Port Blakely by Bookhouse Group

A True and Lasting Legacy

A True and Lasting Legacy History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It By Russ Banham

A True and Lasting Legacy Editorial Director .............................................................Rob Levin Managing Editor .................................................... Sarah E. Fedota Port Blakely Companies Liaison............................Charlotte Lamp Publisher.........................................................................Barry Levin Chief Operating Officer .............................................. Renée Peyton Author..........................................................................Russ Banham Design .......................................................................... Laurie Porter Copyediting and Indexing .................................................Bob Land Bookhouse Group gratefully acknowledges Port Blakely Companies book committee: Eddy Ancinas, René Ancinas, Tantsie Eddy, Thea Engesser, Charlotte Lamp, Bruce Lemire-Elmore, and Jim Warjone. We also offer special thanks to John Warjone. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from Port Blakely Companies.

About the Author Russ Banham is the author of twenty-one books, including the international best-seller The Ford Century, translated into thirteen languages; The Fight for Fairfax, a political and economic history of Fairfax County, Virginia; Wanderlust, which profiles his journeys in an Airstream travel trailer; and Rocky Mountain Legend, his best-selling chronicle of the Coors brewing dynasty. He writes regularly for the Wall Street Journal, CFO, Chief Executive, and other business publications.

Book Development by: Bookhouse Group, Inc. Atlanta, Georgia www.bookhouse.net

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TOC

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Contents Epigraph............................................................................... 9 Chapter 1— “Always Do the Right Thing”...........................12 Chapter 2— Grit and Tenacity..............................................18 Chapter 3 — A Fine Deal......................................................48 Chapter 4 — Building Tomorrow’s Company......................70 Chapter 5 — A New Era......................................................96 Chapter 6 — Forward-Thinking Company.........................118 Chapter 7— PBTF—A Modern Organization....................140 Chapter 8 — A Second Working Circle..............................164 Chapter 9 — Expertise and Excellence...............................190 Chapter 10 — Bright Futures..............................................210 Index...................................................................................224 Photo Credits.....................................................................240 Chapter Title here

PBC0190

By 2010, the Family Gathering had grown significantly. At this particular gathering in a Bellevue, Washington, hotel, the attendees were there to recognize Jim Warjone upon his retirement and to usher in RenĂŠ Ancinas as the new chief executive officer.

“

e have proven that we can behave

as stewards of the land we own [and that] we will take better care of this land than others might. This is meaningful, and it comes directly from the values of the family— values that have been passed down from one generation to the next. This is our true and lasting legacy.” —René Ancinas Chief Executive Officer Port Blakely Companies

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Pacific Lumber and Shipping, founded in 1932, exports from five locations, including this one in Longview, Washington.

Chapter

“Always

Do the Right Thing”

Port Blakely Companies today is as much in the species preservation business as it is in the forestry business.

Entrepreneurial spirit is at the heart of the American family-owned company. From the seeds of one person’s inspiration, work ethic, and tenacity, a business sprouts. Through continuing innovation and effort, the next generation carefully tends the enterprise through its next growth phases. Successive generations further cultivate the company, making it hardier and more resilient. If only this archetype was the established pattern—the truth is very few family-owned companies thrive, and indeed, most wither on the vine. Port Blakely Tree Farms, in all its figurative root forms, is among the few that have thrived. Since 1832 the Eddy family, one of the pioneering families of America, has nurtured its birthright. The family business that began in the forests of Maine is one of the most successful family-owned timber companies in the world today. From its humble beginnings, Port Blakely Tree Farms has amassed 214,000 productive acres of forestlands, of which 72,000 acres are in New Zealand. In the United States the Eddy family is ranked fifty-first in terms of land ownership. It considers itself a steward of its timberlands, vigilantly managing this property for others’ beneficial use, from humans to the diverse species populating the forests. As the timber industry has evolved, Port Blakely Tree Farms has been at the leading edge of this progression. The company is widely considered a leader in sustainable forestry practices that balance the human need for wood products with the

“Always Do The Right Thing”

Four-masted ships were a common and beautiful sight in Blakely Harbor at the turn of the twentieth century.

protection of the creatures living among the trees. Port Blakely Tree Farms has long been acknowledged for its open, fair, and balanced dealings with industry regulators and environmental organizations, setting an example for the industry in how to strategically manage a timber company for long-term benefit. Port Blakely Tree Farms has enjoyed a long and colorful history in milling and shipping, and since it has always been in the landowning business it also became a major developer of real estate in the Pacific Northwest. Many vibrant communities have sprung from the ground thanks to the company’s ingenuity, capital, and spadework, among them the first environmentally sustainable, large-scale “urban village” in the Pacific Northwest—Issaquah Highlands. Today, this community is a veritable city, yet it retains the spirit of small-town America that inspired it. Peering back through the company’s long history offers examples, time and again, of courage through adversity,

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

By the end of the twentieth century, Port Blakely Communities had become one of the Pacific Northwest’s top real estate developers. On the right is Jim Berger, the company’s senior construction manager.

Issaquah Highlands’ natural setting offers a backdrop for both tranquility and activity.

of seemingly insurmountable challenges overcome by

Jim Warjone. Yet this dictum might have been coined nearly 180

entrepreneurial gumption and zest, and of novel ideas pushing

years ago when the Eddy family first discovered its purpose in

the envelope of possibility. Port Blakely Tree Farms shares

the forests of Maine.

extraordinary milestones with the history of the United States.

