Visitor Information

Shay Park is a small and mostly undeveloped park located in downtown Harbor Springs. It sits east of Judd Street between Main and Bay Streets. The park is owned and operated by the City of Harbor Springs and hosts two permanent outdoor exhibits created by the Historical Society.

The first exhibit is a historic steel yacht, the Aha. The Aha is a 50' vessel and one of the largest artifacts in the collection of the Harbor Springs Area Historical Society. In 2021, the Historical Society finished a restoration of the watercraft and it was installed in Shay Park. In 2025, the second exhibit was installed - a restored Shay Locomotive. Learn more about both projects under the "exhibitions" tab.

History

Named in honor of inventor Ephraim Shay, Shay Park was once home to Shay's machine shop and the city's first waterworks plant and reservoir. Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps from 1884 to 1926 show the changes the property went through over the years. Today, the only building that remains of the original "Shay Complex" is Shay's 1892 hexagon house across the street, now open as the Ephraim Shay Works Museum. No buildings still stand in Shay Park itself.

The park and its many buildings were sold sometime after Shay's death in 1916 and it is likely that the City of Harbor Springs was using the old machine shop as a garage by the 1920s. Eventually, the only building left standing was that garage, which the city used to store equipment and road salt. The garage was too deteriorated to maintain or restore and was torn down in 1981. After the last building was removed the lot remained as it was until 2021, when the Historical Society worked with the city's Parks and Recreation Department to install the first of our outdoor exhibits.