Why the Indiana-Michigan Border Is Still Fuzzy

Camden Township — Michigan has been in border disputes since before it was a state, but a new Michigan bill could finally determine the blurry state line between Indiana and Michigan.

The original state border survey, completed in 1827, never clarified to residents where the lines fell, particularly for Hoosiers and Michiganders, and could lead to controversies similar.

Michigan’s first land controversy, the 1835 Toledo War, resulted in Ohio getting the Toledo Strip and Michigan getting the Upper Peninsula. The second dispute regarding territory between Wisconsin and Michigan was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1836, granting a water and land boundary in the U.P.

Now, Senate Bill 595, introduced by Sen. Jonathan Lindsey (R-Coldwater), could secure a survey company to accurately assess the proper markings for the state line between Indiana and Michigan.

“It is past time we accurately survey and remonument the Michigan-Indiana border, which has not been done since before we became a state,” Lindsey said.

A tri-state landmark established in 1977 marks the junction point where Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana meet, but where the border lines continue from there remains unclear. Unlike Michigan’s borders with Ohio and Wisconsin, which were settled through conflict and court rulings, the Indiana border has a single marker that stands as the official tri-state boundary point, but little clarity beyond it.

“I’ve always been interested in the sign of the entry of the state,” Battle Creek resident Kani Esaid, who was visiting the monument, said. “I have seen this place from Google Maps, and it connects the three states Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, and I have been wanting to come here for the longest time.”

The marker, which is engraved on a rock with miles of fields surrounding it, leaves no clear indication of where the state boundaries actually run.

Lindsey’s bill, which Gov. Whitmer signed into law last month, will continue through 2030 to establish a boundary line benefiting residents and avoid conflicts similar to those of the 1830s.

“It’s gonna affect a lot of families who have been thinking they were living in Indiana when maybe they actually live in Michigan,” Kourtney Esaid, Kani’s wife, said. “They were paying taxes, property taxes all to Indiana, but now they might find themselves living in Michigan.”

According to locals in Clear Lake, Indiana, the unclear boundary lines cause issues with conflicting state laws. On nearby Little Long Lake, the supposed border runs straight through the middle of the lake.

“You need both a Michigan license and an Indiana one to fish on that lake,” Indiana resident Chase Eichler said. “I’ve heard from regulars that live over there that if you are on the Indiana side, you’re only allowed to go a certain speed, and after a certain time, your boats have to be off the water. But then on the Michigan side you can be loud and stay out longer.”

Locals said during the Covid-19 pandemic the blurry borders made it easier for Michiganders to drive across the border into Indiana because of Michigan’s strict restrictions.

“I’m from Michigan. I would drive down here and go shopping,” a Clear Lake Pub bartender said. “Michigan was completely shut down, so we would drive down here to go to the outlets because Indiana didn’t have all the stipulations you had in Michigan.”

While the boundary lines confuse everyone around the supposed border, most locals said there are some easy, unofficial ways to tell if you are in Michigan or Indiana.

“The only way I know what state I’m driving in here is the roads are numbered in Indiana and the ones in Michigan have names,” Eichler said. “And Indiana is a little bit better with the snowplows, but I don’t think we will ever really know where the border was meant to be in the first place.”