History of Some Northwest Towns

English Log Camp #6

Dad was born in a logging camp (#6). According to "Kinsey Photographer, Volume Three, The Locomotive Portrait", at one time English operated several camps and up to sixty miles of railroad East of Pilchuck and north of Lake Cavanaugh. The 90-ton locomotive he purchased in 1922 was still in service when the operation ended in the mid 1940's. (Edward English died in 1930 at the age of 79.)

Clear Lake, Washington
"Kinsey Photographer, Volume Three, The Locomotive Portrait" relates that about the year 1900 two lumbermen from Minneapolis set up Bratnober-Waite Lumber Company in Clear Lake. They built a sawmill on Clear Lake which burned a couple years later. The property changed hands and the Clear Lake Lumber Company emerged in 1903.

My grade school years were spent attending the Seventh-day Adventist Grade School in Clear Lake. Over the years the "house" structure served as a school, converted back to a house, converted to a house and school and back to just a school by the time I attended. Last time I drove past the area (35+ years after "graduating" from the 8th grade) it was once again a house. The school/house is near the location of the once-upon-a-time sawmill, Clear Lake Lumber Company. The schooling there was fantastic. Multiple grades in a single room. One year the enrollment was so small we had all 8 grades in one room! (Kathryn Curtis Martin)

Sedro-Woolley
Another town of my childhood was Sedro-Woolley. My grandmother once told me a funny story about how the town got its name. I always thought she made it up to entertain me. Maybe it wasn't a made-up story afterall. I found this article among newspaper clippings: (Kathryn Curtis Martin)

How Sedro-Woolley got its name (local newspaper article, year unknown)
"Up the Skagit River from Mount Vernon is the town of Sedro-Woolley, incorporated in 1898-99. the dual-name town of Skagit County came about from the cedar trees in the area mis-spelled with an "s" and from the name of an early settler named Woolley. Both settlements were close together and began growing into one settlement when a name was being sought.

The resulting battle that raged about the name brought results of a sort from a local businessman. Disgusted with the constant fighting and tired of swatting the giant mosquitoes that thrived among the giant cedars he suggested they name the town "Bug."

The women of the town were horrified with "Bug" and set about to settle the argument with "Sedro-Woolley" with a hyphen. At one time the city council voted to dispense with the hyphen but the matter was not followed through in Olympia.

On the town's 75th anniversary the Courier Times newspaper published a special issue, "The Year of the Hyphen" and a local realtor used on his advertising and letterheads the slogan "The Only Sedro-Woolley on Earth."

My sister and youngest brother were both born in the Sedro-Woolley hospital. My brother's claim to fame is that he remembers seeing our aunt's car parked in the hospital parking lot the day he was born! Most of us CURTIS' have a literary bent. Along those lines, Harold spent several years in Russia setting up a religious publishing house. He returned to the states the summer of 2000 and accepted a position at Christian Record Services in Lincoln, Nebraska.