Branded board from the Krouse
Machine Shop–one of 184
historic, locally-registered brands
in the Pomeroy Heritage Collection.

From the desk of Evan Robb

A new digital collection from the Washington Rural Heritage initiative documents early agricultural technology and domestic life in Washington’s least populous county (Garfield).  The Denny Ashby Library in Pomeroy, Washington is kicking off its new project with a sub-collection of materials from its local partner, the Eastern Washington Agricultural Museum (EWAM).  Washington Rural Heritage staff helped with imaging of the collection in 2009 and the Denny Ashby Library did a fantastic job of cataloging the items with help from community members and local experts at EWAM.

During our on-location project at EWAM, our hosts frequently demonstrated that expertise–interpreting the objects as we imaged them, pointing out their unique features and explaining how each tells a specific story about life in this part of the state.  For example, this wagon had a customized wide rear axle so that it could be used while harvesting wheat on the steep, rugged hillsides of Garfield County.  While admiring this horse drawn postal wagon/sleigh with miniature stove, we learned that the postmaster’s winter route sometimes took three days to complete.  And as it turned out, the granddaughter of its primary driver lived right in town.  She soon arrived on scene and gladly contributed this photo of her grandfather, “Skinny” Trescott, posing next to his mail sleigh.

Our EWAM hosts also half-jokingly mentioned that this 1912 windmill was kind of unique (for any American windmill) simply because there are no bullet holes in its vane.  And that the standard line about this reversible plow is that it was for a farmer “who didn’t know whether he was coming or going”.  Joking aside, much of the equipment at EWAM has been carefully restored and is still more than serviceable.  The museum hosts an annual Spring Farming Days on its grounds where community members are invited to watch land be tilled and planted using horse drawn plows and implements.

The Denny Ashby Library is currently working on a grant-funded project to produce two additional sub-collections.  One will document small rural schoolhouses of Garfield County.  The other will focus on the Mayview Tramway, a unique method of transporting grain to market prior to railroad development in the region.  Keep an eye out for those new collections, which will go live later this summer!

From the desk of Evan Robb

The Washington Rural Heritage initiative is pleased to announce our newest digital collection: Vashon Island Heritage.  A project of the Vashon Library (King County Library System) and the Vashon-Maury Island Heritage Association, the collection documents life on the island from the late 1800s through the 1960s. Four sub-collections make up the collection:

• Journals & Memoirs features local histories such as Marjorie Rose Stanley’s Search for Laughter and Bill Rendall’s Memoirs of Maury Island. Our favorite item in this sub-collection is a scrapbook documenting a mother and daughter’s 1923 move from Michigan to Paradise Cove on Vashon Island.  Florence Harger Burd painstakingly recorded her daughter Tad’s early years in this scrapbook, which includes photos, letters, artwork, and a journal narrating their day-to-day activities. Here’s a good place to begin exploring this large scrapbook.
• Maps and Periodicals includes maps from c.1895 through the 1920s, and some of the Island’s earliest newspapers and publications. During the 1930s Islander Janet Haugen founded a monthly magazine called the Nor’Wester, which featured many stories of Vashon’s pioneers and farmers.  Here’s a Nor’Wester story about one of those early pioneers.
• Vashon’s First Peoples documents the S’Homamish people of Vashon Island. It includes images of traditional tools and baskets on display at the Vashon Heritage Museum, and details life on the Island prior to S’Homamish removal to the Puyallup Reservation.  Born in a longhouse on Quartermaster Harbor in the 1840s, native S’Homamish Lucy Gerand would later provide vital information regarding the island’s native population and traditional place names. Here are some of those names, told by Lucy to anthropologist T.T. Waterman in 1922.
• Vashon College (1892-1912) includes photos and memorabilia documenting the first college on Vashon Island, which operated from 1892-1912, when fire destroyed key buildings (Vashon College resumed operation as a Washington State nonprofit in 2005, and contributed material for this digital collection).

A big thanks to our participants at the Vashon Library and Vashon-Maury Island Heritage Association for their hard work digitizing and cataloging these materials!

