The Hathaway-Hess Farm began as the homestead of Jonathan Owen Hathaway, who came from New York to Oakland County with his parents in 1830. In 1861, Hathaway and his wife, Marcy C. Dewey, acquired an 80-acre parcel in Waterford Township. In 1902, Hathaway’s granddaughter Myrtle Hathaway married William Hess, an early investor in the Fisher Body Company. After William retired in the 1930s, the Hesses devoted their lives to the family farm, where they operated the successful Lone Cedar Farm dairy and raised champion sheep and Jersey and Hereford cattle. Myrtle Hess died in 1985 and left the family farm to Waterford Township with the requirement that the land be used as a park. In 1989, Waterford Township dedicated Hess-Hathaway Park.