M-115 (Michigan Highway) - History

History

In 1929, the first stretch of M-115 was designated from Benzonia to Frankfort. Beginning in the mid 1930s, construction of M-115 began from central to northwestern Lower Michigan. In 1936, an earthen highway was opened between the south side of Cadillac to M-66, with additional sections west of Mesick and northwest of US 10. By the end of the year, the state was paving the earthen section, completed a gravel highway near Mesick and opened an earthen section in Clare County. The section northwest of Mesick to Copemish was opened as an earthen highway the next year. Construction started in early 1938 to connect Benzonia to Copemish, and before the year was out, the Michigan State Highway Department started work to fill in the gap between M-66 and the highway north of US 10 in Clare County. These two sections were completed as earth-graded highway in 1939. Both discontinuous sections were fully paved by 1945.

In 1953, a county road is built along the path of the future M-115 between Mesick and Cadillac. This road was designated as a state highway by 1957, with a connection along Boon Road north of Cadillac and a concurrency along US 131 to close the gap in 1957. The Boon Road segment was removed the next year when the routing near Lake Mitchell opened. The southern end of M-115 was truncated slightly when the US 10 freeway bypass of Clare was opened in 1975. M-115 has since been rerouted in 1989 along the two-lane Old US 10 from Clare through Farwell to its original southeastern starting point near the US 10 overpass and continuing northwesterly.