From the desk of Evan Robb

Over the course of three intensive community digitization events last Winter, the San Juan Island Library pulled together an impressive array of materials for its 2008-2009 Washington Rural Heritage grant project. The Library asked its patrons to share historically significant photos, documents, and objects from their private collections, and they responded with zeal. The resulting San Juan Story Collection provides a fascinating look at the early people and places of San Juan Island.

I was present to help out with large-format scanning for the first event back in February, and was impressed by the operation. Community members filed into the Friday Harbor High School library on a Saturday afternoon, items in hand. There, they were greeted by Library staff and volunteers trained to scan materials and record detailed information about each item. In the main room, two flatbed scanners were kept humming all afternoon. In another room, three-dimensional objects and artifacts were photographed in an ad hoc studio. And in a quieter section of the library, a historian from San Juan Island National Historical Park recorded interviews with long-time island residents and natives. Islanders were able to hold on to their family treasures, leave with a digital copy in hand, and know that they had just made an important contribution to the telling of their town’s story.

A few highlights from this diverse collection include: Indian arrowheads found throughout the island; locally produced crafts like this tobacco sack quilt or this casserole dish; individual and group portraits; aerial views from around the Island; San Juan County’s first ambulance airplane; and the Islander, an early steamboat ferry.

View San Juan Island Library’s entire collection at http://www.washingtonruralheritage.org/sanjuan. To see their newest 2008 grant material, click here.

Washington Rural Heritage introduced Ellensburg Heritage last year with the stunning Rodeo Collection, documenting 40 years of one of the top 25 rodeos in the country. Their sophomore effort brings us three new collections (and a few more rodeo photographs, too!).

The Kittitas Valley Crossroads Collection contains nearly 200 historic images depicting Indian life in Ellensburg and the surrounding area. It features the work of local photographers as well as a sampling from Eli Emor James, Lee Moorhouse, Vibert Jeffers, and Frank Matsura. The images include portraits of Indians in both traditional and Western dress, photos of pictographs from Rock Island, and scenes of recreation and domestic life.

The Ida Nason Collection is the personal photograph collection of Ellensburg citizen Ida Joseph Nason Aronica. A great-granddaughter of Yakama Chief Owhi, she dedicated her life to the preservation of her native heritage and culture. See images of her weaving and beadwork, family photos – her daughters were Ellensburg Rodeo royalty in 1929, and beautiful portraits of Ida as a young girl and in her later years.

The Fred L. Breckon Historic Portraits Collection is the work of amateur photographer Fred Beckon, an Ellensburg native who captured his fellow citizens in candid shots around town. These portraits date from the early 1940s to 1966 and are accompanied by short biographical information jotted down at the time the photo was taken, giving a very personal glimpse into Ellensburg’s history. Learn more about everyone from a poet to the postmaster.

View Ellensburg Public Library’s entire collection at: http://www.washingtonruralheritage.org/ellensburg. To view their newest 2008 grant material, click here.

From the desk of Evan Robb

The Washington Rural Heritage initiative is pleased to announce several new digital collections–the result of a year’s worth of hard work on the part of four public libraries receiving 2008/2009 LSTA grant funding from WSL. We’ll be featuring material from our new collections all this week.

Horses struck by lightning near St. John, Washington, 1940.
Click image for full record.

Our first new addition came from Whitman County Library, which continued to add to Whitman County Heritage for its 2008 grant project. The Library’s primary focus was on the community of St. John, Washington–its early citizens, schools, and surrounding family farms. Harvest scenes figure predominantly in the new collection, and do a good job of documenting the evolution of wheat farming techniques in Eastern Washington. A few of our favorite images include:

• John McCance’s first horse drawn combine.
• Steam engine used in harvesting operations.
• Front Street in St. John, WA. ca.1890.
• Cowboy Charlie Hitchings on his horse.
• Alix Karen Scheidmiller on her horse.

Harvest operation of Darwin Smith, 1933.
Click image for full record.

