Skagit River Journal of History & Folklore Subscribers Edition Stories & Photos The most in-depth, comprehensive site about the Skagit. Covers from British Columbia to Puget sound. Counties covered: Skagit, Whatcom, Island, San Juan. An evolving history dedicated to the principle of committing random acts of historical kindness

Noel V. Bourasaw, editor 810 Central Ave., Sedro-Woolley, Washington, 98284 Home of the Tarheel Stomp Mortimer Cook slept here & named the town Bug

One of our most supportive readers, Larry Harnden, found this photo in an antique store. All that was written on the back was "road crew west of Sedro-Woolley." Could it have been the crew that dug out and graded the original Dollar Way? Or, judging from the oxen used, was it even earlier? We hope that a reader can identify some of the people for us.

      It was hard, smooth and lovely to drive over
      Sometime back a person dedicated to the preservation of Skagit County history expressed curiosity as to the origin of the name "Dollar Way" for this bit of highway between Sedro-Woolley and Burlington.
      Walking the old memory (and if I'm wrong I will hear about it), it was something like this. Previous to the opening of the electric interurban line in 1912, connecting Sedro-Woolley, Burlington, Mount Vernon and Bellingham, officially known as the Northwest Traction Company, the builders were busy securing a right of way.
      At this time the county road ran from Sedro-Woolley along the northerly side of the Great Northern track to Sterling where it turned south and followed along the high ground not far from the Skagit River in Burlington.
      The Northwest Traction Company wanted the county road right-of-way from Sedro-Woolley to Sterling for their line and offered in exchange to build a paved road alongside and northerly of their railroad grade to about the Sterling Cut-off. This appealed to the county commissioners and they made the trade.
      Now old-timers used to graveled or plain mud roads were thrilled with this modern marvel. Cement of sorts is as old as the Romans, but it hadn't caught on much in our vicinity. Up to this time, filling an impassable mudhole with rocks and gravel had been considered a project of some magnitude.
      This new, solid, hard surfaced road stirred up a lot of conjecture concerning building expense — "Must have cost a million dollars" — "Thy paved it with dollars." Soon it was being called the "Dollar Way" and this name clung until the road was straightened and improved. Bits of it can still be seen out near Scotty's Café [now the Buzz Inn].
      People came from far and near just to drive their Model-T's over it. Nary a bump or chuck hole. Incredible.
      The present road between Sedro-Woolley and Burlington, a section of Highway 20, now occupies what was the interurban grade until sometime in the 1930s. The old station at Sedro-Woolley still stands and what appears to be some of the original steel is extant. It has been under consideration as the western terminus of the tourist steam train to Concrete over which Old Number 6, from the defunct Seattle City Light line often called the "Toonerville Trolley" from Rockport to Diablo, will pull the coaches.
      The old depot at Burlington served as an office for Puget Power for a long time and was still there (the last time I looked). Except for the general vicinity, I can't remember exactly where the stations at Bellingham and Mount Vernon were, though I was there many times.
      It is a fact that there were earlier miles of hard surfaced roads and streets, but they were composed of sawed wooden planks or puncheon split from cedar logs. On Metcalf street in Sedro-Woolley there was a bricked area adjacent to the Great Northern station [north of the present Gateway Hotel parking lot] to expedite the heavy traffic of loading and uploading freight.
      Before this was done it was a bog hole in wet weather. I can still remember the elephants pushing the wagons through the mud when the circus came to town. But as far as the writer knows, the dollar Way was the first cement road in the county, [even] if it was only a mile long. Klahowya.

• List of all stories in this issue about the Stone & Webster Interurban, with links and suggestions for further reading.
  
• We transcribe an article from a 1913 issue of the Mount Vernon Argus that detailed the route of the Interurban. And more Journal research about the birth and demise of the line.
  
• Help us identify mystery photos and caption them, and submit scans of your own photos for Paul Dorpat's new Washington book and our updated Mystery Photos section. Chapter One features Chuckanut drive, the Interurban and Great Northern.
  
• A 1982 article about Andy Loft, "Mr. Interurban," who worked for the company for four decades and spent his retirement decades teaching groups, schools and businesses about the importance of the line.
  
• A schedule for interurban depots and stops and the mileage in between them. Story of the first day of operation in 1912, schedules for the trains and locations of the depots.
  
• Transcripts of newspaper stories from 1906-11 about the planning and construction of the Interurban.
  
• Dollar Way in Sedro-Woolley, the first paved highway in the county, which Stone & Webster built as a demonstration project to earn the right of way for the Interurban.
  

• Warren Wing. To Seattle by Trolley. Edmonds, Washington: Pacific Fast Mail, 1988. Wing is one of our favorite authors. His research and citation is impeccable, his selection of photos and presentation of them enhance the text and he has both a sense of place and time. His research and reference to little known people who made their mark is illustrated in this example: "We are all familiar with the inventions of Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell. Yet Frank Sprague, who was their equal, is virtually unknown. Sprague was both an engaging person and an authentic genius. Besides perfecting the electric streetcar his other inventions included the system of multiple unit control that allowed elevated and subway trains to be controlled from a single cab, and the high speed elevator. The reason his name is not as well known today is that the sold his patents to Westinghouse, Otis Elevator and others, he did not insist that his name be associated with the final product. The building of modern skyscrapers, subways and light rail systems would have been impossible without his inventions."
  
• Daniel E. Turbeville III. The Electric Railway Era in Northwest Washington, 1890-1930. Bellingham: Center for Pacific Northwest Studies (WWU) Occasional Paper No. 12, 1979. Turbeville is an Oregon native who received an M.A. in geography from Western Washington University in 1976. He served as map curator at Western and worked with James Scott of the CPNW to produce the Illustrated Inventory of Historic Bellingham Buildings, 1852-1915. His book on the Interurban is a very important resource that we consult several times a month.
  
• William D. Middleton. The Interurban Era. Born in Davenport Iowa, the grandson of the first chief surgeon of the Rock Island Lines, Mr. Middleton is a 1950 engineering graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and did graduate work in engineering and journalism at the University of Wisconsin and then was an engineering officer in the U.S. Navy. He retired in 1993 and lives in Charlottesville Virginia. He has written several books on this topic: The Time of the Trolley (1967), When the Steam Railroads Electrified (1974), From Bullets to BART and The Last Interurbans.
  

You can read the history websites about our prime sponsors: Allelujah Business Systems/Copies/Mailbox, 133-B State St., Sedro-Woolley, 360 855-1157 Preserve your family keepsakes . . . allcopiersystems web page Schooner Tavern/Cocktails at 621 Metcalf street in downtown Sedro-Woolley, across from Hammer Square: www.schoonerwoolley.com web page . . . History of bar and building Oliver Hammer Clothes Shop at 817 Metcalf street in downtown Sedro-Woolley, 82 years. Joy's Sedro-Woolley Bakery-Cafe at 823 Metcalf street in downtown Sedro-Woolley, 82 years. Heirloom Gardens Natural Foods at 805B Metcalf street, the original home of Oliver Hammer. Check out Sedro-Woolley First for links to all stories and reasons to shop here first or make this your destination on your visit or vacation. Would you like to buy a country church, pews, belfry, pastor's quarters and all? Email us for details. DelNagro Masonry Brick, block, stone — See our work at the new Hammer Heritage Square See our website www.4bricklayers.com

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