Wexford County was organized in 1869, and the law creating it specified that the county seat should be located at or near what was called Manistee Bridge, where the Newaygo and Northport State Road crossed the Manistee River. In 1870 the village of Sherman was platted just south of the bridge, and the first county courthouse, completed in 1872, stood about two hundred feet west of this site. After a heated controversy, the county offices were transferred in 1881 to Manton, a small town in the eastern part of the county. The dispute was finally settled in 1882 when Cadillac was chosen as the county seat of Wexford County. The old courthouse in Sherman was used as a school until 1937.