Douglas grew on the south side of the Kalamazoo River later than nearby Saugatuck and Singapore, beginning in 1851 when Jonathon Wade built a small sawmill and expanding after William Dutcher and his family arrived in 1855, bought the mill and surrounding land, and developed production of shingles, lath, and lumber in an enterprise that later became the town's largest and most successful basket factory. The river was central to this growth, supporting lumber mills, riverboat traffic, and industry such as a second sawmill operating by 1862 at the east end of Center Street and Gerber's tannery farther south along the shore, while a drawbridge built in 1869 and later replaced by a swing bridge improved connections. By the 1870's, Douglas had about 500 people and a busy economy that included lumber yards, sawmills, shingle mills, a grist mill, a tannery, a planing shop, a basket factory, blacksmith shops, a wagon shop, a school, two churches, and six downtown shops. Fruit growing then began to dominate the economy, with a claim that the village once had 10,000 peach trees within its boundaries, before tourism and summer residents along the Lake Michigan shoreline became the dominant influence in the early 1900's and continued for the next 100 years. Landmarks and institutions in Douglas reflected this development, including the 1866 Union School, the 1870 Methodist Episcopal Church, the evolving basket factory, the ferry landing at the east end of Center Street, the swing bridge installed in 1902, longstanding baseball at Beery Field, the arrival of the Keewatin in 1967 to become a marine museum, businesses on Center Street, and the downtown church and commercial block that long formed the heart of the community.