Marionville, County Line 1872
Dash 1881-1897
Brunswick 1897-1980
by Terry E. Wantz
 

Charles Marion started a saw mill on the Muskegon and Newaygo County Line about four miles south of Forrest City, which was located at the corner of where Muskegon, Oceana and Newaygo Counties meets. There was a small settlement around the mill and it became known as Marionville because of the Marion’s family, who did much to help the community on its way. Later when they applied for a post office there was already a office called Marionville in Michigan so they settled on the name of Dash for the post office. In 1872 when the Muskegon and Big Rapids Railroad came through they called the station there County Line.

When the postoffice first opened in 1881 it was located on the west side of the line in Muskegon. It moved several times back and forth between Muskegon and Newaygo County, depending on who the postmaster was and where they had the office. On the 15th. of September1897 the office was moved back into Newaygo County and the name was change to Brunswick.

In earlier days Brunswick had quite an extensive railroad service. The trains usually started out from Muskegon and ran to White Cloud or Big Rapids. In White Cloud they would make connections with the trains running north and south. The train would make a return trip so that each train passed through Brunswick twice, once on the way up and once on the way back. At one time there were four passenger trains and one freight train each way per day. These trains would stop at Brunswick to load on passenger or cargo at the depot or warehouses here. This was also the dropping off place of anything or anybody going north to Hesperia. There were several wagons and buggies which made a daily trip back and forth from Brunswick to Hesperia with supplies and passengers. A lot of peaches, apples and lumber were also shipped from this depot.