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 75

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 75
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 75

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It will therefore be seen that Skagit county would be an important lumber producing re- gion for many years, even if its lumbermen were confined to their own county for their raw material. They are not, however, for much timber outside of the county must pass through it on its way to a market and much of it will no doubt be manufactured in the county's mills. The end of the lumber industry is certainly not in sight at this date.

A good general idea of the present status of lumbering in Skagit county may be had from statistics of the industry kindly furnished by the assessor. These show the following logging camps: English Lumber Company, Conway, four railroad engines, 125 men: Tyee Logging Company, Conway, which also logs by rail, 75 men; Dickey & Angel, Fredonia, 35 men; Clear Lake Lumber Company, Clear Lake, two railroad engines, 125 men; Lyman Lumber Company, two railroad engines, 75 men ; Bradsbury Log-

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ging Company. Sedro-Woolley, 25 men: Patrick McCoy. Edison, one locomotive, six miles of railroad, three donkey engines, 50 to 60 men; Ballard Lumber Company, Bay View, one loco- motive, three miles of railroad, 10 men; Hough- ton Lumber Company, McMurray, 125 men. At the present time the Blanchard Lumber Company, on Blanchard slough, is not operating its mills and camps, but it deserves mention both on account of the long period of time during which it has followed the business of logging on the sound, and on account of its having been the first company in the county, indeed the first in the sound country, to use an all steam ontfit. Per- haps mention should also be made of the Alger Logging Company, which some time in the later eiglities bought out the Samish Logging Con- pany and moved the outfit to McElroy slough, where for years it operated very extensively. It sold in 1900 to the Lake Whatcom Logging Company. It is said that whatever may have been the failures of R. A. Alger, as secretary of war, he was one of the most skilful managers of a large lumbering company that ever operated on the sound.

The saw-mills now operating in Skagit county, with the location and daily capacity of each, are as follows: A. W. Fox's , Fredonia, 10,000 feet ; Gorton Brothers', Bay View, 6,000; Cedardale Lumber Company's, Mount Vernon, 15,000: North Avon Lumber Company's, 20,000; La Con- ner Lumber Company's, 10,000; Edison Lumber Company's, 10,000: Clear Lake Lumber Com- pany's, 85,000; Fidalgo Mill Company's, Ana- cortes, 40,000; Hightower Lumber Company's, Hamilton, 15,000; Tower Mill Company's, Van Horn, 25,000; Butler Brothers', Bow, 15,000; Atlas Lumber & Shingle Company's, McMurray, 80,000; Nelson & Neal's, Montborne, 75,000; Day Lumber Company's, Big Lake, 100,000; Lyman Lumber & Shingle Company's, 45,000; WV. M. Rodger's, Anacortes, 75,000; Jacobs & Harpst's, Avon, 10,000; North Avon Lumber Company's, 25,000; D. J. Cain & Company's, Thornwood, 40,000; Great Northern Lumber Company's, Anacortes, 100,000.

Inception was given to the shingle mill busi- ness in Skagit county by Mortimer Cook in the fall of 1886. Mr. Cook deserves the further and greater honor of having been one of the very first who introduced the red cedar shingle of Puget sound to the markets of the middle western states, thereby starting a trade which has grown to enormous proportions, and contributing immensely to the development of the entire sound basin. As a result shingle mills are abundant in every accessible part of western Washington. That Skagit county is not behind in the extent to which this industry has been developed will appear from the following list of mill men and companies operating at present : Hawley Mill Company, Milltown, 125,000; Green

