No longer a Midwestern secret, Apostle Islands National Lakeshore celebrates 50 years

For more than four decades, the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore was a Midwestern secret. 

A six-hour drive from Milwaukee off the tip of northern Wisconsin in ice-cold Lake Superior, the 21-island archipelago remained off the radar of most travelers, even Wisconsinites. 

“When I moved up here in 1992, nobody had heard of it. I barely knew the place existed. It was a sleepy little place, as far as national parks go,” said Bob Mackreth, who moved to the area to work as the park’s west district ranger and later its historian.