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Samuelson

In 1881, when he was 19 years old, Frank William Samuelson emigrated from Sweden to the Dakota Territory, where he worked for the railroad. There he met his wife, Marie Smeby, who was born in Norway. At the suggestion of Marie’s brother who praised the climate and scenery, Fank and Marie moved to Washington in 1898. They built a home in Cromwell and purchased 80 acres of land, which became the Sunny Hill Fruit Farm. Before the land could be cultivated, it had to be cleared. Trees, some as large as ten feet in diameter, were felled by hand. Some stumps were too difficult to remove, so crops were simply planted around them. Neighbors were few and far between. The house was lit by candles, and water was carried to the house in buckets. The Samuelsons had 14 children: Sigurd (Fred), Oscar, Mabel (died in infancy), Esther, Hedvig (Hedda), Frans Victor (Vic), Gustaf, Mabel, Walter, Martin, Anna Marie, Emma (Nora), Ethel (Violet), and Flora. The children helped tend to the farm. There were five acres of fruit trees, four acres of berries (particularly strawberries), and a huge vegetable garden. They also had five cows, 400 chickens, four big fat hogs, and a horse. The family raised almost all of their own food. The sale of fruit, produce and eggs provided them a good income. In order to better market their products, the farmers in the area purchased a steamboat, the Bay Island, and formed the Hales Pass and Wollochet Navigation Co. Frank was its first president. He also served as Pierce County Road Commissioner and helped build the Cromwell Grade School (est. 1902). Church and school were the centers of activity for the settlers. There were many socials for the young people. Skits and dialogues were favorite amusements. Music was a popular entertainment. The singing ability of the Samuelson family was widely recognized and always in demand. (source: Paul McCormick) GHPHS

Sandin

Erik Sandin established a 160-acre homestead in Artondale, on a spot that reminded him of his native Sweden – big evergreen trees, rolling hills, with a stream flowing between them. It was more land than he had ever expected to own. In 1870, the property was thick with brush. Erik cleared a path, then a road, then a plot of land for a house. He built a one room cabin for his family, then added a kitchen, and a bedroom. His wife, Martha, was also from Sweden. They were married in Seattle and had two sons, Arthur and George Henry. Erik built a blacksmith shop to forge the square-top nails and other tools he needed for the farm, and built a bridge to cross the creek that ran through his property. Martha and Erik planted ten varieties of apple trees. Once, when a bear attempted to eat the apples, Martha shot it. She canned the bear meat to provide food for the family and rendered its fat into lard. She knew that the lard, sweeter than butter, would help make an excellent pie crust. The Sandins walked or rowed a boat to wherever they wished to go. Sometimes this involved considerable distances. Erik walked to Wilkeson to work in the mines. As founding members of the Swedish Baptist Church in Tacoma, the family walked to Point Fosdick on Sundays, then rowed across the Narrows to attend church. Erik also crossed the Narrows to sell products from their farm in Tacoma. He once slaughtered calf, loaded the meat into a wheelbarrow, pushed the wheelbarrow to Point Fosdick, put the wheelbarrow in a row boat, and rowed across the Narrows to sell the meat up and down the streets of Old Town Tacoma. (source: Marthajean Sandin Packard) GHPHS

Sather

John M. Sather immigrated from Norway to the U.S. as a young man. He became a successful businessman in Gig Harbor and married Amanda Tollefsen. Together they had four children: Marion, Jean, Leona (“Lettie”) & John Jr. Shortly after the birth of their son, John Sather was murdered on his boat, where he conducted business. The quiet community of Gig Harbor was shocked. “Who killed John Sather?” The horrible crime remains a mystery to this day. (source: John Sather Jr.) GHPHS

Schindler

John Schindler was born in Wertenburg, Germany. He married his first wife, Nicoline K. Sellikin, in 1874. The couple had six children: Frederick, Nicoline Gertrude, Louise, George, Carl & Daukertina. The eldest was born in the Dakota Territory, the next four in Chicago and the youngest in Rosedale, Gig Harbor. Wife Nicoline and daughter Daukertina both died in1888. Daughter Nicoline died in 1891. All were buried on the family’s 160-acre homestead. John eventually remarried Alice Altenburg Milbrad. Alice was also widowed and had three children from her earlier marriage: DeVere, Alton & Claudia. Together, John and Alice had three more children: Dorothy, John George & Wesley. This brought the total number of children to twelve. The family farm produced milk, fruit and other products for market in Tacoma. According to Capt. Ed Lorenz, a local steamboat operator in the 1930s, John was the first person to suggest a bridge across the Narrows. “It was 1888 or 1889. We were going through the Narrows one day when Schindler, pointing to the high bluffs on each side, said ‘Captain, some day you will see a bridge over these Narrows.’ ” GHPHS

