Before he was a state game protector (now called a game warden) for 30 years on Whidbey, and before he owned Bercot's Fishing Resort on Holmes Harbor, Dode Bercot was a Pacific Northwest boxing sensation. It was just a little over 100 years ago that Dode first began...

Scenes of the season from yesteryear... If you like the work we are doing at the South Whidbey Historical Society, please consider making a year-end, tax-deductible gift at the link below. Thank you! https://www.paypal.com/donate/...

Sixty years ago today one of South Whidbey’s earliest and most enduring charities was started: Good Cheer Food Bank & Thrift Stores. It began near Christmastime in 1962, when a group of friends from various churches came up with an idea to spread some Good Cheer...

Our early winter newsletter has been mailed out. The issue features an update on a local history project focused at Sandy Point (formerly Brown's Point, and before that a Snohomish village) and members of the Brown/Shelton family. It also features an in-depth story...

We are saddened at the passing of longtime SWHS Board member Charlie Pancerzewski last week. Charlie and his wife Gayle Cattron Pancerzewski, were benefactors for the digitizing of Island County Fair scrapbooks dating back to the 1950s, as well as donating to the...

We are beyond grateful to The Goose Community Grocer and Goosefoot to have been chosen as November's Round-Up charity. This morning South Whidbey Historical Society president Bill Haroldson, received a check for $6,467.07 from Goose store manager Kayla Leganza. It...

It was a beautiful day for the Langley Holly Jolly Parade. Thanks to SWHS docents and Board members, and a special shout-out to Patricia Friedman and Bill Haroldson for organizing the decorations.

Thanks to Dick Bryant for these photos he shared about Maxwelton in the 1950s. His father, Fulton, loaded a truck with hay and then had neighborhood children ride on it for the Maxwelton 4th of July parade. Let us know if you can identify any of the children.

The Daughters of Norway, Ester Moe Lodge, are having their Nordic Bakery and Boutique Sale at St. Peter's Lutheran Church in Clinton this Saturday, Nov. 12 between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. Stop on by for this popular local event. We thought you might like to know a little...

Craig 'Windmill' Holman (shown below) was featured in a segment on this morning's KIRO radio program Seattle's Morning News with Dave Ross and Colleen O'Brien. Historian Feliks Banel's call for recordings of the Outdoor Line radio program hosted by Bill Davis (from...

When you shop at the Goose Community Grocer in November, you will likely be asked to 'round up' your bill to benefit the South Whidbey Historical Museum. It may be a few cents, or it may be closer to a dollar. When you say yes, your spare change will help fund the...

This lead article about Henry Bailey appears in our most recent newsletter.Our next newsletter, due out in early November, will feature information about Henry Bailey's parents: Robert Bailey (South Whidbey's first white settler) and Yabo-Litza (daughter...

In the last video post of memories of Bayview School in the 1930s and early 1940s, former Bayview student Leon Josephson mentioned that the school bus stop for the grade school students was at the Bayview Cash Store. If you can identify any of the students in this...

Thanks to Mabel Olsen Alexander and Leon Josephson for their memories as students at Bayview School. Mabel, now 98, attended second through eighth grades from 1930 to 1937 before she attended Langley High School.Leon Josephson, 88, attended first and...

"Reflecting on my Cultus Bay days I have come to the conclusion that it was probably the most productive area on the south end. We had all kinds of clams: butter, steamers, horse and geoducks when the tide was out. One of the best salmon fisheries was off Possession...

The silver salmon (Coho) are beginning to run, so we thought we’d do a post of a fishing resort located at Cultus Bay, near Possession Shores, in the 1940s and 1950s. It was begun as A & B Camp, but Bob and Eilene Tribou bought it and changed the name...

Fair Friday... The Whidbey Island Fair begins next week, and in honor of it, here's a throwback to the year 1916 when the Island County Fair was held up in Coupeville and featured baseball and softball games between Langley and Coupeville. Langley's own Lucy Bainter...

  Sitting on tree stumps was evidently a favorite pastime circa 1915 in Langley. (Photos from Hannah Jacobsen's photo album.)

  Our community is still grieving the loss of the "Conductor of Fun" Jim Freeman, and we thought it appropriate on this 'Fair Friday' to honor him with a look back to 1986 and 1987 when Jim first began to serve as emcee for the Island County Fair's entertainment...

Here's a photo of the 1911 Langley Baseball team... Back row: (l to r) Leon Hartley, Elmer "Skinny" Rothgeb, Ed Boynton, Ed Howard (manager), Carl Gillespie, Harry Kraber, and Bill Howard. Seated: (l to r): Fred Howard, Charles Alex, Ray Howard (mascot), and Walt...

Lest we forget... the names of students of Langley High School who died in World War II and the Korean War... names that are etched on the monument at the South Whidbey Community Center (formerly Langley Middle School). Named on the memorial are Paul Applegate,...

Langley on Whidby Island, which has the distinction of being the first municipality in this part of the world to be governed entirely by women, is quick to challenge the claims of Jackson, Wyoming announced recently in a press dispatch printed In the dally papers that...