Following upon two successful years of digitization work, this grant project involved Whitman County Library’s first foray into “community digitization”–reaching out to library patrons for historic material held in their own private collections. Whitman County Library was recently awarded another digitization grant for 2009-2010, and will be expanding upon that model, uncovering hidden treasures throughout Whitman County.

Take a look at the entire Whitman County Heritage collection here. Or view all of Whitman County Library’s 2008 grant material here.

The Washington Rural Heritage team has been criss-crossing the state consulting with project participants, meeting with potential contributors and scanning, scanning, and scanning some more. In the last month, we’ve seen three out of four corners of this state — and a few spots in between — and though we’re a little road-weary, we can’t wait to feature these incredible historic finds on our site.

We started the month of July on Lummi Island, capturing some large reef-netting maps and historic fishing gear like cedar buoys and anchor stones once used by Lummi Indians.

The next week, we were off to the grassy plains of Garfield County, where we set up shop at the Eastern Washington Agricultural Museum to scan some incredibly-restored farming implements and equipment. We were psyched to have the opportunity to capture our largest item to date: a fully-restored, horse-drawn 36-foot Harris pull combine.

After that, we met with the Sedro-Woolley librarian and representatives from the Sedro-Woolley Museum to discuss a future project scanning some of their incredible holdings (including 97 glass lantern slides, ca. 1910, documenting a real shoot-em-up robbery!).

And finally, we drove almost eight hours to get up to Metaline Falls in Pend Oreille County, where we scanned almost 600 century-old photographs portraying life in this tiny community surrounded by the Colville National Forest. You’ll see scenes from a bear bbq, many shots of construction of the Box Canyon Bridge and Dam, and, of course, Black Beauty in all her glory (blogged about here).

Check back for more collections soon!

From the desk of Evan Robb

Congratulations to the latest group of Washington libraries who will be awarded LSTA grants through the Washington Rural Heritage initiative:

• Benton City Branch, Mid-Columbia Libraries
• Blanche Bradley Public Library (Cathlamet, WA)
• Columbia County Rural Library District
• Denny Ashby Library (Pomeroy, WA)
• Ellensburg Public Library
• Metalines Community Library (Pend Oreille County Library District)
• Stevenson and North Bonneville Community Libraries (Fort Vancouver Regional Library District)
• Whitman County Library

These grants are part of the Washington Rural Heritage 2009/2010 fiscal subgrant cycle that will end August 13, 2010.  Funds were made available by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services.  For more information, contact Evan Robb, Project Manager, 360.704.5228 or Jeff Martin, Grants Program, 360.704.5248.

Every day, thousands of motorists make their way along Interstate-90 as it winds through Snoqualmie Pass before sloping gracefully to the Columbia Plateau. This often-traveled highway affords beautiful views of central Washington: from rugged, snow-capped mountain peaks to rolling, golden fields. Most cars fly past Roslyn, a tiny mountain town a few miles north of Cle Elum, without realizing that it is home to a fascinating, one-of-a-kind cemetery; the state’s oldest continually operated bar; and was the setting of a popular 1990s television show. Most notoriously, however, it boasts some of the state’s richest mining history.

Roslyn was settled in the late nineteenth century by miners and their families, recruited by the Northwest Improvement Company to tunnel underground and exhume the deposits of coal that would be tapped for more than half a century. These founding families hailed from dozens of countries, and together they forged a home and a community. Though mining activities have gradually halted, this rich blend of languages, cultures and traditions is still evident in today’s citizens.

Washington Rural Heritage worked with Erin Krake, Roslyn’s librarian, to digitize and preserve a fading set of Ektachrome slides showing many facets of early Roslyn life. She tapped several townspeople to lend vivid descriptions of these images, telling the story behind the story. Many of these volunteer catalogers, sons and daughters of miners, recall hearing firsthand accounts of the events in the photographs.

Our favorites include a chilling portrait of women widowed by the 1892 mine explosion; a snapshot of a young couple giving a backyard concert; and a 22-ton chunk of coal, destined for greatness at the Chicago World Fair in 1893.

We’ve also included a lecture series by local historian David H.A. Browitt, who gives explicitly detailed accounts of the role that mining played in the town’s development. You’ll hear, for example, about mining methodology; the corporate decisions that brought in African-American strikebreakers; and the events leading up to and surrounding the mine explosions that rocked this sleepy community.