Secor

David and Lettie Secor came to Washington from Colorado with their two sons Eugene and Hubert in 1904. They lived in Elma and then Tacoma, where David served as a deputy sheriff. The family moved to Gig Harbor in 1907 to care for Lettie’s ailing father, Robert, who came to Gig Harbor with his wife Sarah in 1888. Lettie became a founding member of the Ladies’ Fortnightly Club. Eugene worked at the Peninsula Gateway. He was known as one of the better horseshoe pitchers in Gig Harbor. Hubert grew up and married Mary Frances. In the early 1920s, Hubert operated the telephone company in Gig Harbor. Later, he and his father David organized the first bus route between Ft. Lewis, Tacoma, Gig Harbor & Bremerton. He operated the bus system until 1935, when he devoted his full time to the Minter Creek Oyster Co., which he and his wife had started in1929. Hubert took a keen interest in his community’s development and served as mayor from 1964-1969. (sources: A History of Pierce County Washington, Paul Alvestad, & GH Cem. Assoc.) GHPHS

Sehmel

Henry W.L.C. Sehmel was one of three brothers to leave Munden, Germany and settle in Gig Harbor in 1884. His brothers, Karl and Albert, lived nearby and over time the three acquired more than 520 acres of land. Henry met his future wife, Dora Sophia Gummert, by mail, introduced by Henry’s sister-in-law, Johanna Sehmel. The two met in person for the first time in Tacoma, at the end of Dora’s long journey from Germany. They married in 1887 and had four children: Carl Louis, Adolph, Ernest & Elsa. Henry was a blacksmith. He also farmed his homestead and worked in the logging industry. Henry became a road supervisor and oversaw the construction of roads that linked the communities of the Peninsula. For many years, Dora crossed the Narrows by ferryboat to sell eggs and produce from her farm in Tacoma markets. Both Henry and Dora were active in the community, supporting the Rosedale school and the constrction of community’s first church. Henry served on the school board and donated his labor and money to the church. Dora travelled many miles along trails through the forest collecting money to buy a large American flag for the school and a stained glass window for the church. Henry was also a trustee and president of the Rosedale Cemetery Association. BK/61, GHPHS

Serka

Paul Serka was an exceptional fisherman. Born in Sumartin, on the Island of Brac, Dalmatia, Paul left Croatia when he was 23. He arrived to Washington with two other would-be prominent Gig Harbor fishermen, Tony Ancich and Nikola Babich. Paul wanted to fish, but opportunities were few and far between. He worked in the sawmills of Tacoma and laid streetcar track along the Point Defiance line until Andrew Gilich gave him his first shot to substitute as crewman on a seiner. Within a year, Paul was fishing the West Passage for sockeye and humpies with Joe Martinac on the boat Traveler. When Paul moved from Tacoma to Gig Harbor in 1914, he found himself in the company of other great fishermen, many of whom were also from Sumartin: Lee Makovich, the Skansie brothers, John Skansie (there were two, unrelated Skansie families in Gig Harbor), Mike Katich, Pasco Dorotich, Spiro Babich, and Sam and John Borovich. By 1915, Paul became one-quarter owner of the boat St. Nicholas, along with Mike Katich, Andrew Gilich, and John Skansie. Competition at sea was fierce. There were at least 200 boats fishing the Strait of Juan de Fuca at the time. A plentiful catch was known as a “big scratch,” and “high boat” designated the boat that had caught the most fish. In those days, High Boat made about $2,000 a haul, but many boats failed to even make expenses. Fishermen who were consistently “high boat” were less vulnerable than most because their catch was guaranteed by the canneries. Paul became one of these fishermen. After he sold the St. Nicholas, he was part owner of several other vessels, amongst them: Confidence, the Emancipator, and a 60 ft. seiner he owned with Mike Katich. In 1920, Paul commissioned The Oceanic, which was designed by Joe Martinac and built at the Skansie Shipyard for $12,000. It was powered by one of the first diesel engines on the Sound. Among the crew members were Joe and Jerry Markota, John Jerkovich, and Tony Ancich. Serka skippered this boat for fourteen years. Paul married Maria Cvitanovic in 1924 and went on to fish successfully for another 43 years. As a regular High Boat, Serka knew the tides, how to spot a school of fish, and how to work them both to his advantage. Others boats followed wherever he went or set his nets. In 1958, Paul commissioned The Sea Monster, one of the fastest purse seiners on the Sound. It was built by Mike Kazulin (Son of Sam Kazulin of Skansie Shipyard). The master seiner was Serka’s last command. Paul retired in 1967. (source: croatians.com, American biographies)

