Austin Center, Michigan

Austin Township is a civil township of Sanilac County of the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2000 census, the township had a total population 673. The township was organized in 1851.CommunitiesAustin Center is an unincorporated community near the center of the township at Cumber and M-19/Ubly Roads (Elevation: 791 ft./241 m.). A Mr. Watson was the first white settler in the area in 1854, soon joined by Alexander McRae, whose wife taught at the first school. A sawmill was built in 1868. The settlement was named after the township, which was first organized in 1851, but did not have its current boundaries until 1864. It was named for pioneer William Austin, who had settled in the county about 1844. Cumber is an unincorporated community in the western part of the Township at Cumber and Wheeler Roads (Elevation: 807 Ft./246 m.). T.M. Bradshaw opened a blacksmith shop in 1869. A post office was established in June 1874. Freidberger (or Freiburgers or Freiburger) is an unincorporated community in the central portion of the Township at Cumber and Freidberger Roads (Elevation: 787 ft./240 m.). A post office operated from July 1888 until June 1906. Once a stop on an early stagecoach route, it was later a stop on the Pere Marquette Railroad. The town declined greatly once the railroad stopped coming.Tyre is an unincorporated community in the northeast corner of the Township on Tyre Road at the Huron and Eastern Railway (Elevation: 781 ft./238 m.). Tyre was founded in 1857 by Alex Soule, John Getty and others. The Soule family named it after the Biblical Tyre because of the stony terrain. A post office operated from October 1863 until September 1881 and again from November 1881 until July 1964. It was a station on the Pere Marquette Railway. At one time there were five general stores and seven doctors, three drug stores, and its large railroad station was a major agricultural shipping point for crops and livestock.