An illustrated history of Skagit and Snohomish Counties; their people, their commerce and their resources, with an outline of the early history of the state of Washington, Part 27

Author: Inter-state Publishing Company (Chicago, Ill.)
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: [Chicago] Interstate Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1172

USA > Washington > Skagit County > An illustrated history of Skagit and Snohomish Counties; their people, their commerce and their resources, with an outline of the early history of the state of Washington > Part 27
USA > Washington > Snohomish County > An illustrated history of Skagit and Snohomish Counties; their people, their commerce and their resources, with an outline of the early history of the state of Washington > Part 27

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We have now sketched the most important facts in the beginnings of the island region, of the Swi- nomish flats, of the Padilla Country, of the lower Skagit and of the upper Skagit, and may trace for a few pages the interesting history of the Samish region, one of the most productive and attractive parts of this whole favored county. The Samish valley consists of a belt of tide lands skirting the river, slough. bay and island all bearing the same name. The chief town of the region and the oldest. is Edison, founded in the early seventies upon land originally located by Ben Samson and Edward McTaggart. The possibilities of the Samish coun- try had early attracted the attention of explorers, one of the earliest of these being John H. Fravel. He passed through the country as early as 1858 and was engaged for some time in 1864 in erecting poles for the proposed great international telegraph line through Alaska, subsequently taking up his claim in the year 18:1. His settlement was ante- dated, however, by others. There seems, also, to be some authority for the statement that William Jarman established a residence upon the prairie, which later received his name, as early as 1866, while Wesley Whitener and John Gray began oper- ating a logging camp in 1861 on what is now known as Blanchard slough, and James Hutchins was engaged in fishing on what afterward became the Whitehill place. Among the settlers of 1869 may be mentioned Ben Samson, William Wood, Daniel Dingwall, George Forbes. Nathaniel Mor- gan, Watson Hodge. John Straighthoof, Joseph Hall, John Cornell, Captain John Warner, Joe Larry, Ben Welcher, William J. Brown and Thomas Hayes. The pioneers of 18:0 were David Lewis, John Miller, William Hanson, Edward McTaggart, "Big" Brown, "Little" Brown (W. J.), William Dean and George Coffin. The years 1821 and 1872 were marked by the incoming of a great number of settlers.

Daniel Dingwall seems to have been the pioneer merchant of the Samish country, having established a store in partnership with Thomas Haves, in the fall of 1869 on Samish island adjoining the Siwash slough. This Siwash slough was so called from the location tipon it of two thousand Siwashes en- gaged in fishing and hunting. They had a house twelve hundred feet long by seventy-five feet wide.

Thomas Hayes remained in partnership with Ding- wall but a short time and was succeeded in the partnership by William Dean, who also in a short time relinquished his share in the business to Ding- wall and started a store of his own in 1823. Mr. Dingwall became postmaster of what became known as the Samish postoffice in 1810.

Everything in the Samish country depended on the diking system and this vitally important under- taking was inaugurated by John Muller in 18; 1. by whom sixty acres were inclosed upon the place now occupied by Nathaniel Mccullough near the Samish. Daniel Sullivan reclaimed a hundred and sixty acres during the same year at a cost of thir- teen thousand dollars. Both Muller and Sullivan had land producing bountiful crops of oats in 1812 and 18:3. Ben Welcher introduced soon after a diking machine, which was operated for five dollars per rod, and with this they diked for Messrs. Ding- wall and McTaggart. It may be noted here that according to the recollection of William Wood the first diking done in the Samish region was by Messrs. Wood, Emery and Stevens.

It did not take the settlers of the Samish long to inaugurate public schools. As nearly as can be ascertained the first school was held in 18:3 in a house belonging to Mr. Cutler * on his old claim east of the Wood place, afterward occupied by Mr. Samson. There were seven scholars in the first school, consisting of the children of the Stevens and Wood families, Mary Stevens, Mr. Stevens' oldest daughter, being the teacher. Two years later a regular district was established, district number eight, Messrs. Wood, Legg and Emery being the first directors and Mr. Stevens the first clerk.

Among the notable early settlers of the Samish was Captain J. M. Warner, who was also more than a decade later the earliest settler of the upper Samish, on what is now known as Warner's prairie, a region of great fertility but so difficult of ap- proach by reason of the dense timber and swamps as not to be inviting to settlers.

Record has been found of but one crime during that carly period of the Samish country. This occurred in the summer of 1822. The slayer was William Hanson and the victim Patrick Mahoney.

