The house of William Frederick and Mary Kohlwes at Useless Bay. Front row: Fred, Tom, and Henry Kohlwes. Second row: Lillie Ulrich, Mary Kohlwes, William Frederick Kohlwes. Far left is Pepper the
[Note: No family has had more influence in Bay-view over the years than the Kohlwes members. Their stories follow.]
Three fresh-faced buxom teen-age girls were chattering excitedly as they sat in the passenger waiting room of the Vancouver (British Columbia) dock in 1892 waiting for the boat which would take them to Seattle. Seated on a bench directly behind them was a stylishly dressed lady who leaned forward slightly so that she could follow their conversation, which was in English heavily accented with Scandinavian.
The lady gathered that the girls had been part of a boat-load of young women who had sailed from Sweden seeking their fortunes in Canada and the United States. She leaned over and tapped the shoulder of the girl who appeared to be the leader of the threesome. “I couldn’t help overhearing that you young ladies are newcomers to Canada and that you are seeking work. I own a hotel here in Vancouver and I need help. I’ll pay you well if you will all come and work for me.”
Mary Thompson, who had urged the other two girls to come with her to Seattle and join another of the girls from the boat who had lined up jobs for them, looked the stylish lady over carefully. She appeared prosperous and very nice, and the salary she was offering was exciting. The temptation to accept was great. However, Mary was aware that her friend in Seattle had gone to much trouble to find jobs for her and the other two, and it would be wrong to leave her empty handed. With some reluctance and considerable objections from the other two girls, Mary declined the lady’s offer and the three girls continued on to Seattle. Later, she learned that the “nice” lady who had offered her a job in Vancouver was the contact for a white slaver who was assembling a boat-load of young girls to be sent to Shanghai as prostitutes. Mary shuddered at the thought of the ugly fate that would have overtaken her if it had not been for her high standard of ethics.
The fate which did overtake her was decidedly pleasant and it brought her, in a round-about way, to a romantic marriage, a beautiful home overlooking Useless Bay on South Whidbey, and three sons who figured prominently in the early history of the area.
Mary earned ten dollars a month plus her room and board working as a housekeeper for Mr. Bash, but she had her sights set on being something more than just a paid housekeeper.
When she heard word of the gold strike in the Klondike, her adventurous nature impelled her to head north in 1898 with a group shipping out for Alaska, taking a girl friend with her.
There was no gold to amount to anything where they first landed, so the girls joined a group going to a place north of the Arctic Circle called Bettles, and it was here that Mary met William Kohlwes. He was cleaning gold the wrong way, according to Mary, so she took over the process of cleaning the gold as she had seen it done in mines in Sweden.
William Frederick Kohlwes was born in 1861 in Nordrheim, Westfalia, Germany. A poor economy made it impossible for many Germans to remain in their country. William’s parents stayed on at Nordrheim along with three of his sisters and one brother. William and another brother emigrated to the United States. His brother settled in the Saint Louis area while William eventually reached Everett.
While working there, William Kohlwes became acquainted with Jacob Anthes and the Tiemeyer brothers—William, Henry, and Fred of South Whidbey. He later moved to Seattle and worked in the saw mills there. While in Seattle, William homesteaded in the Edmonds area, but when he left for Alaska to join the gold rush, he left money with a friend who had agreed to make the required improvements. The friend did not do what was asked and William lost the homestead.
Romance blossomed between William Kohlwes and Mary Thompson while she was teaching him how to pan and clean gold. They were married in Coldfoot, Alaska in 1901. Soon afterward, they moved to Goldbench on the south fork of the Koyukuk River above the Arctic Circle, along the present pipeline. Their present son Frederick was bom there. He was the first white child to be bom above the Arctic Circle in the Territory of Alaska. The Eskimos had never seen a white child before. Fred was bom May 14, 1902. His birth certificate came from the territorial government.
William and Mary decided that it was no place for a baby, so in 1903, they came to Whidbey Island and bought 160 acres above Sunlight Beach on Useless Bay, plus the sand-spit, from William Tiemeyer for $1500. William Tiemeyer had purchased the land from Edward Oliver.
The Kohlweses had a second son, Tom, born in December of 1904. In 1906, they built a new house and started farming in earnest. They bought cows, pigs, sheep, and chickens. They built a large bam to hold the hay they harvested. Their third son was bom on April 2, 1906, and was named Henry.
Eventually, William and Mary built another barn so there were two bams on the farm with space not only for hay but for the animals. There were horses, too, of course. They had no other means of transportation but to walk or ride the horses, or to hitch up the horses to a wagon or buggy. Now they were bringing pork and veal to Langley to put on the boat Clatawa, which took the meat to Everett to be sold in the markets. They were also taking eggs, sour cream, and produce to put on the boat Calista which went to Seattle.
Fred remembers a boat called Sedro which belonged to Bernie Cram. It would come into Useless Bay on a high tide with supplies for the Bayview Store. After he had delivered the supplies, Bernie would have to stay over until the next high tide before he could take the boat out of the bay.
