Beaver Island Airport

Summary

The Beaver Island airport was an operating island airfield by June 1951. A Charlevoix County Herald report says its two principal runways measured 3,500 and 2,500 feet; 100-foot strips down their centers had been resodded, runway approaches had been cleared, and a new steel tower had been erected for the wind indicator.[^airport]

The report also says telephone service had been established between the airport and St. James. Regular airplane service connected Charlevoix and Beaver Island at passenger convenience, and private planes carrying passengers could use the airport.[^airport] The facility was located five miles south of St. James, in the heart of the 16-mile-long island, with transportation onward to hotels and other island destinations.[^airport]

The airport was also the base of a community emergency-aircraft program in 1974. A March report described the aircraft as still in preparation for Island delivery, while the May–June issue records its first two medical evacuations on June 18 and June 24. A December report says construction had begun on a 62-by-40-foot hangar for “The Beaver.” The held sources still do not establish the hangar’s completion, aircraft registration, ownership, or later service history.

The January 1971 Beaver Beacon supplies a winter operational attestation: a severe blizzard plugged the airport with drifting snow, delaying supplies and mail for nearly a week and contributing to an extended interruption of regular trips. The report does not identify the aircraft or operator and is modeled separately as a weather-related disruption.

Evidence and limits

This article records the facility broadly as a Structure because the held report does not provide a formal airport name, exact coordinates, ownership, construction date, runway orientation, or an official operator. The 1951 improvement report is not treated as proof that the airport was first built in that year. Its relationship to the probable Beaver Island Air Service reported in 1926 is left as an open research connection rather than an identity claim.

Open questions

• What formal name, legal owner, and operator did the airport have in 1951?
• When was the airfield first established, and what later records document its runway changes?
• Can airport, township, FAA, or chart records supply coordinates and runway orientation?
• Was the 1951 passenger service operated by the Beaver Island Air Service or a later company?
• Was the 1974 emergency-aircraft hangar completed, and what became of the aircraft after its first two documented flights?

See also

• Beaver Island Airport Improvements Reported in 1951
• Preparation of Beaver Island emergency aircraft (1974)
• First medical evacuation by Beaver Island emergency aircraft (1974)
• Second medical evacuation by Beaver Island emergency aircraft (1974)
• Construction of Beaver Island emergency-aircraft hangar (1974)
• Beaver Island Air Service (1926)
• Beaver Island