The Century-Old Feud That Created Michigan's Twin Towers

Onsted — Michigan has its very own twin towers.

Thankfully, these ones have never been at the center of any national tragedy.

What they do have, though, is one of the most ridiculous backstories of any landmark in Michigan.

If you've ever driven through the Irish Hills along US-12, chances are you've seen these two nearly identical towers sitting side by side on top of a hill.

One was built on purpose, but the other was built purely out of spite. What followed was one of the the pettiest rivalries in Michigan history.

The story starts back in 1924 when the Michigan Observation Company wanted to build a tower overlooking all of the beautiful rolling hills and lakes of Lenawee County.

The company had been constructing observation towers all over the state in an effort to capitalize on the growing popularity of car travel and roadside tourism. The hill they were hoping to build on in the Irish Hills happened to be split between two neighboring property owners, Edward Kelly and Thomas Brighton.

The company first approached Kelly, who adamantly refused to let them build on his land. But Brighton said yes.

And just like that, a 50-foot-tall wooden observation tower was built on Brighton's side of the hill, only 6 feet from Kelly's property line. Suddenly, hundreds of people were each paying 5 cents to climb to the top and take in the view. During the opening weekend alone, more than 1,200 people made the trip to Brighton's property.

Now, Kelly obviously wasn't too thrilled about his next-door neighbor cashing in on hundreds of tourists showing up just outside his property everyday.

So he did what any calm and rational person would do and decided to build his own nearly identical observation tower just a few feet away. But because of the guy Edward Kelly was, simply building another tower wasn't enough. He had to one-up them by making his 10 feet taller.

So within roughly two months, the Irish Hills had gone from having zero observation towers to having two nearly identical ones right next to each other.

What Edward Kelly didn't realize though, was that two could play the pettiness game.

The Michigan Observation Company wasn't about to let him have the last laugh. They added another observation platform to their tower, increasing its height from 50 feet to 64 feet.

And to nobody's surprise, Kelly had to clap back. He added another four feet to his tower, leaving both standing at exactly 64 feet.

The Michigan Observation Company eventually warned Kelly that if he kept trying to outdo them, they would replace their current tower with a massive steel one that he could never compete with, finally ending the vertical one-upmanship.

But this dispute was still far from over.

Now the two sides weren't fighting over height, they were fighting over tourists.

And because the Michigan Observation Company had much deeper pockets, Kelly never really stood a chance.

Over the next several years, they added restaurants, a hotel, a golf course, a dance hall, an arcade, and even a small petting zoo with monkeys and alligators, each new attraction bringing thousands of visitors through the Irish Hills year after year. Before long, a small roadside community had formed. By 1929, as many as 52 buses a day were reportedly stopping there.

For decades, the towers operated as two separate, competing attractions, both offering the exact same experience from practically the exact same spot.

In the 1940s, the Michigan Observation Company exited the business and sold its tower to a man named Frank Lamping. He immediately tried to buy Kelly's tower too, and—shocker—Kelly refused. More than 20 years after the rivalry began, he was still committed to the bit.

It wasn't until after Kelly had died that Lamping was finally able to purchase the second tower from one of Kelly's heirs. He then connected the two structures at their base, and later renovations in the 1960s and '70s gave them the truly matching appearance that you see today.

By 1966, around two million people had reportedly visited the towers.

But just as many once-popular roadside attractions eventually do, the Irish Hills Towers slowly lost their audience. Interstate travel changed, larger attractions pulled tourists elsewhere, and fewer drivers had a reason to stop along the old highway.

The towers closed to the public after the 2000 season and have been sitting there ever since. In 2007, they were officially added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Today, anyone driving through the Irish Hills can still spot the two towers standing side by side above the road. They're weathered, boarded up, and long closed to visitors, but both are still standing.

A level of pettiness that's lasted more than 100 years.