In 1911, the Kohlweses had prospered enough to allow the hiring of a care-taker for their farm. They could then spend the year traveling with their three sons. They visited the home of Mary’s family in Sweden as well as William’s family in Germany. St. Louis was the next stop as William’s brother had remained there.
Fred, the first bom son, attended Bayview School as did Tom and Henry. Fred started school at age seven in 1909 and at that time the school building had a belfry. There were two wings in the building. The first four grades were contained in one wing and the last four grades in the other. An average of eight children were in each grade. Students took a state examination at the end of the eighth grade. Fred remembers one of the teachers was a Miss Ferris.
Each room had a large wood stove that stood on legs and was six feet high with a shield around it. The boys took turns bringing in wood for the stove. There were “his” and “her” out-houses back of the school. The Bayview School building is currently owned by the South Whidbey School District and currently leased to Skagit Valley College.
When Fred left school after the eighth grade, he worked on the farm—milking cows, taking care of the horses, and plowing. When he was 20 years old, he went to Seattle and worked for the Westinghouse Service Department making electrical repairs, rebuilding motors, and helping to hook up the first generator for the City of Seattle at Diablo Dam. The generator was brought up in pieces and assembled at the dam. The coils were so big they needed block and tackle to put them in place.
In 1924 William died of complications resulting from an accident when a pile driver smashed his arm (Mary died in 1961). Young Fred came home for his father’s funeral, after which he returned to Seattle and Westinghouse.
After a time Fred came back to Whidbey to help his mother run the farm. They had acetylene carbide gas in the house with a light fixture in every room. At the time when Fred and his brothers were children, most homes had coal oil lights. Fred now proceeded to wire the whole house for electricity, and got power from the Kohler light generator. Fred also brought a long distance radio with him from Seattle and all the neighbors would come to listen to it.
Fred and his mother and brothers kept the farm running. They now had cherries and a large filbert orchard. Fred was the field man for the Washington State Filbert Control Board and traveled to places such as Samish and Sedro-Woolley to see that the growers were drying the nuts properly before selling them.
The Kohlwes’ filbert farm became famous throughout the area. The following article about it was published in the Progress edition of the Whidbey Record, November 30, 1939.
“South Whidbey is ideally adapted to the culture of filberts as has been successfully proved by the Kohlwes family of Bayview, pioneers here in the introduction of this new crop, which rates a premium on the market.
“Filbert trees grow to a height of twenty-five feet and if given proper care, will start bearing in about three years. In the fifth year from three to eight pounds of nuts should be secured from each tree. Thirty year old trees have been known to yield as much as 100 pounds each.
“The Kohlwes orchard has been in bearing for several years now and the nuts from it have been commanding a premium on the market. Others, inspired by the success of the Kohlwes venture have set out orchards until now there are quite a number of these on South Whidbey.
“Filberts are in great demand throughout the United States and thousands of pounds are imported annually. Western Washington and Oregon are the only two sections of the country where these nuts have been raised successfully. Of this section, South Whidbey has been found to be the best adapted to their culture.”
In 1939 Fred married Clara Helland, the daughter of Carl and Gurine Helland of Clinton. The Hellands had twelve children five sons and seven daughters. When Clara finished school she worked on the ferries in the lunch-room until she and Fred married. For several years Fred worked in the county court house at Coupeville as county treasurer.
Fred and Clara have two sons and three daughters. Their oldest daughter, Arlene, is married to Dave Alschbach and now lives in California. The oldest son, Alfred, went to school on the island, as did all of William and Mary’s grandchildren. He works for Washington Mutual Savings Bank in Seattle, where he lives with his wife Jeannie. Fred and Clara’s daughter Karen married Frank Brady and lives in Woodinville. Kathy lives in Des Moines with her husband Peter Woeck, II. The youngest son, Michael, served in the Air Force, went on to college, and now lives in California with his wife Janet.
Tom was a truck driver for Western Washington Farmer’s Co-op until his retirement. He was married to Audrey Peterson and they have a daughter, Maxine Jackson Sanders. Tom and Audrey separated; later Tom married Donna and they have a son, Bill Kohlwes, who lives and works on the island as a contractor, farmer, and restaurant owner.
The youngest Kohlwes son, Henry, retired from the Olympian Stone Company in Seattle after more than 30 years as a dispatcher. He married Mabel Stone and they have three children—Bob, Gary, and Janet Kohlwes Witsoe. The oldest, Bob, is a commercial fisherman. Gary is superintendent of the Renton School District; Janet is South Whidbey’s Community School coordinator and registrar at the high school. Henry and his daughter Janet recently visited Wehdem, Germany, becoming acquainted with their relatives there.
The three sons of William Frederick and Mary Kohlwes all live on property which was part of the original farm as do Bob and Janet. The children and grandchildren of William Frederick and Mary have prospered and are helping to keep the Kohlwes name alive.