Max McKee
President, The Mart Dock
560 Mart Street, Muskegon, Michigan
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President of The Mart Dock and Sand Products Corporation, Muskegon, Michigan
The Port
Max McKee is president of The Mart Dock in Muskegon, Michigan, a 40-acre deep-water commercial port on the south shore of Muskegon Lake. The site's history as a working dock dates to the late 1800s, when it was owned by the Goodrich Transportation Company and served the passenger and freight traffic that moved across Lake Michigan.
Today the property handles marine cargo, services vessels, and operates one of the largest indoor and outdoor storage facilities for boats, vehicles, and RVs in West Michigan. A closer look at how the deep-water port operates gives some sense of what moves across the dock in a season.
Family Business
Alongside the dock, McKee heads Sand Products Corporation, described by Great Lakes maritime writers as one of the oldest family-operated marine companies on the lakes. The company's holdings have included bulk carriers, tug-barge units, and the passenger vessel now sailing as the Aquastar.
Sand Products bought the vessel that became the McKee Sons in the post-war years and converted it to a tug-barge unit in 1953. The same long-horizon approach to hardware explains why so much of the company's older tonnage is still afloat rather than scrapped.
Heritage Fleet
The best-known vessel at the Mart Dock is the USS LST 393, a 328-foot landing ship tank that earned three battle stars in World War II and made dozens of round trips to Omaha Beach during the Normandy invasion. Sand Products purchased her in 1948, renamed her Highway 16, and ran her as an automobile carrier between Detroit, Milwaukee, and Muskegon until 1973.
She sat at the dock for decades afterward. In 2005 the USS LST 393 Preservation Association formed and began restoration; the group operates her today as a veterans museum, and she is one of only two surviving LSTs from the 1,051 built during the war. McKee's account of preserving the USS LST 393 covers how that arrangement came together.
Passenger Cruises
In recent years McKee and his brother Patrick purchased the 61-foot passenger vessel long known locally as the Port City Princess, renamed her Aquastar, and refit her inside and out. She now runs afternoon and sunset cruises from the Mart Dock through the sailing season, out the Muskegon channel and along the Lake Michigan shoreline.
The Aquastar's ticket office is the same one used decades ago by the Milwaukee Clipper, the auto-and-passenger ferry now preserved further west in the Lakeside District. More on the Aquastar's return to Muskegon Lake and what the refit involved.
Muskegon
McKee has been a participant in long-running public discussions about the future of Muskegon's downtown waterfront, including a proposal that would shift port operations and open portions of the shoreline for public use. Those conversations are ongoing and involve the city, the Mart Dock, and several other property owners.
Closer to home, the Mart Dock keeps free parking next to the LST 393 and subsidizes the ship's berth so the museum can stay in the water. McKee has also supported local causes in Muskegon County, including donating winnings back to a Muskegon County Sheriff's Office program.