The first well in Mount Clemens was drilled by Charles Steffens in 1862. He hoped to strike oil but found only brine, and the well was abandoned. This well is now down the distance of 250 feet, and boring is being kept up night and day. Mr. Parke, who has the contract for sinking the well, informs us that the water now pumped from the well is impregnated with three percent of salt, and that every indication for a paying well is better than any he ever saw at the Saginaw salt wells the same distance down. At this point an old lame horse and a man named Dorr Kellogg enter the story.
Legend has it that a farmer turned the horse out to die.
The horse sought the shade of an abandoned tank of the old salt mine and stamped out a small basin that collected the dripping mineral water. Actually, the discovery of the curative powers of mineral water from this well was probably made by Dorr Kellogg. When he came to Mount Clemens in 1870 to operate the milling firm of Hess and Kellogg on the site of the Fluemer Mill , he had a bad case of eczema. Remembering the beneficial effects of a sea voyage, he asked for permission to use the mineral water. He made a rough tub between the vats, and, after a series of baths, he was cured.