by James Canby | Mar 2, 2022 | SW People & Families
He was just an ordinary man, unpolished, given to straight talk and to smoking a pipe; not the sort at first glance whom one would expect to be immortalized by having a waterfront park dedicated to him, but that is what happened to Phil Simon. He was noted for many...
by James Canby | Mar 2, 2022 | SW People & Families
Ray Fossek’s daughter, Rae, married a man from Alabama, Vance Tillman, who now works as an accountant with a firm in Everett. Rae and Vance make their home on Sixth Street adjacent to the original Jensen family home. Especially for this Volume, Rae taped an interview...
by James Canby | Mar 2, 2022 | SW People & Families
When a woman who has been a busy wife and mother for over 20 years is left a widow in midlife with six grown and teen-age children it would be logical to assume she would slow her pace and settle down in the area to which she was accustomed. That is not what Louisa...
by James Canby | Mar 2, 2022 | SW People & Families
“How would you like to go out West and see this Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition that’s being written up in the paper?”The year was 1909. The place was the Iowa living room of Hans Peter Jensen. He was ad-dressing his wife, Cecila. She responded with enthusiasm, ‘‘That...
by James Canby | Mar 2, 2022 | SW People & Families
The youngsters of early day Langley knew Jacob and Ava Brehm as “Grandpa” and “Grandma”. The business community knew Jacob as the owner of the livery stable on First street, and Ava as the lady who made everybody feel welcome at her home in the field just east of the...
by James Canby | Mar 2, 2022 | SW People & Families
On a certain Sunday in 1907, a 30 year-old carpenter, Albert Melsen, decided to take his wife, Amelia, and their small daughters Elva and Grace, on an outing. He had come to the Pacific Northwest from Nebraska to visit his sister in Everett and was casting about for a...
