Features Kristi Kates You can celebrate Christmas Celtic style this year by traveling across the water to the Emerald Isle – without going near the Atlantic Ocean. “An Irish Christmas in America” celebrates the heritage of Ireland on Beaver Island Dec. 18. A 15-minute plane ride or two-hour boat trip from Charlevoix, Beaver Island is called “America’s Emerald Isle” in reference to its Irish roots.

Features Patrick Sullivan

British soldiers didn’t take Mackinac Island entirely by surprise 200 years ago, though they may as well have.

When the British invaded on July 17, 1812, they found the Americans unprepared because news of the war had not yet reached this frontier outpost, even though President James Madison had declared war on the British a month earlier.