Reed City’s railroad history centered on depots and the diamond crossing where the Grand Rapids and Indiana Railroad and the Flint and Pere Marquette Railroad met. The first two depots are little documented, but the third Reed City Depot, built in 1892, was an octagonal Queen Anne union station designed in 1891 by New York City architect Bradford Lee Gilbert, whose railroad work made it one of the finest depots in Michigan for a community of Reed City’s size. The Grand Rapids and Indiana reached Reed City from the south in 1870, and the Flint and Pere Marquette was completed to Reed City from the east in November 1871; the two lines crossed just east of this site. The depot stood at the southwest corner of the diamond, and at the railroads’ peak twelve passenger trains a day stopped in Reed City as the lines carried people and goods across Michigan. Declining forestry and oil production gradually reduced railroad business, the depot’s passenger wings were demolished in 1939, the remaining passenger structure closed in 1957 and was demolished in the late 1960s for parking, and remaining freight structures were razed in 1978. Railroad ownership changed repeatedly, Michigan Northern ended service to Reed City in 1984, CSX followed in 1987, and by 1991 the tracks were removed. The abandoned rights-of-way became trails, including the Crossroads Trail and the White Pine Trail State Park, and on July 19, 1998, the diamond crossing returned to Reed City. William and Mable Porteous were instrumental in bringing Reed City’s trail system to prominence, and the Reed City Depot was named in their honor.