Two Rivers

As of 2015. Hours, prices and phone numbers on this page are kept as the original site listed them (captured May 26, 2015). Check current information with each attraction before you go.

Kurtz’s Pub & Deli

1410 Washington St., Two Rivers, open 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Fri. and Sat., 11 a.m-9 p.m. Mon. and Tues., 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Wed. & Thurs.

Stop in at this historic pub and deli that gets rave reviews.

Susie Q Fish Company

1810 East St., Two Rivers, open 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Thurs., 8 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Fri., 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Sat

Visit one of Two Rivers' oldest fishing families. The LeClair family has been fishing Lake Michigan for more than 130 years. Today, Susie Q Fish Company owns two trawlers (Susie Q and Peter Paul), one gill net boat (Avis-J) and a trap-net boat (Jamie Ann). The trawlers fish for smelt, the gill net boats fish for chubs and the trap-net boat fishes for whitefish. Stop in for fish smoked the ol' fashioned way.

Added in 2026

The LeClair family boats named on the original page fished out of the oldest corner of town. The neighborhood along the East Twin River, settled largely by French Canadian immigrants, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the Frenchside Fishing Village (1987). It became the longest-running commercial fishing district on the Great Lakes, and Rogers Street Fishing Village museum sits inside it.

Population (2020 census): 11,271
Rivers: East Twin and West Twin meet at the harbor
NRHP district: Frenchside Fishing Village, 1987
Claim to fame: the ice cream sundae, 1881

Two things the old page did not mention

Two Rivers says the ice cream sundae was invented here in 1881, when a customer talked soda-fountain owner Edward C. Berners into pouring chocolate syrup over ice cream. Ithaca, New York disputes it, and the two towns have traded ads and postcards over the question. The Historic Washington House, an old inn and saloon, now serves ice cream and history together.

The other is the Hamilton Wood Type and Printing Museum, opened in 1999 in a former Hamilton Manufacturing Company plant and moved to its present building in 2013. Hamilton began cutting wooden printing letters in 1880 and grew into the country's largest maker of them; the museum keeps more than 1.5 million pieces of type in over 1,000 styles and still runs printing workshops.

Sources: Wikipedia articles on Two Rivers, Frenchside Fishing Village and the Hamilton Wood Type and Printing Museum; National Register listing 86003580 (read November 2026).

Questions visitors ask

Where in Two Rivers can I see the old fishing village?

Walk the streets along the East Twin River near the harbor. Rogers Street Fishing Village, at 2102 Jackson Street, is the museum inside the historic district and holds the old Two Rivers pierhead lighthouse and artifacts from the Rouse Simmons.

Is the sundae story actually true?

It is a local tradition with a named shop owner and a date, 1881, but Ithaca, New York makes a rival claim with its own evidence. Neither town has convinced the other, so enjoy the sundae and leave the verdict open.

Original text restored from the Wayback Machine capture of May 26, 2015. Typos and dead links were tidied; nothing else in the original section was rewritten. How this archive works.