The Former Village of Millett (1874), Now Part of South Lansing

It’s the little historic village that kinda got sucked up as part of Lansing.....Millett.

Just outside of Ingham County is the Eaton County community of Millett (originally called Milletts, according to the 1895 atlas). It’s located in Delta Township between Lansing Road and Old Lansing Road, east of Creyts Road and just north of the Grand River.

It didn't really disappear.....it just got overtaken by the ever-growing outskirts of Lansing. The village, then known as Milletts, was a farming community, plotted in 1874 with a post office being established in 1877.

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The village grew around the clay & coal beds that belonged to  S.E. Millett, of whom it was named “Milletts”. In 1877, a railroad station was implemented and that same year a post office began operating, dropping the “s” and now called simply “Millett”.

Millett had a sawmill, church, a couple of stores, oar factory and one-room schoolhouse. The post office closed permanently in 1910.

The railroad station handled local freight accounts, Western Union Telegraph, and the Railway Express Agency as well as passengers. Once Lansing's truck & automobile business began its boom, the competition was too strong, causing Millett's railroad station services to be dwindled down to a precariously low level. The old depot still stands, now housing the Lansing Model Railroad Club at 5309 Old Lansing Road.

These days, traveling down Old Lansing Road through the former Millett offers a nice handful of historic sites: the old schoolhouse, depot and a few other buildings and original dwellings where the old downtown used to be.