Severtsen

Andrew E. Severtsen was born in Egersund, Norway in 1886. He immigrated to Minnesota with his aunt and uncle. Eight years later, they came to Gig Harbor and settled in Cromwell. They purchased 20 acres overlooking Wollochet Bay and built a home, barn and chicken coops. Effie Isabelle Chapman was born in Michigan. She came to Cromwell to teach in the one-room schoolhouse when she was 24. She taught eight grades in the schoolhouse and helped local Norwegian immigrants learn English. One of the first people Effie met was Andrew. They were married in 1908, just a year after she arrived. When she became a mother, she stopped teaching and joined the school board, a position she held for more than 20 years. Effie and Andrew had five children: Lloyd, Carlton, Leonard, and twins Lyle and Laura. Leonard never married. The rest married and had children of their own. The Severtsen farm was enlarged to sixty acres and grew strawberries, loganberries and tomatoes. At one time, there were three thousand egg-producing chickens on the farm. The family gathered in the kitchen every evening, cleaning buckets of eggs by hand. Three of the boys later went to work on the ferries. GHPHS

Three generations after immigrating from Norway, the Severtsen family gave rise to an American dream. Henry and Monvilla Severtsen’s daughter, Doris, was gifted with exceptional athletic ability. Long before Title IX guaranteed equal opportunity in sports, Doris was a girl who loved to run – and run she did, all the way to distinction as USA and World Cross Country champion. From 1967 to 1971, she became to only person to win both national and international titles five times in a row. With little support for girls’ atheletics at the time, the people of Gig Harbor rallied together to send Doris to her first Olympics. She went on to a distinguished career in coaching, training men’s and women’s track and cross country teams at the university level, as well as national teams in Finland, Canada, England, Japan, and Nepal. She also coached the USA track, USA Olympic, and USA World Championships teams. Doris is currently an assistant professor in the School of Physical Education and Athletics at Seattle Pacific University, where she heads the cross country teams for both men and women. She was recently honored as a Pioneer of Women's Track and Field. Her definition of a pioneer is “doing it before it was there to do.” HHMA

Shyleen

Overlooking the harbor, Nils and Mary Shyleen owned a 20-acre berry farm and operated a struggling laundry business. Nils also worked as a carpenter, when there was construction work to be had. From 1903-1905, their daughter Mabel (born 1886) chronicled the highs, lows and everyday events of her life. Her diary survives to the present day, offering rare and valuable insight into the pioneering days of Gig Harbor. BK/80-87

Skansie

Peter Skansie left the fishing town of Sumartin on the Dalmatian Island of Brac (Croatia) on July 4, 1886. He arrived in New York and soon boarded a train bound for California, where tales of the Gold Rush promised fortune and a better life. He disembarked at San Jose, where he picked fruit for a dollar a day – not exactly the future he had in mind. Greater possibilities lay to the north, he heard. So he traveled to Washington where he earned $2.50 a day at the Wollochet brickyard. When the brickworks went under, he took a job at the Gig Harbor sawmill. When that business failed, he was happy to earn $1.50 a day at a sawmill in Tacoma. When wages fell to $1.25, Peter was ready to go fishing with the Jerisich boys, John and Mike. Their rowboats were almost exclusively purse seiners, a method of fishing introduced to the Puget Sound by Dalmatian fishermen in the mid-1880s. The catch was good and before long Peter established a homestead in Gig Harbor and convinced his brothers (Andrew, Mitchell & Joseph) and sister (Tomazina) to come to America. Peter married Melissa Jerisich, with whom he had a daughter, Julia. Mitchell arrived in 1899 and married Amanda Dorotich, the daughter of another prominent Gig Harbor fishing family. Brothers Joseph and Andrew arrived in 1900. Andrew was a stonemason in Crotia. In Gig Harbor, he built the family home (1908) and the Skansie net shed (1910). His wife Bertha join him in 1909. Peter had long envisioned enlarging the fishing boats, equipping them with an engine and adding a cabin. In 1902, under Mitchell’s expert direction, the Skansie brothers built their first motorized fishing boat (equipped with a 7-horsepower, standard gasoline engine). In 1910, they launched the Navigator, a motorized fishing boat with a cabin and a manually operated seine. Recognizing the potential of automation, in 1912, the Skansie brothers established the Skansie Shipbuilding Company and engaged Sam Kazulin – a fellow Dalmatian from the Island of Brac whose family’s reputation as master boat-builders preceeded him by generations – to manage the shipyard. During these early years, the Skansies fished during the spring and summer, and built boats in the winter. They improved upon the design of early motorized purse seiners, realizing that a pinched, teardrop-shaped bow would be more fuel-efficient than the flat-bed oval shape of other motorized boats. Their reputation grew as they shifted from repairing and modifying existing boats to building vessels from start to finnish. As the shipyard took hold, Peter and Andrew drifted back into fishing, while Mitchell, Joseph and Simon focused on boat-building. By the 1930s, the shipyard expanded to include the construction of autoferries. When Mitchell assumed management of the Washington Navigation Company (which succeeded the Pierce County ferry operation), he ran seven ferries along four routes throughout the Puget Sound. Together with other early Croatian fishing families of Gig Harbor, the Skansies’ boatworks helped create one of the most successful fishing fleets on the west coast. (source: croatians.com, American biograpies; also cityofgigharbor.net) BK/88-91, HHMA