Thanks to the unimpeachable character of its leaders, Port

It has provided inestimable value to the American people

Blakely Tree Farms has never been a follower. It generally

through periods of economic growth and distress, and even war.

grows trees for much longer durations than the rest of the

Through it all, this great forestry family's leaders hewed

industry, producing higher-quality wood. It is a guardian of its

tightly to their ideals of honor and integrity. Among its guiding

forestlands, harvesting only two trees per year out of every one

maxims today is “Always do the right thing,” a statement from

hundred trees it owns. Ninety-eight percent of the trees are left

“Always Do The Right Thing”

to grow, guaranteeing vital forest products for generations to come. The company leads the industry in commercial thinning practices, many that it pioneered. Following a harvest, Port Blakely Tree Farms typically plants 530 trees per acre with seedlings that it has grown in nurseries with specific genetic attributes to produce the finest trees. Significantly, one of its many leaders created and initially funded the countryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s premier forestry genetics research institution. Certainly, this all could have turned out differently. Like many family companies, Port Blakely Tree Farms might have survived a couple generations before splintering and vanishing into the dustbin of history. It held together, sometimes with great difficulty, for a single reasonâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the legacy of its meaningful purpose and the deep feelings of satisfaction and pride this heritage has inspired in the multigenerational Eddy family.

Within Issaquah Highlands is a series of neighborhoods, each with a range of amenities appealing to residents, such as this pocket park and playground.

This is their story. Fittingly, it begins a scant four decades after George Washington became the first president of the United States. The country was in its infancy, seeking its own meaning and purpose. Jonathan Eddy was on the same quest. u

It held together, sometimes with great difficulty, for a single reasonâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the legacy of its meaningful purpose and the deep feelings of satisfaction and pride this heritage has inspired in the multigenerational

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Eddy family.

Port Blakely Tree Farms leads the way in sustainable practices. At a nursery that grows seedlings under contract for Port Blakely, Chris Whitson, a Port Blakely Tree Farms forester, inspects the trees.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;Always Do The Right Thingâ&#x20AC;?

Chapter

The image depicts a horse-drawn logging sled for hauling on snow and ice in Michiganâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s abundant forestlands.

Grit and Tenacity

In 1832 America brimmed with pride and confidence. Having won a second war of independence, its eminence was now secure. The new Erie Canal linking the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes promised a flourishing maritime commerce, and the nation’s first steam locomotive, the four-wheel Tom Thumb, offered the potential of an interlinked national economy. The future beamed bright. This optimistic spirit pervaded the small but fast-growing lumber town of Bangor, Maine, which lay along the Penobscot River in the southern part of Penobscot County. More than three hundred sawmills buzzed and whirred within Bangor’s thirty-four square miles, and local officials proclaimed it the “undisputed lumber capital of the world.” The Abenaki Indians centuries earlier had coined the word “penobscot” to express the “whitening of the sky before dawn.” The tribe was prescient; white pine sawdust now floated in the air, working its way into every nook and cranny. Geography set the stage for Bangor’s lumber boom. Maine’s forests were wild and nearly unbroken, and the mighty Penobscot River and its tributaries penetrated these woodlands in every direction, offering the means to convey the harvested (Top) The Selwyn Eddy home, pictured in 1886, was an outstanding example of Victorian architecture in Bay City, Michigan. (Bottom) A Blackman geared-steam locomotive, manufactured by Washington-based Blackman Brothers in the 1880s, designed to run on log rails and haul logs to a mill or waterway.

timber to the city’s mills. With a natural harbor deep enough at seventeen feet to accommodate the largest vessels of the day, Bangor could ship lumber anywhere in the world. When Jonathan Eddy entered the timber business in 1832, the mills were cutting more than 37 million board feet of

Grit and Tenacity

The lumber boomtown of Bangor, Maine, in the 1850s, where Jonathan Eddy built the first of several Eddy family enterprises. The city’s mills processed a seemingly never-ending supply of timber in northern Maine’s woods.

lumber annually, much of it destined for the big, growing cities

of thousands to Europe. Not that all the wood left for parts

of Portland, Boston, and New York. Some was sent farther

elsewhere— from the bountiful supply, Bangor’s more affluent

down the Penobscot to the towns of Winterport and Belfast,

citizens erected stately manors along Broadway and State

where fast-sailing schooners were fashioned from the wood.

streets.

