The Emmet County Transportation Quest Geo-trail will take participants on a tour to discover the interesting historic transportation places in the county. Each cache will provide a specific answer to a question on the passport. Information and the passport can be downloaded from the Emmet County web site http://www.emmetcounty.org/geocache/
Once 25 of the caches in this tour have been completed, the passport can be taken to Emmet County Building, Suite 178 or mailed to Beth Eckerle, Emmet County Building, Suite 178, 200 Division St., Petoskey, MI 49770 to receive a collectable souvenir coin for this series.
*************************************************************************************
The Brutus Post Office was the first post office in Emmet County that was not near Lake Michigan. It existed in the two towns of Brutus that were two miles apart. And no one lived near the Brutus Post Office when it was started! The railroad came to Petoskey in 1874. Cheboygan did not have a railroad yet so a stage/mail coach traveled between Petoskey and Cheboygan. The halfway point was near Brutus. The horses were changed or rested here so a post office was officially formed even through no one lived in the area. Abner Lee was the first postmaster. He named the town, Brutus, after his hometown in New York.
In 1882, the railroad was finished from Petoskey to Mackinaw City and Brutus (the name) was moved from Maple River to the current location. The post office was usually in the home or business of the postmaster so locations changed frequently. Brutus started to grow rapidly in about 1897 when Nelson Pier became the 16th postmaster and served for 28 years. Pier built a still standing building as a post office building.