Shingle Company, Sedro-Woolley, two mills, 200,000; Baker River Lumber Company, 125,000; Hatch Bonser Mill Company, Milltown, 80,000; Siwash Shingle Company, Mount Vernon, 150, - 000; Fidalgo Island Shingle Company, Anacortes, 50,000; Cleary Brothers, Belleville, 55,000; Sterl- ing Mill Company, Sedro-Woolley, 100,000; Sulli- van Shingle Company, Sauk, 100,000; Boyd Shingle Company, Sauk, 125,000; Rockport Shingle Company, Marblemount, 30,000; Hawk- eye Shingle Company, Sauk, 125,000; Baty Shingle Company, Anacortes, 150,000; Burpee Brothers Company, Anacortes, 125,000; Ana- cortes Shingle Company, 150,000; P. E. Berard Shingle Company, 150,000; Little Mountain Shingle Company, Mount Vernon, 130,000; Win - ner Shingle Company, Bow, 75,000; Allen Roray Company, Bow, 75,000: Blanchard Shingle Com- pany, Fravel, 50,000; Kalberg & Schaffer, Bow, 50,000; Belfast Manufacturing Company, 100,000; Castle & McKay, Bow, 60,000; De Can & Yorks- ton, Wickersham, 50,000; Clear Lake Shingle Company, 100,000; Clear Lake Lumber Com- pany, 200,000; Burke & McLean, Anacortes, 150,000; James H. Cavanaugh, Anacortes, 150, - 000; Burlington Mill Company, 50.000; F. N. Hatch, Conway, 33,000; Burns Mill Company, Sedro-Woolley, 100,000; J. M. Hoyt, Prairie, 60,000; J. D. Cain, Prairie, 60,000; James Van Horn, Van Horn, 125,000; O. K. Shingle Com- pany, Van Horn, 125,000; J. W. Hall, Avon, 50,000; Butler Brothers, Bow, 75,000; George Heathman, Burlington, 20,000; McLeod & But- lers, Desmond, 60,000; Pingree & Day, Ehrlich, 125,000; J. C. Stitt, Bay View, 45,000; Lyman Lumber & Shingle Company, 125,000; Minkler & Vanderford, Lyman, 65,000; Hitchcock-Kelley Company, Lyman, 50,000; North Avon Lumber Company, 100,000; Grand Rapids Shingle Com- pany, Sedro-Woolley, 100,000; J. A. Childs, Ly- man, 100,000; Taylor & Ristine, Lyman, 100,000; Puget Single & Lumber Company, Milltown, 30,000; Williams & Henry, Milltown, 30,000; Hawkeye Shingle Company, Rockport, 100,000; Clark & Lennon, Sedro-Woolley, 125,000; Ner- drum & Meddangh, Sedro-Woolley, 100,000; Woolley Shingle Company, 40,000.

The mineral wealth of Skagit county is in a very undeveloped condition notwithstanding its existence has been known for many years. The two principal minerals are coal and iron, though discoveries have not been limited to these by any means. More effort has been expended upon the coal veins than any of the other minerals, perhaps more than on all of them put together, yet the output of coal from the county has never been great, notwithstanding the somewhat wide distri- bution of outcroppings and the fairness of their promise.

"In the western half of Skagit county," says the report of the Washington geological survey for 1902, "coal measures outcrop at

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a number of places. Surrounding these out- crops, as a rule, there are small coal basins, which seemingly . have never been connected but have always been separated one from another. In the northwestern part of the county, the large coal field of Whatcom county extends into Skagit for a little way. A mile west of Thornwood on Samish river, there is an outcrop of coal where a little development work has been done. Immediately east of Montborne there is a small area of coal measures with a few coal outcrops. Near Cokedale and Hamilton there is in each case a coal measure arca in which well-known veins of coal occur.

"At the town of Cokedale a coal mine has been in operation for a number of years. The mine is located at the extreme Northern limit of the coal basin, the lowest vein of coal being but a few feet from the schist which lies below. The coal measures of Cokedale ontcrop along the northern boundaries of the district, but for the most part they are covered by the alluvial deposits of the Skagit river. The district is not believed to be a large one extending from Coke- dale southward to the Skagit, and in an east and west direction from near Lyman to a point a little way beyond Sedro-Woolley.

"At the Cokedale mine three veins of coal are found, viz., the north or Klondike vein, the middle vein and the south vein. The north vein is the lowest one in the series and has a thickness varying from ten to twenty-five feet ; the middle vein lies one hundred and forty feet above the north vein, stratigraphically, and has a thickness of from four to eight feet, with an average of six feet; the south vein, lying forty feet above the middle vein, has a thickness varying from six inches to two and a half feet. * *

* In the deformation of the coal measures, the coal was so greatly broken that in mining it is obtained only in small pieces, and never in large lumps. It is a good coking coal, and a large part of it is made into coke. The coal is all passed through washers after leaving the mine; the coarser part is then used for steaming and domestic purposes, while the finer part is taken directly to the coke ovens near by. Forty ovens are now in place. They are of the beehive pattern, each having a capacity of five tons. In 190} the output of the Cokedale mine consisted of 12,613 tons of coal and 5,806 tons of coke, and in 1902 it consisted of 19,017 tons of coal and 601 of coke. "