The vessels carried pine boards to the West Indies, where they

The first sawmill in Bangor had been built in 1772, when

were exchanged for molasses, sugar, and rum, and a brisk trade

the city was known as Sunbury. While Maine was too far north

also burgeoned with the United Kingdom and Europe. Along

and too cold to attract settlers intent on farming, the same

the shores of the Penobscot, artisans fashioned barrels and

conditions made it ideal for lumbering. From late fall to winter

fruit boxes called shooks that were shipped by the hundreds

when the ground was frozen, lumberjacks felled the trees,

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The Eddy family in America enjoys a long and intricate lineage hailing back

The Other Eddys

to the formative years of the country. As anyone who has attempted a

genealogical search well knows, multiple family generations, marriages,

been members of the tragic Donner Party led by George Donner in 1846.

and births create a complicated family web. Over the course of a hundred

En route to California on a wagon, the hopeful settlers were snowbound in

years, it could easily involve literally hundreds of family members.

the Sierra Nevada for the winter. Only half the original party of eighty-nine

people survived to reach the destination. Among the survivors was William

In the case of the Eddy family, several three-inch-thick volumes trace

Among other Eddys lost to time are some distant relatives said to have

its long heritage. Not all of the Eddys were famous, but as it turns out many

Eddy, whose wife and children perished from starvation that long, hard

led quite remarkable lives. Take Millard Fillmore, the thirteenth president

winter. u

of the United States. Fillmore was the great-grandson of Hannah Eddy and Robert Millard. Hannah was the daughter of Eleazar Eddy, who was the sixth child of John Eddy, who emigrated from England to Plymouth, Massachusetts, around 1630—a veritable Pilgrim.

Other interesting family members, though less important historically,

include Charles K. Eddy, born in 1820 and the president of C. K. Eddy & Son, manufacturers of lumber and salt in Saginaw, Michigan. A greatgrandson of Revolutionary War hero Colonel Jonathan Eddy, Charles followed the lumber business from Maine to Michigan, and built a stateof-the-art sawmill of impressive proportions. He struck it so big that his obituary in 1900 stated, “Perhaps no other fortune has done so much for the City of Saginaw as has the Eddy fortune.”

Selwyn Eddy found his fortune in Bay City, Michigan. The son of

Jonathan Eddy’s cousin—and also a onetime partner, Edwin Eddy— branched off to create Pacific Lumber Company, a major logging and sawmill business in San Francisco managed by his son, also named Edwin. Selwyn eventually ended up owning more than sixty-five thousand acres of redwood trees in California’s Humboldt County.

Other notable Eddys include Ezra Butler Eddy, part of the Canadian

branch of the family, who built several successful businesses in Hull, Quebec, manufacturing friction matches, sashes, washboards, and paper and pulp. The Eddy Match Company still manufactures matches today. Caleb Eddy was a Bostonian who is remembered for single-handedly saving the Middlesex Canal as a source of water for the city’s residents. Mary Baker Eddy, founder of the Christian Science religion, is another distant relative, as is the singer Nelson Eddy. A pine forest in Michigan’s Saginaw Valley in the nineteenth century.

Grit and Tenacity

taking advantage of the deep snows which made it less complicated for their horse-drawn sleighs to slide the stripped tree trunks to the banks of the frozen Penobscot and its tributaries. On a steep descent down a hill, the lumberjacks hitched the sleigh to a device called a snubber, a thick rope that was played out slowly around a stump to slow its progress. When the river thawed and the ice broke, another group of workers— the rivermen or drivers—dislodged, jacked, and rolled the piles of logs into the Penobscot’s raging torrents. Mammoth spruce and white pine logs floated incessantly down the river, the water so jammed with timber a driver could literally walk from one bank to the other, and not get his feet wet. To turn logs

in the unruly river. Those who survived were dubbed “Bangor

caught in a logjam, the rivermen used primitive wooden poles

Tigers,” an accolade recognizing a man’s dexterity in a logjam as

called cant hooks and swing dingles, until a Maine blacksmith

much as his pugilistic skills in a barroom.

invented his eponymous peavey in the 1850s. Five to six feet

Once the floating logs finished their crowded journey to

in length, the pole had a sharp spike on the end adjoining an

Bangor, they were sorted by which company owned them,

adjustable steel hook that permitted clasping. The novel tool

and assembled in booms. Booms were groups of floating logs

revolutionized the industry and is still in use today.

that were contained inside a closed loop of boom logs, which

Breaking a logjam was exciting dangerous work that could

Beginning in the 1700s, Maine’s Penobscot River was a waterway made for logs as they floated toward the Bangor mills. Ware Eddy and his son Jonathan knew its twists and turns, the money it could produce for them, and the dangers for lumberjacks lurking within.

were linked together to provide a flexible floating fence. These

take days and even weeks. The objective was to find and redirect

booms could be towed by boat to their destination often

the errant king log that locked up the flow. When discovered,

with a second boat steering from the rear. Each log end had

the cry “Break her loose!” would echo down the Penobscot. The

been branded with a hammer with raised letters, numbers,

rivermen’s spiked boots, called caulks, helped prevent falling off

or symbols that left a special design called a log mark to

a log during the exercise, though many a driver met his maker

distinguish its ownership.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The logs were cut into planks of different dimensions by

he was given the rank of colonel and bequeathed a large land

powerful gang saws equipped with multiple blades to make

grant on the east side of the Penobscot River, subsequently

several parallel cuts simultaneously. The productive saws were

named Eddytown, and later Eddington. He became a successful

driven by steam or powered by water wheels in the Penobscot

farmer and dabbled on the side in the timber trade, as did his

itself, which rushed at a rate of two thousand cubic feet of

son Ibrook.

water per second.