*NOTE .- Mr. Cutler, his pioneer associates on the Samish say, was the San Juan settler who precipitated the noted struggle between Great Britain and the United States for the possession of that rich archipelago. Cutler, it is claimed, killed the pig cver which the initial litigation immediately sprang up, then fled by boat to the mainland, finally making his way down into the almost primeval Samish region to escape the officers. He died early in the seventies upon his claim there, leaving no heirs so far as known. Among his possessions sold at the time to pay a few debts he left was the identical double-barreled shot- gun, of fancy English manufacture, which Cutler used to shoot the pig. This weapon came into the hands of David r. Thomas, one of Cutler's neighbors, who still resides near Edison, and is prized by him very highly as an object of historical interest.

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Hanson had been in Olympia to act as a witness for Daniel Sullivan in land business. Upon his return he found reason to suspect his Indian wife of ques- tionable relations with Mahoney, and as a result promptly emptied his shotgun into the latter. The wound proving fatal, Hanson was tried, convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to two years in the penitentiary.

This year may be regarded as closing the first era of settlement in the various centers of progress

in that portion of Whatcom county which subse- quently became Skagit county. As is unavoidable in all such cases where the earliest settlers have in many cases passed away and where written records have been destroyed and lost, statements are some- what conflicting as to names and dates. We have, however, endeavored as far as possible to harmonize these conflicts and to present such a continuous nar- rative as will be essentially correct both in details of fact and in its reflection of the spirit of the period.

CHAPTER II

SKAGIT COUNTY, 1814-83

In the year 1814 the effects of the financial crisis of the preceding year in the East were felt in an especial degree by reason of the fact that as a result of it the Northern Pacific Railroad Com- pany was compelled to suspend building operations and with this suspension immigration ceased in great measure ; therefore the large speculating and investing class which had been coming to the Puget sound region in previous years and had been dis- tributing money freely by purchases of many kinds were for a period after the financial panic conspic- uous for their absence. The Bellingham Bay Mail of August 29. 18:4. notes the fact that not only is the local market on Puget sound greatly depressed by those conditions but that even their ordinary normal market in San Francisco is weakened by the competition of San Francisco firms and companies who owned most of the vessels used in the carrying trade between the sound and California. The Mail expresses the conviction that that unfortunate con- dition of affairs will continue until the building operations of the Northern Pacific are revived, and this revival it deems dependent upon some fav- orable action by congress on behalf of the railroad : it therefore urges united action by the people of the territory in favor both of the railroad directly and of government aid for it.

The first of the series of efforts on the part of the people of the Skagit to secure the removal of drift and jams from the Skagit river seems to have been instituted in the year 1814. A formal petition was presented to congress at that time asking for an appropriation of twenty-five thousand dollars for the purpose of improving the river.

The January of 1815 was notable for a degree

of cold very unusual in the Puget sound country. The cold spell lasting from the 9th of that month to February 4th. A weather record kept by E. A. Sisson gives three degrees above zero as the coldest of the period, but during the entire time the thermometer was below the freezing point and at one time there was a fall of several feet of snow. This is remembered as the severest spell of weather to last so long, in the history of Skagit county. It was followed by a late, cold spring, with an ac- cumulation of snow in the mountains so great that when it was increased by the autumnal snowfall the conditions were all provided for a flood in the river in case of sudden warm winds. The warm winds came on the 25th of December, and the Ska- git river had the highest water known in its history, completely flooding the flats for the first time since their settlement.

The Bellingham Bay Mail of April 10. 1875, presents a bird's-eye view of Whatcom county in- cluding. of course, a valuable picture of the general state of affairs in the Skagit region at that date. The writer notes the reclamation and cultivation of a considerable part of the tide flats on the north side of the Skagit river and mentions the fact that La Conner, then the base of supplies for the entire region, had three general merchandise stores be- sides warehouses and wharves. Special mention is made of the following men as active in the de- velopments of that period ; namely. Messrs. Conner. Dodge, Whitney, Calhoun, Sullivan, Smith, White. Stacy, Polson, Cornelius, McAlpine, Sartwell, Mad- dow. Wallace. Ball and Allen.