The coal measures in the Cokedale region were first uncovered by Lafayette Stevens about 1878, some four years after he with Amasa Everett and Orlando Graham discovered the coal veins at Hamilton. Stevens first associated with him J. B. Ball, B. A. Marshall and a man named Smith and proceeded to develop the prospects, but capital was lacking and little more than to

acquire property in the district could be attempted though one tunnel, three hundred feet in length, was driven. When the Fairhaven & Southern railroad was built from Whatcom to Sedro in ISS9, Nelson Bennett and his associates, under the name of the Skagit Coal & Transportation Company, acquired the property and immedi- ately began extensive developments. C. A. Larabee bought Bennett's interest in 1991. Under his management the mining of coal in that locality became an enterprise of considerable magnitnde. In 1894 shipping by rail was begun and the next year forty coke ovens were installed at an expense of twenty-five thousand dollars. It was at this time that the town of Cokedale sprang up. From 1894 to 1598 the mines pro- duced heavily. In the early nineties, James J. Hill, of the Great Northern, bought a quarter interest in the properties and in 1999, his road, under the name of the Skagit Coal & Coke Com- pany, acquired the entire property. It was operated continuously until May, 1904, since which time nothing has been done. Six thousand acres are embraced in the Cokedale property.

A few miles to eastward of Cokedale is the Hamilton district or Hamilton field as it is called. "The rock outcrops of the Cokedale and Hamilton districts are separated by the broad alluvial plain of the Skagit, and it is not known at the present time whether the coal-bearing rocks extend from one district to the other. At several places in the Hamilton district coal veins of commercial importance are known to ontcrop. Upon some of these veins considerable develop- ment work has been done and in times past some coal has been mined and sold. The coal is of good quality and of a variety that may be made into coke. "

The story of the discovery of coal in the mountains just across the river from Hamilton has been already told. J. J. Conner says he first learned of the existence of coal in that vicinity from an Indian chief, and that it was at his (Conner's) suggestion that Amasa Everett, Orlando Graham and the others investigated this coal region. Subsequent to their discovery, a com- pany was organized by Mr. Conner and others, some of them Seattle people, to exploit the coal, but nothing resulted from their efforts. Mr. Conner then obtained entire control of the prop- erty, and in 1880 mined and shipped a hundred tons for the supply of blacksmiths, but the local demand was limited and no further efforts in this direction were made. In 1885, F. J. Horsewell, an employee of certain San Francisco men, obtained from Mr. Conner a working bond on a part of the property. The Skagit Cumberland Company was incorporated, much stock was sold to English capitalists and by borrowing addi- tional money, funds were raised to operate on a large scale. Toward the close of the eighties they got started in good earnest, and for two or

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three years a large force of men was employed, an air compressor and other machinery were installed and two tunnels, three hundred and eight hundred feet respectively, were run.

Meantime, however, the company had become involved in litigation with Mr. Conner, who claims they tried to defraud him of his property, and a shut down eventually resulted. About this time Henry Wood, agent for the Northern Pacific Company, investigated the property. Having satisfied himself as to its merits, he offered, on behalf of his principals, three-quart- ers of a million dollars for the holdings of the Skagit Cumberland Company and Mr. Conner, the latter to receive one hundred and fifty thou- sand dollars. The company would not sell, and for seven years litigation between them and Conner continued. Conner says that the entire property is now in the hands of himself and his associates and that they are able and willing to sell to any person or corporation with the means and experience to operate the mine. Recently a deal seemed on the point of materializing by which English capitalists were to purchase this Hamilton property entire, together with Mr. Conner's iron interests, in all five thousand two hundred and eighty acres of mineral land, on which are one hundred and fifty million feet of timber, for five hundred thousand dollars. It is said that the purchasing agent went so far as to enter the bank in New York to draw his check for the first payment, but the deal fell through nevertheless. The reason for the purchaser's sudden change of mind is unknown, but Mr. Conner thinks he was influenced from his orig- inal intention by railroad interests.

In March, 1880, iron was discovered in the vicinity of Hamilton, but across the river from that town, by J. J. Conner. He had tests made of the ore, and in 1881 succeeded in interesting David Lester, R. F. Radabaugh, General Spragne and others, who formed the Tacoma Steel & Iron Company, in the property. Two tons of ore were shipped to Philadelphia, where a satisfac- tory test was made and a capitalist willing to back the enterprise found in the person of C. B. Wright. On learning that Tacoma was to have a steel and iron plant, Seattle became exceedingly jealous. Some of her citizens at once chartered a steamer, proceeded to the mines, jumped the various unpatented claims and took possession generally. Before Conner's title could be quieted, the deal had fallen through. It is said that Tacoma got revenge on Seattle a few years later when iron works were about to be estab- lished at Kirkland, by cutting off transportation through her influence with the Northern Pacific. Certainly the Kirkland plant failed to mate- rialize.