The farming life was not for the modern-day Jonathan

In the 1830s, few jobs were as stimulating

Eddy, however. Like many young men he sought

or as uplifting as those in the timber trade.

adventure and wanted to make his own mark on

“Lumberjacks,” an 1856 article in Outdoor

the world—and that world was covered in

Life reported, “have a passion for their

timber. In 1832 he joined with two other

wild and toilsome life.”

partners in forming Turner, Levensaler

Jonathan Eddy well knew the tug

and Eddy, a logging company that

of the profession, its physical and

operated a mill in Old Town and

emotional rewards. He had toiled

maintained a sales office and

for several seasons as a river driver,

lumberyard in Bangor. He was in the

rafting lumber down the Penobscot

right industry in the right place at the

from Old Town to Bangor. Hard

right time.

work was an inheritance from his

forebears. Jonathan was born in 1811 in

the northern states in the early 1830s

Penobscot County. His father, Ware Eddy,

were being built with white pine from the

was a farmer, working the land handed

Penobscot basin, which provided 81,820,000

down by his grandfather, the famous Colonel Jonathan Eddy. Jonathan was named for his great-grandfather, whom many people said he resembled.

Three-quarters of the houses in

board feet of lumber in 1834—more than Farmer Ware Eddy was the father of Jonathan Eddy, who would lead the Eddy family into the timber business in 1832, an industry it has served ever since.

The older Jonathan was a hero of the

where he and his family had settled. In leading the attack on

and sold at a record twenty-four dollars per board foot. A gold rush in timber terms erupted, and Bangor’s population surged from

Revolutionary War, heading what later became known as the Eddy Rebellion in Nova Scotia, Canada,

double the volume of just a few years earlier—

2,808 people in 1830 to more than 8,000 people four years later. A range of enterprises sprang up to serve the booming

British forces at the Bay of Fundy, he had personally sought aid

industry, including iron and brass foundries, brickyards,

from General George Washington. As a reward for his services,

machine shops, belting and boiler factories, and carriage

Grit and Tenacity

makers. Other businesses like taverns, grog shops, and brothels in the part of Bangor colloquially called the “Devil’s Half-Acre” catered to the less reputable pursuits of the lumberjacks, rivermen, deepwater sailors, and boat builders as they

to splurge. “The men of our lumbering camps . . . come out

Before the decade ended, Jonathan parted company

in spring as hearty as bucks,” The Bangor Whig and Courier

with his former associates

descended upon the city in springtime, their traveling sacks— or turkeys, as they called them—stashed with pay stakes ready

reported about the seasonal population. “Our streets begin to be thronged with athletic young men [in] bright red shirts.” Before the decade ended, Jonathan parted company with his former associates and formed a new lumber operation later known as Eddy, Murphy and Company. Jonathan owned half the company; his partners included his cousin, Edwin Eddy; his brother Darius; and his brothers-in-law, Newell and Sewall Avery. Newell and Sewall were married to Jonathan’s sisters, Nancy Clapp Eddy and Eliza Holland Eddy, respectively. Both men had grown up on a farm in Maine and had worked in Penobscot sawmills. Their father also was a lumberman. A sixth partner, Simon J. Murphy, came on board in 1846. The grandson of Irish and Scottish immigrants, Murphy had fifteen years experience in the Penobscot timber trade, starting at the age of fourteen. More than business was on Jonathan’s mind, however. He had fallen in love. Caroline Bailey was eight years younger, and was recalled as a woman of strong character, kindhearted, generous, energetic, and patient. The couple married and built a house in Bradley, near Old Town, where their first child, Laura, was born in 1840. Two more daughters and two sons followed. The youngest of the boys, John Franklin Eddy, was born in 1848 and was known as Frank. While Jonathan tended

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

and formed a new lumber operation later known as

Eddy, Murphy and Company.

(Above) Bangorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Universalist Church two years after its dedication in 1860. Jonathan and Caroline Eddy were leading members and major benefactors of the church, the primary institution in the city decrying the horrors of slavery. (Left) The Eddy family house in Bangor, not far from Main Street, where today a thirty-one-foot tall statue of the mythological lumberjack Paul Bunyan testifies to the cityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s past as a timber boomtown.

Grit and Tenacity

to his business, Caroline managed the household and growing family; another

center hall winding up to the second and third stories, the house was indeed an anomaly—one soon copied by Bangor’s

1850s, Charles Fremont

other budding industrialists.

Eddy. As his business thrived, Jonathan relocated the family in 1848 to Bangor,

The Eddys became part of the city’s upper class just as it was forming. Many older people in the city, recognizing Jonathan’s resemblance to his famous namesake, had begun calling him Colonel, though he had no military experience. His tireless public service certainly made him deserving of the

where Eddy, Murphy and

honorific. He was a board director of two banks, Bangor First

Company had established

National and the Mercantile. And he was also a leading member

headquarters at 36 Exchange

and major benefactor of the city’s Universalist Church in Center

Street in the city’s bustling

Park, serving on a committee that raised money to build a new

central business district. The

six-hundred-person-capacity church across the street from the

Avery brothers spent most of

existing one. The new church, dedicated in December 1860,

their time cruising new timber stands and overseeing logging

was the foremost critic in Bangor of the horrific institution of

operations, while Jonathan attended to sales at the office. The

slavery, decried at the pulpit virtually every Sunday.

company “grew steadily under masterful management and

It was disturbingly obvious to Bangor’s lumbermen that

untiring labor, until few if any lumbering firms in the United

the vast forests of Maine were being depleted. In the 1840s

States equaled it either in the volume or profit of its business,”

Jonathan had sent Caroline’s brothers Mark and Amos Bailey

the Magazine of Western History reported.

to Michigan to scout out and acquire promising timberlands.

