Circle M

Organization

Founded

circa 1963

Coordinates

45.7205° N, 85.5316° WGoogle Maps: Circle MDownload KML

Eras

Modern era

Concepts

economytourismcommunityfoodways

Within

Beaver Island

Summary

The Circle M is a restaurant and bar on Beaver Island, trading under that name since at least 1963 and, as of August 2026, still operating. It was created by Jack Martin, a Buick retiree, in a building the Beaver Beacon calls the Rectory, and opened as a bed-and-breakfast before becoming, in 1964, the first restaurant on the island to serve draft beer. Bob and Lil McGlocklin bought it in 1970 and held it for more than a quarter of a century. For one summer in 1992 it traded as Stoney Acres Farm before reverting to its old name.

Current operation

The house trades as the Circle M at 26300 Old Church Crest Road and was listed and open as of August 2026.¹ It appears on the review platforms with two different populations — 4.5 from 239 reviews on Google, 4.3 from 64 on Tripadvisor, both retrieved 14 August 2026 — figures that describe the platforms rather than the house.¹²

History

The earliest held notice is from October 1963, when the Beacon listed the houses open for the deer season and named the Circle M among them, alongside Grace Coles’ Killarney Inn and the LaFreniere and Wojan motels.³ By January 1970 it was open for meals in winter as well.⁴

The origin comes from a single retrospective. A September 2005 Beacon column, recalling issues datable to 1995, records the death of Jack Martin at 83, who “retired to Beaver Island from Buick, bought the Rectory, and created the Circle M as a bed-and-breakfast; in 1964 it became the first Island restaurant to serve draft beer.”⁵ No held source gives the year Martin bought the building or opened the business; the 1963 notice establishes only that it was trading by then.

Bob and Lil McGlocklin “arrived in 1970, and bought the Circle M,” and were still running it in 1996 after more than twenty-five years on the island; Bob served on the Airport Committee and Lil as a Township Trustee.⁶ In the summer of 1992 the house was managed by Dave and Shannon Heynig under the name Stoney Acres Farm; by January 1993 it was “once again The Circle M, under the ownership and management of Bob and Lil McGlocklin,” open all year but on four days a week in winter with a reduced menu.⁷

The premises

The building was a rectory before it was a business — the only held statement of the site’s earlier use, and it comes from the same 1995 retrospective that gives the founding.⁵ The Beacon’s 1993 description of “massive stone walls and beautiful rock garden” is the fullest account of the fabric in the held record.⁷ The present street address, Old Church Crest Road, is consistent with a former church building on the site, but no held source connects the road name to the rectory and this record does not treat the agreement as evidence.

The room has served the island beyond its trade. The Community Players staged their shows here in 1988 “because the acoustics are better than at the gym of the school or the social hall,” with the audience watching through open windows on a cool evening; the Medical Center Auxiliary held its sixth annual Style Show and Luncheon at “the Circle M Lodge” in July 1989.⁸⁹

Evidence and limits

Premises and business are carried on one page here because the held record will not support two: apart from the words “bought the Rectory” and one sentence about stone walls, nothing describes the building. No deed, licence, construction date, or account of the rectory’s own period has been consulted. The founding rests on a single retrospective sentence published about thirty years after the event and about ten years before the issue that reprints it. Ownership after 1996 is not covered by any held source, and the held Beacon run ends in 2014, so the twenty-two years to 2026 rest only on commercial listings.

Added 14 August 2026. Recent changes