Spadoni

The Spadoni name is well known in the Gig Harbor area. Folks who attended Peninsula High School (PHS) in the 1970s and ‘80s recall Paul Spadoni, the journalism teacher who led the school’s newspaper to win national awards for many years. Old-timers in the area remember going to Midway School with Spadoni kids in the 1930s and ‘40s. Others know about the Spadoni Brothers’ land clearing and road building business founded in 1946 by brothers Julius, Claude (better known as Mike), and Rudolph. Roy joined his brothers in the business in the 1950's and within 10 years became a partner. Their family had come to America in 1904 from Monticatini, Italy. According to family historian Annette Spadoni Bannon, the patriarch, Michele (“Michael”) Spadoni and his wife Anita settled in Clay City, Washington, a brick-manufacturing town near present day Eatonville. A few years later, they bought land in the Shore Acres neighborhood of Gig Harbor and built a home there, near Reid Road. “My father Roy was born on that farm in 1914,” Bannon said. By 1932, other family members had also moved to Gig Harbor. Roland Spadoni recalls that he was 10 years old when his parents moved here, also from Clay City. “Our old home is still standing,” Roland said. “It’s the last one at the top of Soundview Drive, next to where the big real estate office is now.” Roland attended Midway school “… from fourth grade on. We all walked to school. Some of us had to walk two miles. I usually walked through the woods rather than on the roads. I always carried my gun with me to hunt along the way. When I got to school, I’d just put my gun behind the potbellied stove to store it. After awhile, though, the teacher made me put it outside.” Roland’s cousin, Al Spadoni, grew up in Kent before his folks moved to Gig Harbor. He spent his school vacations with his Gig Harbor cousins, he said, and, because their school breaks were different from his, he tagged along with them to Midway School. “I just went to Midway during my school vacations,” Al said. “But I have strong memories of it. I remember one time at the end of a lunch break the teacher, Mrs. Mabel Parks, came running back to the school crying. She said, ‘Everybody go home, there’s no school this afternoon. My cow fell in the well and I have to get it out.’” The whole Spadoni family was hard-working, inventive and enterprising. Roland remembered helping his father and uncle dig the family’s wells by hand. “We had to dig three different holes before we got water. One of them was 100-feet deep.” Before Bannon’s father and his brothers started the family business, they did mostly logging, she said. “They logged and cleared land for a lot of people for their homes and farms and for roads.” When the business was started, they also sold coal, oil and asphalt, Roland Spadoni recalled. “I drove the coal truck and hauled coal from Tacoma for them.” “That was before the city had its own paving crews,” Bannon said. “They paved streets in Canterwood and lots of other places.” They also re-turfed the PHS ball-field and paved the parking lot at the Catholic church, Al Spadoni said. “They did lots of things for free. They never wanted any credit for it. It was just the right thing to do.” The Spadonis are like that, Roland Spadoni said. “I remember one time when Don Gillich’s engine went out on his fishing boat. “It was a Friday night and Don was getting ready to leave to fish in Alaska. My dad went over and pulled the engine and took it to Tacoma and had it all fixed and back in by Sunday night, so Don could leave right on schedule. After that, Don always had three or four fish in the hold for us when he got back to Gig Harbor.” “That’s the way it was back then,” Al said. “There wasn’t ever any rivalry. Everybody helped everybody else and shared tools and labor. If one fellow had a cement mixer or a miter saw, everybody just shared it.” “It was a fabulous place to grow up,” Bannon said. “It’s why my husband and I moved back home after his military career.” (see: The Kitsap Sun, 9/13/2010; also http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2010/sep/13/spadoni-family-has-deep-gh-roots/?print=1