The writer also visited Fidalgo island, noticing the Swinomish Indian reservation in the southern

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part and the white settlements in the northern, classing the land hekl by the latter as the garden spot of Whatcom county. He made mention of the fine farms of Messrs. H. C. Barkhousen, H. A. March, S. B. Best, William Munks, William Cran- dall, H. J. White, J. A. Compton, Robert Becker, Shadrach Wooten, H. Sibley and others. He also crossed to Guemes island and visited the places be- longing to Messrs. Edens and O'Bryant; likewise called at Cypress island on his round and viewed the well-improved farms of Mr. Kittles and Mr. Tilton. He found also, interesting improvements in progress in the Samish country, observing what he regarded as some of the finest timber in the territory, and noting approvingly the ranches re- cently reclaimed and in process of cultivation be- longing to Messrs. Muller, McTaggart, Stevens, Larry, Dean, Dingwall, Whitehill and Legg. He referred to the Bellingham Bay stone quarry at the foot of the Chuckanut range, and visited and de- scribed the coal, the stone and the timber lands extending northward to the limits of what is now Skagit county.

The progress of development of the coal mines is indicated by the fact that on April 22, 18:5, the company shipped its first coal by the schooner Sa- bina. The cost of delivering that first shipment below the jam was about ten dollars per ton, which was so great as to leave no profits, but in a short time the construction of the new road so diminished the expense as to leave a goodly margin to the con- pany. After the completion they were able to transport from one hundred to two hundred tons per month to a shipping point.

A valuable reminiscence by James H. Moores preserves a statement of the scale of prices in 1876, which may be found interesting in comparison with present prices. Sugar, he says, was 8 pounds for $1 : flour, $? a barrel ; tea, 50 to 60 cents per pound ; nails, ? cents a pound ; butter, 15 cents a pound ; hay, $14 per ton ; oats, ranging all the way from $11 to $30 per ton ; potatoes, $18 to $20 per ton ; carrots, $15 per ton ; salt. 1 cent per pound ; beef, hardly obtainable at any price. Wages for ordi- nary labor ranged from $40 to $15 per month.

Reference has been made in earlier pages to the initial attempts toward securing government aid for the great work of opening the Skagit river. The government agent estimated the probable ex- pense of the work at a hundred thousand dollars. Gireat credit is due to certain citizens of the county for the initiation and final completion of this task. A company for the purpose was organized, consist- ing of James Cochrane, Donald McDonald, Marvin Minnick, Joe Wilson, Jolin Quirk, Daniel Hines, Fritz Dibbern and Dennis Storrs, Wilson and Me- Donald being the original promoters. To raise money for starting their undertaking Wilson and McDonald mortgaged two lots in Seattle belong- ing to Mr. Wilson. The others joined at various

times in the enterprise. Their first theory was to reimburse themselves by the sale of the logs which woukl be loosened from the jam, but the logs proved to be so badly strained by the pressure that they did not yield much merchantable timber.

Another proposed improvement allied to the removal of the big jam was the buikling of a levee along the north side of the Skagit river from the Sound waters to the head of the jam. This im- provement would be practicable if the jam were removed. It was estimated at that time that the total cost of the proposed levee would not exceed ten thousand dollars, but this proved to be a gross underestimate, as the work is not yet completed and the ten thousand dollars has proved but a drop in the bucket.

The great jam consisted of two divisions, the lower beginning at the okdl Kimble homestead be- low Mount Vernon and extending up the river to a point about opposite the present Kimble resi- dence, a distance of perhaps half a mile. The upper part of the jam was considerably larger, be- ginning about half a mile above the upper end of the lower jam and extending over a mile. The lower one was believed to be at least a century old and was probably much older, while the upper one was to all appearance of comparatively recent for- mation. It was increasing in size very rapidly. Dennis Storrs, to whom we are indebted for much valuable information respecting this matter, states that within three years after his arrival a quarter of a mile of debris had accumulated at its upper end. Beneath and between the tangled mass of debris the river was obliged to force its passage and in places beneath the lower jam there were twenty-four feet of water at the lowest stage. The material of the jam was mainly green timber, but in many places sediment had accumulated to such an extent as to permit the growth upon it of a perfect jungle of brush and even of large trees. At many points, often concealed from the view of the explorer by brush, there were open shoots into the sullen, treacherous depths below. David E. Kimble relates that on one occasion while he was at work on the jam with others, one of the party suddenly disappeared into one of those holes. The other men rushed as rapidly as possible to a larger expanse of water some distance below, but Mr. Kimble, remembering a small opening between the trees nearer by, hastened to it. Just as he reached it he saw an agitation of the debris at the place and thrusting his arm into the water he grasped the struggling man and succeeded in rescuing him from cleath.

