Family History

As I dig into the more recent history of my family, Snohomish County and Everett, Washington, and the surrounding areas played a huge part not just in my life, education, and culture, but also to several branches of my family, especially the West and Knapp sides.

The West family came from Michigan to log the Pacific Northwest, surviving in rough logging camps at the turn of the century. A family of adventurers, they arrived on the Mayflower and brought “civilization” across what became the United States. While not leaving a huge impact on Snohomish County, my Grandfather Howard W. West guarded the Pacific Northwest waters at sea and inland his entire life, serving on the new USS Arizona 15 years before Pearl Harbor, raising his children in Marysville and later at the Friday Harbor lighthouse, and dying as security for Chief Joseph Dam.

My mother’s Knapp family was forced by the Depression to leave behind their beloved but poverty and struggles in the logging community of Taylor Rapids, Wisconsin, for the west coast, seeking a better life. Knowing nothing but logging, they joined the logging camps in Oregon until a fire destroyed what little they had left. They moved to the wilderness of Snohomish County to work the Frye Lettuce Farm in Monroe, then the logging teams blazing roads roads through the forested mountain foothills to build what is now Old Highway 2.

Two of the Knapp brothers married into the Elwell family, descendants of Chief Seattle. Robert Knapp stayed with his wife, Evelyn Elwell (of Charles Elwell and Laura Stillman), in Lake Stevens. Lloyd married Irene Elwell and moved to Eastern Washington. Wayne Knapp married into the Odell family of Snohomish, another family of early homesteaders, merging native Americans even further with immigrant whites.

Father-in-law Captain Elwell hired on Robert and Wayne on the tug, Skagit Chief, maneuvering logs through the treacherous waterways of the Snohomish and Skagit Rivers and Puget Sound. As the roads opened up, cargo moved from the waterways, and the two Knapp brothers found jobs as security guards at the Monroe State Prison. Wayne soon moved onto Seattle, working his way up to the head of Boeing security.

Snohomish County has a long history, going back to the Native Americans. Everett, Washington, played a role in both World Wars as a protected port for the Pacific ocean. Just recently, a World War I cannon was found in Clark Park in Everett on Lombard Avenue, though not lost in the sense of lost to history but missing from the park in a mystery over 10 years old. It was found in a maintenance area of the park, forgotten and ignored. The city is now trying to figure out how to restore and/or protect this one playground for myself and children to climb over and pretend we were fighting the enemy below on the bay.

Paine Field Airport was named for a pilot in World War I, and the Boeing plant in Mukilteo, southwest of Everett, continues to be one of the largest buildings on one floor in the world as well as a major driver to the world economy and transportation system. Port Gardner Bay, once filled with logs yanked down the foothills of Mt. Pilchuck and all over Snohomish County, still hosts the paper mill remains, part of what pulled Everett out of the Great Depression when logging ran dry. It’s now dwarfed by the new marina and naval base next door.

Everett was a cross road for transportation in all directions. From the sea to the mountains east across Highway 2, later complemented by the North Cascades Highway connecting the northwestern part of the area with Eastern Washington during the passable times of the year. To the north lie Vancouver, Canada, along Interstate 5, and to the south, along the same highway, lie the industrial city of Seattle and points beyond all the way to Mexico. Continue reading →