Squalley

Dave Squalley and his wife, Anne, had nine children: David, Peter, Agnes, Andy, Mary, Ida, Agatha, Margaret & Emma. The Squalleys are perhaps the best known of the Native American families living in the Gig Harbor area at the time of European settlement and one of a few granted land ownership on Wollochet Bay. Dave was known by the settler community as "Chief Squalley." He was a fisherman and his wife was a skilled basket maker. They had nine children: David, Peter, Agnes, Andy, Mary, Ida, Agatha, Margaret and Emma. Upon David’s death, there was an outpouring of grief in the Native American community. He was interred with a traditional Native American ceremony. Annie eventually sold their property and moved to the Puyallup reservation. GHPHS

Stanich

Both originally from Dubrovnik, Croatia, Martin and Katherine Stanich met and married in Astoria, Oregon. They moved to Gig Harbor in 1910 with their four children: Lena and Mary (twins), Tony (Antone) and John. Their last child, Ann, was born in their Gig Harbor home in 1915. Martin built the house and adjacent net shed on the waterfront at Dorotich Avenue. The dock was constructed for his first purse seiner, the Welcome, built in 1913 by Barbare shipyard in Tacoma. The boat was sold in 1920, after Welcome II was built at the Skansie Shipyard. Martin believed in diversification and purchased the Strout property adjacent to his home in 1924. Formerly St. Peter’s Bros. grocery (which burned down), it was replaced by the Stanich Grocery Store. As was customary among Croatian fishing families, Martin’s sons eventually acquired the family businesses. Tony, the eldest, managed the grocery store and son John took over the family fishing boat. Both sons inherited the dock and net shed, and the house was left to the Martin’s daughters. Tony married Adelaide Hubmann and built their home on the lot between the family home and grocery store. He ran the store until the late 1950s. The Stanich store served Gig Harbor’s commercial fleet, supplying groceries on credit at the beginning of each season, with fishing family members helping out in the store as needed. When competitors entered the Gig Harbor grocery business, operating a “credit store” was no longer feasible. Stanich Grocery was remodeled, with space designated for a liquor store and a smaller space made into a deli in the late 1950s. When the liquor distributor left, Tony retired in 1971. The liquor store was rented out to a realty company, and the smaller space remained a bakery/deli (today’s NY Nails and Suzanne’s Deli) . After Tony died in 1995, the building was sold to Debra and Alan Ross (1997). Their daughter, Irene, still lives in Gig Harbor, in the family home on Dorotich street, next to the old Stanich grocery store. Martin and Katherine’s son John, fishing since age 16, took over the Welcome II, upon his father retirement. He married Pauline Castelan and skippered the vessel for over 50 years. They lived a half block away from the original grocery store on Harborview Drive with their daughter. John passed suddenly in 1974 and the following year the Welcome II was sold. The home that Martin built was left to John and Tony’s sisters, Ann Manley and Lena Karmelich. Ann Manley’s daughter, Mary Ann Jackson now owns the home. John’s grandsons, John and Tom Dempsey maintained the Stanich dock until it was sold in 1983. Three years later, Mike Thornhill and Robert Ellsworth, proprietor of the Ship to Shore and Kayaks, purchased the site. Prior to Ellsworth’s complete remodel of the shed, the space was rented by a local commercial fisherman, who used it to store fishing nets and equipment. It is now a series of rooms for storage, office space and an art studio with an elevated dock extending in front, and low floats for moorage. WFL, GHNSS

Sweeney

Sweeney, a native of Ireland, came to the United States in 1893 to visit an uncle and see teh World's Fair in Chicago. She decided to stay and in 1894 married James Sweeney. In 1908, James, Theresa, and their sons James, Francis, John, and Leo settled on 40 acres of land they purchased near Rosedale. The family farmed and operated a dairy until 1915 when Theresa moved into the harbor after a fire on the farm. She built a home at the head of the bay, operating a store and real estate office out of the house. She was appointed postmistress that same year and added the post office to her house. She served as postmistress for seven years. In 1922, Theresa built the Sweeney Block across the street from her home. The building housed the new post office, a dental office, pharmacy, general mercantile, and a restaurant. Theresa's general store boasted an inventory valued at $15,000. The original building was destroyed by fire in the late 1920s. Another building replaced it but was demolished in the late 1940s. Nothing has been built at the location since. Theresa played an active role in the Gig Harbor community. She campaigned to build St. Nicholas Church, served as the first woman Justice of the Peace for four years, was the first Secretary of the Peninsula Federated Clubs, a director of the Peninsula Fair, a leader in transportation and mercantile businesses, and active in local politics. In 1926 she was the Democratic candidate for the legislature, but Pierce County was considered a Republican stronghold at the time and she lost the election – although it is recorded that she “ran a good race.” HHMA