Behind the Sign

The current Skagit County Historical Museum exhibit, "A Little Off the Top," showcases the history of barber shops in Skagit County, highlighting their important role in the area. It takes visitors through the evolution of barber shops from the Valley’s pioneer era to the present day, emphasizing their impact on the community. The exhibit features a fascinating collection of artifacts from old to modern-day barber shops, which is impressive given the fact that according to the museum’s executive director, Jo Wolfe, “this is the first time such an exhibit has been created.” The exhibit ends on March 10th, so visit La Conner Hill soon and explore the rich history of barber shops in Skagit County!

Unfortunately, like most treaties signed between the United States of America and Native American tribes, the written promises typically did not hold up in practice — and this was the case as well with the Treaty of Point Elliott. In this second part of our Tales of the Magic Skagit series, “Treaty Day,” we look at the reasons the signatory tribes signed a document written in a language they did not understand, and the consequences of their doing so. Finally, we consider the counter-intuitive reasons why Coast Salish tribes would celebrate the event that took place in Mukilteo 169 years ago that forever changed their way of life.

On January 22, 1855 more than 2,000 natives of the Puget Sound area, represented by a dozen acknowledged tribal leaders, met with representative of the federal government of the United States at a place in Mukilteo, Washington known as Point Elliott to reach a “lands settlement agreement.” The resulting “Treaty of Point Elliott” effectively ceded more than 5 million acres of native land in exchange for retaining inherent rights to self-governance and self determination, as well as the right to fish in all “usual and accustomed places and to hunt and gather on all open and unclaimed land.” Additionally, the native peoples represented at Point Elliott were promised education, healthcare, and housing as well as "payment" for their ceded lands and abandoned homes. This is the first of three Tales of the Magic Skagit episodes that I’ll be devoting to the history of the Treaty of Point Elliott and its legacy. As one of the “New People” to the Skagit Valley, this is not a story I feel especially qualified to tell, so I’m relying on the excellent work that has been done by the Hibulb Cultural Center and Natural History Preserve, which is located on the Tulalip Reservation near Marysville.

If you like a good ghost story, Valerie Stafford has more than a few to tell you. We’re not talking about your run-of-the-mill, sit-around-the-campfire-eating-s’mores-giving-each-other-the-shivers genre of creep outs and urban legend gore. Oh, no, my friends. We’re talking real ghost stories here.

Christopher Columbus has long remained at the heart of the American origin story. But if you really want to get the historical record straight as to who "discovered" our country, you have to travel back many millennia to "time immemorial" and the original inhabitants and stewards of the land we call America.

The Skagit County Historical Museum’s current exhibit, “I Do!”, finishes its run at the “top of the hill” in La Conner at the end of the month. For her second “Tales of the Magic Skagit” story, I asked our Skagit Valley Youth History Project intern, Morgan White, to write a story about it based her visit to the exhibit, as well as a previous TMS podcast interview with museum executive director Jo Wolfe and collections manager Laney Moran. The result is an overview of the exhibit's narrative that spans more than a dozen pivotal periods in U.S. and Skagit Valley history.

In a display of old yearbooks at the Anacortes History Museum, there was one in particular that caught my eye: the 1934 “Rhododendron.” What was most immediately remarkable about it was its cover material, which appropriately for the Pacific Northwest was fashioned from wood rather than paper. Opening it was like unsealing a wood grained time capsule into which I peered briefly at the life of its former owner, Jeannette Wilson.

This is the story of an important step in restoring some balance to our historical notions of who we are as Skagitonians. It started with a visit to the Sedro-Woolley Museum from a woman whose husband had discovered an artifact that, according to museum president and executive director JoEllen Kesti, “turned out to be not only rare but of cultural significance.” That discovery culminated in the August 19, 2023 unveiling of a new museum exhibit dedicated to the history of the Upper Skagit Tribe before a standing room only gathering of not only tribal members, but those of the broader Skagit Valley community as well.

So, just how well do you know the Magic Skagit? Play this trivia contest and see if you can beat our Tales of the Magic Skagit winner. Our thanks to Mari Densmore, archivist at the Skagit County Historical Museum in La Conner for providing the trivia questions. You'll find the answers as well in this TMS episode.

It would be reasonable to assume that the starting point for the Skagit County Fair is settled history. But as is often the case in the retelling of history, things can get a bit hazy. In this TMS episode, we state the case for why 2023 marks the 124th Skagit County Fair.

Three years after the ending of The Great War in 1918, a book was published to commemorate the fallen heroes of the global conflict from Whatcom, Skagit, and San Juan counties: "With The Colors." Here is an excerpt from its pages that lists the 59 men from Skagit County who perished as a result of that conflict. As you will discover, however, roughly a quarter of those deaths were due to an invisible, but nonetheless deadly, adversary. Tales of the Magic Skagit is proud to do honor to their memories.

This is a Mothers’ Day story. More specifically, it’s the story of two Skagit Valley mothers, both of whom are no longer with us, but each of whom left amazing legacies in the wake of their very different lives. Both were born and raised in the Magic Skagit, and each were trailblazers in their respective spheres of influence. This is the story of Susan Schuh and Imogene Bowen, and of all the many thousands of moms in the Skagit Valley that one might choose to commemorate on Mothers’ Day, their stories struck me as particularly emblematic of our community — and in my efforts to pay tribute to them, I celebrate the loving and creative power of womanhood that is at the core of what I think all of us most love, respect, and remember about our mothers.