Not only was the big jam a great impediment to navigation, but it was also a continual menace to the fields and stock and buildings of the settlers ou the lowlands on either side of the river. On account also of the great difficulty of making roads through the forest this impediment to river communication

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almost prevented settlement at points on the river above; furthermore, the removal of the jam was the sine qua non of the lumber industry above it. The scanty resources of the early settlers seemed to forbid their carrying the task to completion, but they made most energetic, even heroic and finally successful efforts to meet the emergency. The ter- ritorial legislature had sent memorials to congress urging an appropriation for the opening of the river and Orange Jacobs, the congressional delegate in 1815, secured the sending of General Mickler to investigate conditions, but nothing resulted from his visit, and it became apparent that the settlers must, after all, depend mainly upon themselves for accomplishing the heavy task. The people of Mount Vernon generously supported the efforts of the company, whose initiatory work has already been described, and in the summer of 1876 sub- scriptions were started for its assistance. The Northern Star of December 16th notes the fact that the men had at that time been working nearly a year, had removed nearly a half mile of the jam and had reduced the portage distance one and one half miles. The paper describes the magnitude of the task by stating that the men were compelled to cut through from five to eight tiers of logs, which generally ranged from three to eight feet in diam- eter, representing a total cutting out of a space thirty feet deep. The following paragraph from the Star, well expresses the nature of the work in progress: "To say that the jam loggers are doing their work thoroughly and well conveys no ade- quate idea of the magnitude and thoroughness of the work done. What they have received from sale of logs taken from the jam and contributions from citizens will only partially pay actual expenses, yet these men should have more than this as a suitable recognition of their great work. We think the general government, even if it declines to grant them a money recompense for their services, could well afford to grant each of them a whole section of timber land to be located above the jam on its removal and upon proof of the fact at the general land office."

In the progress of the work the jam loggers met with many narrow escapes from death by crushing or drowning and were subjected to con- stant losses of tools. Sometimes Nature assisted and sometimes hindered their work. Floods some- times wedged the loosened logs still tighter and undid the work of many days, while on the other hand a flood in 1877 suddenly dislodged a section of the jam which they estimated at not less than five acres and carried it out to sea. Sometimes trees four feet in diameter were snapped off like so many pipe stems.

Six months were required of these faithful and enterprising loggers to cut a two hundred and fifty foot channel through the lower jam and over two years more were consumed in cutting a channel a

hundred and twenty feet wide through the upper jam. On account of the narrowness of this it was two or three times closed up again by the moving drifts, but with the aid of the loggers above, a passage way was maintained and gradually widened. By the summer of 1829 the drift was sufficiently open to allow of any ordinary navigation, although not for ten years was the vast accumulation of debris essentially removed from the river.

It should be remembered as an added reason for paying an unstinted tribute to the men who performed this great task that at that early day they were destitute of the modern agents which would now be employed for such a task, such as dynamite, swinging frames, crushers, etc. Brain and brawn, patience and judgment, with scanty resources of money and little financial gain then or since, were the distinguishing features of this, the greatest undertaking of the kind in the history of the county. It is rather a melancholy reflection that the stalwart partners who had undertaken and successfully executed their work found themselves at the expiration of their three years of anxious and harassing toil for the public benefit rather than for their own, each a thousand dollars in debt. About the only return which they received was between eight and nine hundred thousand feet of timber, which was salable at from four to five dollars a thousand and subscriptions of eight hundred dollars from Seattle merchants and another of several hundred dollars from settlers in the flats. The vastly greater proportion of logs dislodged were worthless for commercial purposes. Although great interest was taken by the general public in the work, and profuse expressions of praise and gratitude were lavished upon the heroes of the big jam, the actual contributions received amounted to comparatively little. Congress has been petitioned from time to time to make some recompense, but without avail and not even has opportunity been given those men to acquire public lands on any special terms. The old saying that republics are ungrateful is unfortunately illustrated in this, as in some more noted cases. Of the seven men who at one time or another expended their time and strength in the great task of removing the Skagit jam, three are still living, Joseph S. Wilson, Dennis Storrs and James Cochrane. Fritz Dibbern, Daniel Hines, Marvin Minnick, John Quirk and Donald McDonald have passed away.

The year 1816, which was a great crop year in general throughout the Pacific Northwest, witnessed the heaviest shipments of grain from the Skagit country known up to that time. The Gaches Brothers, merchants at La Conner, at one time shipped fifteen hundred and fifteen sacks of oats on the steamer Panama to San Francisco and by the steamer Dakota three thousand eight hundred and forty, and they continued to make similar shipments

Out Field+

La Comer Flats

Fish Trap.

eLa Cenaer Flatss

SKAGIT COUNTY INDUSTRIES

THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR, LENOX .TILDEN SCONTATI

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every two weeks throughout the fall; also shipped about fifty bales of hops raised on the Skagit river.