Bangor also grew, reaching a population of 14,432 in 1850,

Michigan, like Maine, lay in the great northern pine belt, but

when it was ranked as the country’s ninth most active seaport.

unlike Maine its abundant forests were still largely intact. The

Three years later, in 1853, Jonathan and Caroline bought an

Bailey brothers purchased several tracts at the juncture of the

abandoned schoolhouse with a large lot at 89 State Street on

Pine and St. Clair rivers. In the early 1850s, Newell Avery was

the corner of Boyd Street. With the intent of building a new

sent to examine these parcels and report his findings.

home, the couple hired local architect Darius Lawrence to

twelve-foot ceilings on the first floor, and a stairway in the

two sons were born in the Eddy and Newell Avery

Bay City’s great lumberman John Franklin Eddy owned many businesses in his adopted hometown. By the mid-1880s Frank had amassed considerable wealth—capital that would assist the acquisition of the world’s largest sawmill in Port Blakely, Washington.

by a mansard roof—then a novelty. With marble chimneys,

When Newell returned east, he urged his partners to make

design a house that would be different from other homes.

additional investments in the high-quality pine forests of the

Lawrence devised a splendid Italianate mansion made of dark

Saginaw Valley in Michigan’s lower peninsula. He noted that the

and light colored bricks laid on a granite foundation and topped

estuary of the Saginaw River was navigable to large schooners

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

A felled log awaits greasing for skidding by oxen to Michiganâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s tributaries, where the logs will be rafted to one of the Saginaw Valleyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s sawmills.

Grit and Tenacity

Party in Jackson to oppose the spread of slavery. A famous painting of the event, Under the Oaks, depicts a large group of abolitionists congregating in the shade of an oak grove. Seven years later, the Civil War erupted, cleaving the union in two. Jonathan was in his fifties, in an era when men were fortunate to live that long. Although tantalized by the opportunities, he decided to remain in Bangor and let Newell oversee the company’s holdings in Michigan. At one point, he considered dissolving the company altogether and letting each partner go his own way. Instead he reorganized the enterprise and changed its name to Eddy, Avery and Murphy, in recognition of Newell’s expanded responsibilities. Each man held a one-third interest in the new company. In 1864 Newell returned to Maine for medical care, and Simon Murphy took charge in Michigan. The arrangement The John F. Eddy, one of many ships owned by Eddy Transportation Company and named for a member of the Eddy family. By 1898, the company comprised a significant fleet of tugs, barges, steamers, and schooners.

Jonathan was walking down State Street after tea at home, enroute to hear news regarding the war with the South, he

bound for the Great Lakes ports of Detroit and Chicago, each

collapsed and died, the victim of an apparent heart attack. He

with significant rail links. The river frontage was solid, offering

was fifty-four years old. The Whig and Courier reported that

a prime foundation for sawmills, and its tributaries and their

he had not felt well for several days. “About seven o’clock last

many branches presented the means to float logs to the mills

evening, Col. Jonathan Eddy, one of our wealthiest and most

from virtually all directions. In many respects, Michigan was

respected lumbermen, fell dead,” the newspaper stated. “Col.

the new Maine, with white pine trees reputedly as tall as two

Eddy was an honorable business man, an excellent citizen, and

hundred feet, and trunks as wide as seven feet in diameter.

leaves a large circle of friends to mourn his untimely death.”

Shortly after delivering this report, Newell relocated

Caroline outlived Jonathan by many years, passing away in

to Michigan to open the western office of Eddy, Murphy & Company, settling first in Port Huron and then in St. Clair. In

did not last long. On August 24 of the following year, while

1897 at the age of seventy-eight. The company dissolved following Jonathan’s passing. His

succeeding years, he established four sawmills in the Saginaw

cousin, Edwin Eddy, who handled his estate, sold the lumber

Valley. Newell also was a witness to history, attending as

interests in Maine. Edwin subsequently moved to Michigan’s

a delegate the founding on July 6, 1854, of the Republican

Bay City, on the shore of Lake Huron’s Saginaw Bay, to manage

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

John of Taunton

The origins of the Eddy family in America begin with Pilgrims John and Samuel Eddy, the sons of the Vicar William Eddy of Cranbrook, England, who traveled across the Atlantic in 1630 aboard the Handmaiden, only ten years after the Mayflower landed at the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts. What is unknown is whether this branch of the family tree is related to the Eddys of Port Blakely Companies.

Another Eddy, John Eddy, knew both brothers well, having

spent time with them as a youth, and may have been related to them. He came shortly after they did to America and settled in Oxen were the primary means of conveying logs from the forests to rail lines for delivery to Bay City mills in this photograph of Saginaw Valley loggers.

Taunton, where he found work as a carpenter building houses.