In 1890 Conner negotiated a sale of his iron property to Nelson Bennett for fifty-five thousand dollars, but this deal failed on account of Senator

Canfield's having placed a cloud on the title. The cloud was later removed by an agreement with Canfield's administratrix. In the carly nineties, D. H. Gilman, attempted to exploit Washington iron by starting a car-building establishment which should utilize iron from the local mines. He failed financially, losing every- thing. Some years ago, Homer H. Sweeney, of Mckeesport, Pennsylvania, took up the iron matter, secured the Irondale plant at the head of Port Townsend bay, and commenced turning ont a fine product. Mr. Conner shipped him four hundred tons, but the cost of the ore to him proved too great, on account of heavy freight charges. The ambitious plans of Mr. Sweeney were cut short by his death, he having been one of the victims of the Clallam disaster, and the mineral interests of Washington thereby sus- tained an incalculable misfortune.

In just such ways, the development of the iron industry in Skagit county has been prevented. Iron veins extend from Iron mountain, near Ham- ilton, up the Skagit for miles, and there is little doubt of the abundance of the mineral. The estimated amount of iron ore in Conner's prop- erty alone is twenty million tons. It cannot be developed by its present owners, owing to their lack of capital, and so far every proposed sale to men of means has failed to materialize. None of the various reasons for these failures seem to go to the merits of the property. Mr. Conner says that when Prof. Cherry, a friend of Carne- gie, who had charge of ore tests at the Colum- bian exposition, made an analysis of a sample of Hamilton ore, he was impressed with the desir- ability of making a working test. This he did. He succeeded in making a bar of steel two inches square and eighteen inches long, which he pre- sented to Dr. G. V. Calhoun stating that there was only one other mine in the United States which furnished ore from which steel could be made in this manner. Usually it is necessary to mix ores from different mines in order to produce steel. He expressed himself as willing to invest heavily, if the mine was what it appeared to be, and asked Dr. Calhoun to investigate. He never lost interest in Washington iron from that date until the time of his death. Many analyses of the Hamilton iron have been made, differing slightly in results. One of them shows: Iron, 52.60 per cent. ; silica, 20 15; sulphur, .059; phos- phorons, .039; manganese, 5.40; alumina, 2.70; lime, 3.10.

In the same general region, near the mouth of Baker river, Amasa Everett discovered a cement clay, which is being utilized at the pres- ent time, causing an influx of people and the laying out of a town known as Cement City. The value of the clay was discovered by accident. Mr. Everett was showing a lime ledge to an expert, when the latter dropped a remark about some of the clay which had been built into fire-

MT. BAKER AND MT. RAINIER

THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY

ASTOR. IFVOX TILDER ~ 1.

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places, saying it was more valuable for cement than it was for brick. Everett "took the hint," and while trying to sell his lime ledge in New York, showed also a sample of the clay. The ultimate result was the formation of the Wash- ington Portland Cement Company, and the inception of development work on a large scale. The company is now employing all the men it can get, building a twelve hundred barrel plant and it is expected that next year the capacity of the plant will be doubled.

Tale is another mineral that exists in quantity in Skagit county. One deposit was discovered by an old prospector named George Neal, who later associated with himself Robert Moore and A. M. Searight and secured a lease of the school land on which the main body of talc was located. With Fletcher Brothers, who had secured a tract of talc land adjoining, they incorporated a com- pany and began to prospect the property thoroughly. It is said that their labor has demonstrated that the mineral exists in almost inexhaustible quantities and is of high quality. The property is located near Bow on Samish bay within one hundred yards of the Great Northern railroad. The company is getting ready for active operations as rapidly as possible. There are also valuable deposits of tale near Marble- mount, for the elaboration of which T. M. Alvord & Son have erected a water-power mill, the only tale mill in the county at present.

Discoveries of asbestos, graphite, mica and other minerals have been made from time to time in various parts of Skagit county as well as of lead, nickel and the precious metals. In the summer of 1890, there was much excitement over the discovery of rich bodies of ore near the head of Cascade river, and over the sale of one mine to Eastern parties for a reputed price of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. There are a number of prospects in this Cascade district as yet undeveloped, and to the north and east in Whatcom, Okanogan and Chelan counties are several mineral belts of no little promise.