View the collection online at: http://www.washingtonruralheritage.org/roslyn/

From the desk of Evan Robb

This weekend marks the start of Mr. Carnegie’s Grand Tour of Washington, an annual automobile-based passport tour of 20 (out of 33 surviving) Carnegie libraries throughout Washington State.   Many of these original buildings continue to house libraries and related cultural institutions like museums; others, like Carnegie’s Restaurant in Seattle, have been completely re-purposed.  All are characterized by unique design and formal-yet-welcoming architecture, standing as reminders of an important era for American public libraries.

Visitors will be able to pick up “passports” at participating locations beginning Sunday, May 24th, and have them stamped during their visit.  If they get a minimum of three stamps by December 31, 2009, they will be eligible to enter a drawing for a prize giveaway: gift certificates featuring goods and services of Washington-based companies.

Vancouver, WA’s public library, circa 1909.
Now the Clark County Historical Museum.

Conceived by the Clark County Historical Museum (Vancouver, WA) as a way to celebrate the 100-year-birthday of its building (a 1909 Carnegie library), the Grand Tour developed into an initiative of the newly-established Carnegie Library Consortium of Washington, whose mission is to “identify surviving Carnegie Libraries in Washington State and promote public awareness and preservation around the world.”  The Consortium has put together a slideshow about Andrew Carnegie which will be on display at participating locations, as well as a children’s storybook/coloring book featuring “Andy the Library Explorer” as he delves into the history of Carnegie libraries.

The Grand Tour was also developed with local economic stimulus in mind.  According to Susan Tissot, executive director of the CCHM, “Mr. Carnegie’s Grand Tour of Washington is an economic development tool that promotes historic sites and local restaurants, shops and hotels within the state of Washington at a time when many people are cutting back on spending and recreational travel.  The tour is an effective form of sustainable development and an old-fashioned American road trip that is a fun way to learn about your state and its history without breaking the family bank account.”

Carnegie cities participating in the Grand Tour include:

Auburn, Anacortes, Burlington, Edmonds, Goldendale, Pasco, Port Angeles, Port Townsend, Ritzville, Tacoma, Snohomish, Seattle (six sites), Spokane, Vancouver, and Walla Walla.

Call Lisa Christopher, 360-993-5679, or check the CCHM’s website, www.cchmuseum.org, after the May 24 launch, for more information on Mr. Carnegie’s Grand Tour of Washington.

Washington Rural Heritage is pleased to announce our fourth San Juan Island collection: Orcas Island Heritage. The Orcas Island Historical Museum, in partnership with the Orcas Island Public Library, has digitized dozens of photographs, maps and books depicting the lives and livelihood of early settlers as they carved homes into this hilly and verdant island. Successful farming, fishing and logging led to the even more successful industry of tourism as Orcas became a premier summer destination for Washingtonians.

Various docking points around the island grew into villages and towns, complete with post offices, general stores and even schools. Each village has its own story to tell, and for the first time, we’ve enabled users to browse items by community.

Olga, perched on the southern tip of eastern Orcas, is one of these charming communities. One of its residents published a book of local family’s recipes and memories, including landing a 33 1/2 lb. blackmouth, dancing with the C.C.C. boys back in the ’30s, and bloomers hoisted to the top of a flagpole that were mistaken for a distress signal. When Lucille Willis wed in 1937, she lived in a beach-front cabin with few amenities.

She recalls that using an outhouse was the hardest adjustment for her. “One night when Culver had to be away, I went across the yard to the outhouse. I had no sooner got there than I heard the most alarming whooshing sounds. I hurried back to the house and waited for Culver to return home. When I told him my story, he laughed and told me not to worry; it was just a pod of whales making their way across the bay.”

We also invite you to explore items on our customized map. You can see just where that mysterious rock formation of an anchor is situated; envisage the first Ford that topped Mt. Constitution in Moran State Park; and see a steamer pulling into dock at Doe Bay – in 1910.