The steamer Libby was, during the same season. making a weekly trip from La Conner to Seattle transporting grain, while several schooners were constantly engaged in carrying away the bountiful products of the season.

At that date there were in the near vicinity of La Conner the following farms well diked and cul- tivated, with the following owners and the amounts belonging to each: Michael Sullivan, 100 acres ; J. S. Conner, 400; E. T. Dodge, 300; Samuel Cal- houn, 220; Dr. G. V. Calhoun, 160; Walker & Gill, 160; Leando Pierson, 160; James Harrison, 150; James Gaches, 120; John Cornelius, 100; Thomas Lindsey, 100; Culver estate, 100; Aden place, 100 ; Whitney, Sisson & Company, 130; John Ball, 40. About two thousand acres additional within less than four miles of La Conner were in process of preparation for diking during the next year. It was found at that time that the average cost of building a substantial dike four feet high, with a base of eight feet in breadth and two and a half feet wide at the top, was two dollars per rod and until the dikes were solidly settled some additional cost, perhaps twenty-five cents a rod, would be necessary for repairs each year. It had been dis- covered even prior to 1816 that those dike lands would yield astonishing crops of oats, barley and vegetables, although at the present time the yield is much larger than at first. In 1816 the average for oats and barley was sixty bushels per acre, while the same lands at the present time often pro- duce upwards of a hundred bushels on the average. In 1826 Calhoun Brothers alone sold four hundred tons of oats and barley, besides retaining a con- siderable quantity for seed and home consumption and losing about forty tons through the wreck of a vessel, all of this being the product of three hun- dred and twenty acres. E. T. Dodge raised two hundred tons of hay and a hundred and fifty tons of barley and oats on his place during the same year, at the same time making large quantities of butter, two hundred and twenty-eight pounds per cow a year, which sold at forty cents per pound.

So remarkable was the yield of those Swino- mish tide flats that the enterprising owners deemed it worth while to publish sworn statements of the yield upon certain places, some of which statements were published in the Star of December 16, 1816. Robert Kennedy, foreman of Samuel Calhoun's ranch, made affidavit that one hundred and sixty acres of land yielded over fourteen thousand bushels of oats, and another field of twenty-three acres yielded over twenty-three hundred bushels. J. S. Conner made affidavit that sixty bushels of barley and from seventy to seventy-five bushels of oats per acre were the average yields and he esti- mated that there were upwards of a hundred and fifty thousand acres in the Skagit valley and delta

which could be made equally productive by the same cultivation.

The correspondent of the Star of September 30, 1816, gives a very picturesque account of a journey afoot from Skagit City to La Conner, and particularly of the region about Pleasant ridge. The farm of John Cornelius, bordering upon and including a portion of that ridge, afforded the traveling correspondent a view so picturesque and attractive and one giving such suggestions of wealth and productiveness that he waxes enthu- siastic in his encomiums upon it. Immediately about Pleasant ridge there were at that time the following producing places: C. J. Chilberg, 160 acres ; Nelson Chilberg, 80; Robert Kennedy, 160; C. H. Chamberlain, 160; Isaac Chilberg, 160; Albert Leamer, 160; Samuel Calhoun, 160; John Cornelius, 120. Extending towards the Swino- mish and Sullivan sloughs were lands ready for cultivation of the following amounts: J. S. Conner, 140 acres ; Jerry Sullivan, 112 ; M. J. Sullivan, 40; George Aden, 60; the Culver estate, 60; Dodge & Lindsay, 200; D. B. Jackson, 300; Isaac Jennings, 160; Edward Ballou, 160; Charles Muller, 160; Robert White, 80; J. F. Terrace, 80; James HI. McDonald, 160. This made a total in the vicinity of P'leasant ridge and thence onward toward the sloughs of two thousand seven hundred and fifty- two acres.

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An illustrated history of Skagit and Snohomish Counties; their people, their commerce and their resources, with an outline of the early history of the state of Washington, Part 27

Author: Inter-state Publishing Company (Chicago, Ill.) Publication date: 1906 Publisher: [Chicago] Interstate Publishing Company Number of Pages: 1172

Author: Inter-state Publishing Company (Chicago, Ill.)
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: [Chicago] Interstate Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1172