The taking and canning of various kinds of salt-water fish is another Skagit county industry of enormous and constantly growing proportions. The waters of the sound, the gulf, the straits and adjacent ocean teem with cod, herring, stur- geon, anchovies, flounders, perch, halibut, shad, sole, bass, salmon, smelts, etc., as well as oysters, clams, shrimps, crabs and other varieties - of shell fish. There is profit for the experienced fisherman who engages in the capture and pre- paring for market of any of these varieties, but salmon catching and canning far surpass any of the other fishing industries in magnitude and importance. Seven of the largest salmon canneries on Puget sound are located in Skagit county, and their product runs high into the inillions of cans. "The actual number of cans manufactured in Anacortes, " says the American

of June 15, 1905, "is as follows: Northern Fisheries Company, 4,500,000; Alaska Packers Association, 5,000,000; Fidalgo Island Packing Company, 3,000,000; Porter Fish Company, 2,500,000, or a total of 15,000,000 cans manu- factured in Anacortes during the year 1905. This is the total produet of the can-making plants of this city, but it is not the total amount of cans used. The White Crest and Apex canneries buy their cans already made, which adds to the number used about 2,000,000 more cans, or a total of 17,000,000 cans.

"The seventh cannery at Anacortes is that of Will A. Lowman, who employs forty-five white men and fifty Chinamen, turning out about 50,000 cases annually.

The first run of salmon begins about the middle of April. Although these are caught and utilized, they are inferior in value to the sockeye, whose season commences about July 15th. Humbacks, silver salmon and steelheads follow, none of which are comparable to the sockeye, but with them all the season lasts about ninety days. -

In order to render the salmon industry per- manent by conserving the supply of fish the state has enacted strict laws regulating the distance between fish traps, seins, gill nets, etc., that a sufficient number to keep up the supply of young salmon may be allowed to spawn. Furthermore there are twenty fish hatcheries in the state, which, it is estimated, turn out one hundred and forty million young salmon annually. A very large proportion of these return to the parent stream in from two and a half to four years, and many of them are taken by Skagit county fisher- men while on their way.

The Baker Lake Salmon Hatchery which is located on Baker Lake at the head waters of the Baker river, one of the main tributaries of the Skagit, was established about ten years ago by the Washington State Fish Commission and operated by them for about three years when it was sold to the United States government. This is one of the most important stations that the Bureau of Fisheries operates, as it is on one of the very few streams which the sockeye ascend in numbers to warrant artificial propagation. It is of course very expensive to run owing to its geographical location, being situated eighteen miles from Baker, a small town on the Great Northern railroad, and reached only over a rugged mountain pony trail. The buildings are all constructed from lumber split out with a froe, the main hatchery being one hundred feet by forty feet and fitted up with one hundred sixteen- foot salmon troughs.

The Bureau also operates a small sub-station at Birdsview on the Skagit river and the two stations together have an annual output of about twenty million fry including the following species : Sockeye, Quinnat and silver salmon and

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Steelhead trout. The plant is under the super- intendency of Henry O'Malley.

While the habitat of the cod is the northern seas, the work of preparation for market may as well be done in more genial elimes. Anacortes is the possessor of a mammoth plant fitted up for cod curing purposes-that of the Robinson Fisheries Company. This was organized in 1597 as the Robinson-Colt Company for the man- ufacture of fertilizers and fish oil. In 1900 the size of the plant was greatly increased. In 1904 the company reorganized, assumed its present name and launched out into the codfish business. It has enjoyed great prosperity and a phenom- enal growth, the result of much care in treating the fish, much thought in perfecting drying methods and much effort in introducing Pacific coast codfish in the markets of the East. The company is also using the skins of the fish in the manufacture of liquid glue.

With a word about the oyster industry, this brief review of the fisheries may be brought to a close. Inasmuch as a large part of the Samish oyster beds are under control of Bellingham people their product is very often credited to Whatcom county. In reality, however, not a single oyster was ever raised in Washington north of Samish bay. These oysters belong to Skagit county, and they form one of its important assets. "When I came here, I was dum- founded," said Superintendent A. H. Brown, of the Bellingham Oyster Company, "to find the residents of Skagit county so ignorant of the wealth that lay within the very palms of their hands. Skagit county, with its eighteen hundred acres of oyster lands (which is far in excess of any other county of Puget sound), had hardly been touched by white men. The Indians and poachers had for years scraped the Samish flats and had put them in a deplorable state until about two years ago (1902), when they were bought up by individuals, and today there are one hundred acres of oyster lands under cultivation in Skagit county. There are few who realize what this means, and it is but the beginning of what is destined to be one of Washington's greatest industries." Mr. Brown considers the Samish oyster far superior to the Olympia, or, in fact, to any other bivalve in Washington. His company is also importing and cultivating Japanese and Eastern oysters.

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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 75

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