Kirk Michael sat about halfway between Ramsey and St John's on the Manx Northern Railway. The line was first surveyed in 1877, and Kirk Michael was planned then as a passing place where trains running in opposite directions could pass each other on what was otherwise a single-track route. Kirk Michael was also the largest village between the two termini, so the MNR designed the station as a main intermediate stop rather than a simple loop. The result was a substantial sandstone building with a slate roof, comprising the station master's office and a waiting room, all in the local red sandstone that gives Manx coastal towns their colour. A similar station building still stands at St Germain's, another stop further down the line.

Kirk Michael's busiest service was not really for the village at all. It was for Glen Wyllin Pleasure Grounds, in the valley just to the north. Developed privately in the 1890s as soon as the railway arrived, Glen Wyllin became one of the most popular and profitable tourist destinations on the Isle of Man. The line crossed the wide valley on a lattice girder bridge, later replaced in 1922 with a plate girder construction. The glen runs down to a long, partly sandy beach on the island's north-western coast. The Isle of Man Railway eventually bought the pleasure grounds outright and expanded them with a boating lake, pedalos, swings, slides, and other children's attractions. For generations of Manx kids, an annual Sunday school outing meant a train ride to Glen Wyllin. The signs at Kirk Michael station urged passengers to alight here for the pleasure grounds.

At the southern end of the station stood a brick water tank, used by locomotives running in either direction. Southbound engines would normally uncouple and take water here without blocking the level crossing. The run from Ramsey with longer trains often required a stop for water on the way. A small goods shed served the station from opening, rebuilt by the Isle of Man Railway in 1923 to handle increased freight; the rebuilt shed is not in the distinctive red sandstone of the main building and has a more utilitarian look that still distinguishes it today. The water tower itself did not survive. It was demolished in 1975, the same year the rails and sleepers were lifted through the station.

The village's full name comes from the church at its centre, an imposing building with an oak-carved lychgate that still anchors the high street. The railway's own marketing rarely used the full name. Most posters and timetables called the station 'Michael, with an apostrophe acknowledging the Kirk prefix, or simply Michael. The distinctive running-in boards on the platform, however, always carried the full title, as did every ticket issued to and from the station until the day it closed. The village around it has changed quietly: the local branch of the Isle of Man Bank, open more than a hundred years, closed in 2014. The Mitre Hotel and other local businesses are still there. The main road through the village forms part of the TT Mountain Course, so on race weeks the quiet station building sits a few feet from one of the most-watched roads in the motorcycling world.

After the railway closed, a steam centre was set up not far from the station. The most notable resident was Sea Lion, a locomotive from the Groudle Glen Railway, brought in to be preserved. The steam centre was open to the public occasionally, but closed in 1984. Most of its exhibits were relocated, on and off the island, and several can now be found at the Jurby Transport Museum. Sea Lion itself was taken by preservationist John Walton to Loughborough, was restored by British Nuclear Fuels at Sellafield, and eventually returned to its home on the Groudle Glen Railway where it still runs today. Where the rails once ran, a heritage Rail Trail now follows the former railway line. Established along all former trackbeds between Douglas, Peel, and Ramsey in 1993 (the island's Year of Railways), the trail passes the Kirk Michael station site as a footpath and cycleway. The pathway to Glen Wyllin remains. The viaduct over the valley was demolished in 1975, but its stone-built stanchions still stand, a quiet monument to the years when train whistles meant a Sunday school day at the seaside.