Named for the Rose family, who came to Ogemaw County around 1871, Rose City began as Churchill, a settlement one-half mile west that in the 1870s had a post office, general store, boardinghouse, and settlers' homes. William Rose came from New York State for the pine and hardwood timber and built a sawmill along Houghton Creek. His son Allan, a Churchill merchant and the first postmaster, formed a lumber company with M.S. French of West Branch. In 1892 Allan Rose persuaded the Detroit and Mackinac Railroad to build a branch line for the area's lumbering operations, and that year the entire settlement relocated here and was platted as Rose City. The community was incorporated as a city in 1905. In the early morning of April 3, 1910, fire began in D.W. Benjamin's grocery store on the south side of West Main Street and raced through Rose City's commercial district. Although a bucket brigade tried to stop it, the flames crossed the street and swept along the north side. Because most buildings were frame construction, the entire business district burned in less than an hour. More than thirty buildings were lost, and damage from the fire and looting was estimated at $175,000. Only two concrete Main Street buildings, housing Bell's Store and Naylor's Store, survived.