While the brothers’ ancestry can be traced back several

generations in England, this John Eddy left no records of his birth, parents, or other relatives. Some historians have surmised that

the four steam-operated mills that Newell had established.

he might have been the son of Zacharias Eddy, Samuel and John’s

Bay City was four miles from the terminus of the powerful

brother. In any event, John of Taunton is the first generation of the

Saginaw River that emptied into the bay. Newell also moved

Port Blakely Eddys, the great-great-great-grandfather of Jonathan

to Michigan, where he joined Edwin in forming Eddy, Avery &

Eddy of Bangor, Maine.

Company. Simon Murphy followed to launch Avery & Murphy

in Detroit. Darius Eddy stayed in Maine and formed another

uncommon. Most families in the colony averaged five to six children

lumbering firm, Cutler and Eddy.

living under the same roof, and it was not uncommon for a single

Frank Eddy was seventeen years old when his father passed away. Despite Jonathan’s great financial success, Frank did not inherit a fortune. He was one of seven children, and Jonathan’s business interests first had to be split with his partners. Frank would have to invent his own future, but of one thing he was certain: he was a lumberman. In 1866 the new frontier of Michigan and its rich forestlands

John of Taunton had two wives and ten offspring. This was not

family to have grown children moving out before the mother had finished giving birth to the last child. John’s sixth child, Eleazar Eddy, also a carpenter, is the direct ancestor of Jonathan Eddy.

There is another connection between the first Eddy family

members in America and John Eddy of Taunton, other than their childhood escapades. John married Susanna Padduck, whose sister married one of the sons of Samuel Eddy. u

tugged Frank west to the Saginaw Valley, where he joined Edwin Eddy at the Bay City mill of Eddy, Avery & Company. Frank lodged at the new Fraser House Hotel that had just

Grit and Tenacity

This map of Bay City in 1867 lists several of the town’s major businesses, among them mills owned by the Eddy family.

opened at the corner of Center and Water streets. He must have marveled at the goings-on around him. An entire city was in the process of being built, street after street, block after block, building after building. An Indian trading post until 1836, Bay City was laid out as a town the following year. It became an incorporated city in 1865, the year before Frank arrived. America’s second timber boom resounded, as demand for lumber exploded in the growing cities of the Midwest. Next to cotton, wood was America’s highest-value product, used to make wagons, carriages, coaches, furniture, houses, ships, and railroad ties—to cite just a few applications. From 1840 to 1860 the number of mills operating in Michigan doubled, while the value of the lumber produced ascended from $1 million a year to $6 million. Dozens of mills lined the twenty-two-milelong Saginaw River, many utilizing the latest, most productive technologies, such as the steam-powered circular saw, which drove ever-greater capacity. Thirty years earlier, the Chippewa Indians had quietly cruised their canoes in the Saginaw River. From Frank’s

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

This map from 1884 cites several Eddy family sawmills in Bay City. In four years lumber production by the city’s mills would reach 451 million board feet. The same year, more than four billion feet of lumber was produced by all the mills along the Saginaw River.

vantage in Bay City this must have seemed prehistoric. An 1868

seven thousand board feet of lumber daily. Ten years later,

report describes the Saginaw at the time as “alive with craft of all

forty men operated two circular saws, processing thirty-six

kinds, large and small, steamships of a thousand tons and little

thousand board feet a day. Like other mills of the era, a variety

tug-boats, which dart up and down like their namesakes on the

of dimensional wood was cut, mostly boards but also staves,

Thames or in New York Harbor. . . . There are countless barges

shingles, shooks for boxes, pickets and laths, though the

and schooners. The seventy-seven sawmills along the banks

staves and shooks, a report from 1868 states, “were not to be

fill the air with their continual murmur. Great piles of lumber,

considered lumber proper.” Just two years after Frank joined

stacked upon the long wharves, rise from the water-side.”

Edwin at the mill—he later became the mill manager—more

By the end

than 8 million board

of the 1860s

feet of lumber were

Michigan was

produced in seven

the country’s top

months.

timber producer,

As the timber

with more than

trades flourished,

1.3 billion board

buildings in Bay

feet of lumber

City burst forth like

worth $23.5 million

mushrooms after

produced in 1867

a spring rain. “The

alone. In the

demand for business

Saginaw Valley that

places and dwelling

year, ninety-two

houses is greatly in

mills employing

excess of the supply,”

2,402 men were

the Bay City Journal

open for business.

Baseball was just one of many pastimes of Bay Citians in the mid-1880s. Check out the size of that bat!

Like Maine before it, Michigan now “ruled the world as lumber king,” author Leslie E. Arndt writes in his book By These Waters. Eddy, Avery & Company’s mill on Eleventh Street in Bay

warned. “Everywhere the streets are

blocked with new building materials.” The newspaper noted that twenty brick stores were “in various stages of completion” near Frank’s residence at the

