church and Cemetery
In the 1860s and 1870s settlers from Bohemia (now part of Czechoslovakia) came to this area and worked at the Leland Lake Superior Iron Foundry and the Gill sawmill. Catholics attended mass at the Holy Trinity Church in Leland until the church burned in 1880. In 1890 the first St. Wenceslaus Church was built and the cemetery established. Ornate metal grave markers reflect the Bohemian heritage, as do the names Bourda, Houdek, Hula, Jelinek, Kalchick, Kirt, Kolarik, Korson, Kovarik, Maresh, Novotny, Reicha and Sedlacek which appear in the cemetery. The church membership doubled by 1908. In 1914 volunteers hauled bricks and other materials to this site and built the present church. This Late Gothic Revival church was completed during that year.
Bureau of History, Michigan Department of State
Registered Local Site No. 1671
Property of the State of Michigan 1990
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