The curator and board members at the Presque Isle County Historical Museum were all pleasantly surprised by the popularity of their Baby Boomers Guide to Rogers City that came out in the fall of 2007.  The first printing of 400 copies sold out in a couple of weeks and the museum was left with a waiting list for several hundred more copies.  Now in its second printing, the book has sold well over 1,000 copies, quite a feat in a community of 3,700 people. 

            Museum Curator Mark Thompson, who is also the author of Baby Boomers II, thinks it will be just as popular as the original.  “Our first Baby Boomers book focused on the buildings and businesses that were here when we Baby Boomers were growing up,” he said.  “This book concentrates more on the people who were here during those years, including the Baby Boomers themselves, parents of Baby Boomers, and other people from the community who the Baby Boomers would have known.  Lots of people are going to find themselves in the photos in our new book.”

            Most of the photos in the book are from the museum’s Ferris Parsons Collection, donated to the museum last year by his children.  Others are from the museum’s James and Leona Stewart Collection, the Gerald Micketti Collection, and the Calcite Collection.

            Baby Boomers II is 160 pages long and contains 142 photos and accompanying text.  Thirty of the photos are of buildings and businesses, while the other 112 photos are largely of people who were here during the Baby Boomer years.  According to Thompson, a total of 1,049 people appear in the photos..  Some of the topics covered in the book include buildings and businesses, churches, people, schools, sports, celebrations, “the beach,” and “the park.”

Most of the photos in the Presque Isle County Historical Museum's

 new book about Rogers City during the Baby Boomers years show

 photos of people who lived in Rogers City during the 1950s, 1960s,

 and 1970s.  This photo from June of 1956 shows Rogers City's first

 Little League Queen Connie Mulka and her court.  Clockwise behind

 driver Tom McArdle are Mary Jo Buza, Sally Gibbs, Nancy Karsten,

 Judy Lewandowski, Rhoda Noffze, and Queen Connie.  The photo was

 taken at Gilpin Field just prior to the first Major League game. (Ferris

 Parsons Collection)

Photograper Ferris Parsons was called upon in October of 1956 to

photograph those attending a Halloween costume party at the home of

 Helen and LeRoy Warwick.  In back, from left to right, are Paul

 Warwick, Craig Smolinski, Joe Vallee, David Werner, Paul Werner,

Barre Phelps, Mike Dagner, and Lewis Phelps.  In front are David

 Warwick, David Kowalski, David Babbitt, Jon Warwick, William