City was situated on the east bank of the Saginaw River. It

Fraser House Hotel, all of them already leased. The hotel was

had been built in 1854, a decade before Newell purchased

the meeting place for Bay City’s politicians and merchants,

it. Back then ten men worked a single upright saw to cut

and Frank was in the thick of it all. He joined several business

Grit and Tenacity

groups and affiliations like the Masons and the I.K.U.K., the meaning of the acronym lost to the mists of history. In his spare off hours, he most likely enjoyed the hotel’s “theatricals and public entertainment,” as the Bay City Journal called the fare, presented in a ballroom/theater on the hotel’s upper level. He most definitely attended the nine-hundred-seat Westover Opera House, “the pride of northern Michigan,” erected in 1869 on the new Westover Block right across the street from the Fraser House Hotel. The tallest structure in Bay City, it also boasted domed and frescoed ceilings that made it the region’s most distinguished building. Such refined pursuits as the opera stood in contrast to Bay City’s less sophisticated amusements. Although Michigan was a “dry” state, saloons proliferated. Along the Saginaw River near Third Street, more than forty taverns within a radius of four hundred feet competed for business from the shanty boys (as the lumberjacks called themselves) and the river hogs (the rivermen driving logs down the Shiawassee, Pine, Chippewa, Tobacco, Tittabawasee, and other colorfully named rivers and streams). The men exhausted their pay stakes at local dance halls, whooping and hollering when the legendary “Queen of the Hoofers,” Kitty Leroy, shot an apple off a gambler’s head.

(Top) First National Bank is shown in this 1872 image of Bay City’s Westover Block. Not pictured is the Fraser House Hotel across the street where Frank Eddy resided upon his arrival to the boomtown. (Center and Bottom) The pride of Bay City—the Westover Opera House— burned to the ground in January 1886. Frank Eddy subsequently joined other prominent businessmen in raising money to rebuild the opera house. Thanks to their gallant efforts, eight months later it reopened as Wood’s Opera House.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The Eddy Rebellion

Arguably the most famous of all the Eddys was Colonel Jonathan Eddy, the

great-grandfather of Jonathan Eddy of Bangor, Maine. A farmer in Norton,

forces. They united with other small groups of men to capture a sloop in the Bay

Massachusetts, he volunteered in 1754 to fight in the French and Indian

of Fundy dispatched to deliver provisions to Fort Cumberland. They captured the

War.

sloop, commandeered the artillery, and then determined to take the fort itself.

A soldier carrying a white flag entered the fort and presented Colonel Eddy’s

Like other young men at the time—Jonathan was twenty-eight years

He then convinced a group of eighty other men to join him against the British

old—he wanted to help drive the French out of the North American

demands: “Surrender the Fort now under your Command to the Army sent

colonies for good. He was one of twenty-five hundred soldiers under the

under me by the United States of America,” the letter stated. It was signed,

command of Colonel John Winslow, rounding up more than two thousand

“Jona’n Eddy.”

French-speaking settlers in the province of Nova Scotia and putting them

on board ships bound for France—the Great Expulsion, it was called. In

fort with scaling ladders, and were forced to retreat by the vehemence of the

1758 now-Captain Jonathan Eddy and his wife, Mary Ware, the daughter of

French loyalists’ defense. The governor of Halifax subsequently placed a reward

a medical doctor, and their four children were invited to relocate to Nova

for the capture or killing of Colonel Jonathan Eddy. The following June, the

Scotia, as were another eight thousand residents of New England. Each

Massachusetts General Court sent a regiment to assist Jonathan and his “Nova

was provided 100 acres of farmland formerly owned by the French, plus an

Scotia Refugees.” The colonel and his militia of nearly five hundred men made

additional 50 acres per child. The Eddys received 350 acres in Cumberland

several attempts to besiege the fort—all of them unsuccessful. The British loyalists

free of rent for the next ten years, and thereafter at an expense of seven

ultimately repelled the militia, and Jonathan barely escaped with his life. The

shillings a year.

successful defeat of the invaders, from the Canadian point of view, is considered

an important milestone in the country’s history. Today, Fort Cumberland is a

In succeeding years Captain Eddy became a public figure in Nova

On November 12, 1776, Colonel Eddy and his fellow patriots stormed the

Scotia—elected provost marshal, sheriff, and then as a member of the

National Historic Site of Canada.

Nova Scotia Assembly in 1770. During this period he became an ardent

advocate of independence from Great Britain, identifying more with the

One of their sons, William, was killed during the war. The Commonwealth of

seditious colonists than with the Crown. This caused his dismissal from the

Massachusetts subsequently awarded Colonel Eddy and nineteen members of his

Assembly as a “rebble,” documents of the time reveal.

militia large grants of land along the Penobscot River in the District of Maine, for

their efforts during what came to be known as the Eddy Rebellion. Sixty-seven

In 1775 Captain Eddy and his likeminded friends quietly sought to

Eventually, Jonathan, Mary, and their children returned to Massachusetts.

make Nova Scotia the fourteenth rebel colony. Secret meetings were held

residents of Canada who aided the American revolutionary cause also were

with the objective of acquiring seats at the Second Continental Congress

provided land grants. The grant to Jonathan, at 1,280 acres, was among the largest

in Philadelphia. The following year, he and twelve other men signed a

awarded. At first this land was incorporated in 1811 as Eddytown and then finally

petition swearing their allegiance to General George Washington of the

Eddington. Jonathan never learned of the honor, having passed away peacefully at

United Colonies of America. That September, Captain Eddy went before

his home in 1804. u

the General Court of Massachusetts to plead his case for a brigade to lead in Cumberland against the British Army. He left with much-needed supplies and provisions, in addition to a new rank—colonel. Grit and Tenacity

Some took in baser entertainments at the White Row or the

10,722 barrels of salt that year, each barrel weighing 280

Catacombs, places of ill repute for those seeking the “sporting

pounds. By the 1880s, half the salt in America was produced in

life.” As for Frank, he was more apt to sit in a Universalist

the Saginaw Valley.

church pew or in the audience at the Westover Opera House than on a barstool.

