Historically, Kenmore slaked the thirst of travelers

By BRUCE RAMSEY
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Like any town, Kenmore has its historical roots.

Bee Engel arrived in Kenmore in 1933 as part of a program called Back to the Earth promoted by the country's new president, Franklin Roosevelt. Her father, Albert Bennett, worked for the Works Progress Administration for $55 a month. His and about 40 other families were given stump land and lumber, and they built houses covered with tar paper. Her house was 24 feet by 24 feet and had no electricity, water or sewer.

"It was six of us who lived in it," Engel says.

When the WPA money ran out, the families got vouchers. Their neighborhood, between 55th and 61st Avenues Northeast, and Northeast 193rd Street to the county line, was derisively dubbed "Voucherville."

At 17, Bee married a construction worker. Her dad gave them an old hen house for lumber, which they used to build a home. Now 78, Engel says, "I'm still living in it. I've lived in this same house since 1941."

Arlene Torell, born in Kenmore in 1936, was part of the extended Telquist family of grandfather, grandmother, 14 aunts and uncles, and 20 cousins all on the same street. "I still live on the same street," she says.

In Kenmore you can find stories like those, but they are not typical. Ask Arlene Torell how much has changed and she says, "It's changed in every way."

"Some of the buildings are there, but they're all something different," she says.

Kenmore has melded into greater Seattle. "You go to Safeway now and you don't know anybody," she says.

Kenmore was named by John McMaster, its first businessman. McMaster bought a shingle mill in Bothell and moved it to the north end of Lake Washington in 1905. He called the place Kenmore after his hometown of Kenmore, Ontario, which in turn was named after Kenmore on the shores of Loch Tay in the Scottish Highlands.

Kenmore had been on the Seattle, Lake Shore & Eastern Railroad (now the Burke-Gilman Trail) since 1888, but it didn't get a road to Seattle until the completion of Bothell Way in 1913. Bothell Way was red brick, laid by Italian immigrants.

Bob Bannister, who was fire chief for many years, grew up along Bothell Way where the Seafirst Bank is now. He saw lots of road accidents; he used to hang out and watch for them. He says with a twinkle, "When it got wet, those bricks were slicker 'n hell."

Until 1928, when state Route 99 opened to Everett, Bothell Way was part of the main highway north. Along it sprouted roadhouses, which were places for eating, dancing and, between 1917 and 1933, for violating the Prohibition law.

The most-remembered of these cocktail dispensaries was The Blind Pig, where Kenmore Air Harbor is now. Seattle people, throats parched, would arrived by steamer from Madison Park. That was generally far enough away from Prohibition agents, and if not, the evidence could quickly be poured into Lake Washington.

Priscilla Drogue, the town's unofficial historian, says lots of stills operated in the woods during Prohibition. And lots of folks, including her parents, made homemade beer. "After 1933," when prohibition ended, she says, "Mother would use the bottles for grape juice."

From the '20s through '40s, Kenmore also became known for eateries. There was Eula's Beef Bar, the Chowder Bowl, which ran 24 hours a day, and My Southern Home, which served chicken on toast for 50 cents. At 61st and Bothell Way was The Cat's Whiskers, which was known for blackberry pie. The owners used to pay kids 50 cents a coffee can for blackberries -- but only the small, wild berries.

In the 1930s Kenmore had at least one nudist colony -- "or so the story goes," Drogue says.

The development of today's Kenmore really began in the late 1940s.

In 1946, Pan Am mechanic Robert Munro started Kenmore Air Harbor, now the largest seaplane base in the United States -- and still run by three generations of the Munro family. In 1953, Ralph Swanson and three fraternity brothers started Plywood Supply, still run by Swanson, 71, and son Don, 39. In 1960, Earl Davidson, with sons Chip and Ed, started Davidson's Marina, which co-owner Chip Davidson says is "the only public facility in the North End that provides access to the water and services to boat owners."

Kenmore's harbor has seen a world of change since the log drives on the Sammamish Slough peaked in 1910. Where the marina is located once was a fishing resort; the owner kept the fish near his customers, Davidson says, by "salting" the lake with beef bones from a Bothell butcher shop.

Even into the 1960s, the harbor still had a railroad pier for the loading of barges. This pier was long enough for 11 rail cars. In 1965, workers rolled out a 12th, whereupon the first, loaded with logs, plunged into the lake. This error was never publicly admitted, but historian Drogue says it can be verified by searching the bottom of Lake Washington.

By the 1950s, suburbia had arrived, and Kenmore began changing again. The first homes were sold in Uplake in 1954. The first library opened in 1958, the first shopping center, Kenmore Village, in 1961, and the high school, Inglemoor, in 1965.

Pam Vaughn, 40, remembers high school life in the 1970s.

"There was a major rivalry between Inglemoor and Bothell high schools," she says, especially around football games.

Bothell's mascot was a cougar -- a real one, stuffed.

"One time," she says, "my sister's class stole it and shaved it."

Social life then centered on the Kenmore Drive-In (where the Metro Park & Ride is now) and Mike's Burger Bar, then the only fast-food restaurant.

"It was a really big deal for us teenagers when Herfy's came in," she says.