The ferry dock and ranger station are on the island's central eastern shore, directly east of Lake Manitou.

The island is in Leelanau County and is part of the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, although it is over 6 miles (9.7 km) offshore.

No wheeled vehicles are allowed on the island other than those used by the National Park Service or to cart off a dead deer, or to move trash bags.

Long ago, the bear Mishe Mokwa and her two cubs sought to cross Lake Michigan from the Wisconsin shore to escape a great forest fire.

Piers were constructed on the eastern and western sides of the island for the steamers to load wood while traveling up and down Lake Michigan.

Smith & Hull also operated a standard gauge logging railroad, the "Manitou Limited", running northeast 8 miles out of Crescent using two Shay locomotives from July 12, 1909 until 1915 when the timber ran out.

From the late 1940s through the 1960s, the William R. Angell Foundation, which owned most of the island, used the imported deer population as an economic resource, hosting hunters.

The Foundation artificially supported an abundant deer population with commercial salt blocks and custom feed manufactured by Kellogg Company.

A 4,000-foot (1,200 m) lighted runway, now a field in "The Settlement" on the eastern side of the island, next to the designated camping grounds and firepits, was used to bring in the hunters.

The National Park Service occupies the old US Life-Saving Station (later the US Coast Guard) grounds near where the Leland boat lands campers.

After the foundation sold most of the island to the United States government, the deer population declined due to the lack of artificial feed.

Now uninhabited except by the rotating National Park ranger and maintenance crews assigned there, the homesteads and most of the buildings of the island's former settlers lie in varying states of ruin.