Many lumber mills soon ventured into the salt business. The reason was simple—sawdust, then principally a waste product

Besides, he had a business to build and was full of ideas on

dumped into streams wending their way to Lake Huron, was an

how to do it. In 1868 he led Eddy, Avery & Company into salt

ideal fuel for the salt conversion process. Since both the wells

mining, an enterprise oddly related to lumbering. The Saginaw

and sawmills were located along riverbanks, it enticed the mill

River and its many tributaries

owners into producing salt.

were known since Indian times for

Among them was Eddy,

their abundance of brine springs.

Avery & Company, which

On either side of the Tittabawasee

PBC-0728

River, for instance, small ponds

brine equipment was called,

of brackish water contained large

adjacent to its Bay City mill. The

amounts of salt and iron. In 1838

plant comprised sixty kettles

state geologists surveying the

to boil the brine, and a single

region commented that salt could

grainer—a pan sixty-six feet

be found “by boring anywhere in

long and twenty-six feet wide to

(the Saginaw) valley . . . There is

evaporate the brine, leaving the

little doubt that a shaft sunk near

salt crystals.

any of the streams would bring brine to the surface.” The historical origins of this vast quantity of salt were traced to a

The new enterprise guided Eddy, Avery & Company’s salt block produced 10,000 barrels of salt in 1871, competing against nine other salt blocks in Bay City. The company also manufactured barrels to contain the salt.

huge body of water that once covered

erected a “salt block,” as the

the lumbering concerns into a complementary business— making barrels from waste wood to contain the salt.

the region. This sea evaporated more than 400 million years

By 1871 Eddy, Avery & Company’s salt block was producing

ago, and the salt deposits were gradually buried by glacial

ten thousand barrels of salt, and its mill was manufacturing

activity. In 1860 the East Saginaw Valley Company discovered

twenty-five thousand barrels, most sold to other salt producers.

that brine pumped from wells in the valley could be converted

Nine other salt blocks competed against it in Bay City. With

to marketable salt by applying heat to the brine. When boiled

buyers in Chicago paying as much as $3.50 per barrel of salt,

off, the brine dried into salt crystals. The company produced

Frank directed the building of a second salt block at the mill.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Downtown Bay City in the 1880s, shortly after electricity came to the lumber town. Frank and Lottie Eddy were among the first citizens to have electric lighting.

More workers were hired, and within a few years production exceeded sixty thousand barrels. In local business registries, Frank added “salt manufacturer” right behind “lumberman.” The order of the titles made sense, as lumber sales increased each year almost without pause, thanks in part to the expanding network of railroads crisscrossing the country. More than thirty-five thousand miles of track were laid between 1866

PBC-0729

and 1873, adding up to millions of wood railroad ties. Logging railroads also made it easier to transport timber. The Pere Marquette, the first of Michigan’s logging railroads, traversed the white pine forests from Saginaw to Ludington on Lake Michigan. The Michigan Central, another logging railroad, coursed through the High Plains northward to Mackinaw, while the Grand Rapids and Indiana traveled north from Grand Rapids to the western part of the High Plains. Each railroad sprouted numerous branches, complementing the rivers as a transport mode and in some cases supplanting them, as they were operable year-round. Another reason for the record lumber demand was the

The Eddy family’s two primary enterprises in Bay City—salt and lumber—are conveyed in this 1896 advertisement.

massive reconstruction of the city of Chicago following the

Grit and Tenacity

Great Chicago Fire of 1871. Lumber prices skyrocketed the

and Frank likely sported a suit of clothes from F. H. Blackman

following year to thirty-five dollars per thousand board feet

and Company, a clothing store he co-owned on North Water

for the finest grade of Michigan white pine. Business was so

Street in Bay City. The newlyweds settled into a house on the

bullish at Eddy, Avery & Company that it tore up its Bay City

corner of Madison and Seventh streets. Their first child, John

mill buildings in 1873 and put up new ones at a cost of seventy-

Whittemore Eddy, was born on August 12, 1872. A daughter,

five thousand dollars. When completed the next year, the

Lucretia Glover Eddy, blessed them on January 3, 1876. Two

Lumberman’s Gazette called Eddy, Avery & Company “one of

more sons followed—Robert

the finest mills on the river . . . furnished with all the modern

Bailey Eddy, born January 30,

improvements. [It] may be considered as complete as any on

1878, and James Garfield Eddy,

the river.” The Gazette noted that the mill operated eleven and

on April 7, 1881; and one more

a half hours per day, employed eighty men, and had an annual

daughter, Caroline Eddy, born

capacity of more than 13 million board feet of lumber.

November 1, 1885.

As Frank’s business prospects soared, he found time to cultivate a social life. Many of his friends were influential Bay

Lottie married than the nation’s

City businessmen, such as Nathaniel Whittemore, a merchant

economy dived into a recession.

who had held several political positions over the years,

The Panic of 1873 persisted for

including county clerk. Whittemore and his wife Augusta had

nearly six years. The doldrums

moved to Bay City from Boston in 1856, and they opened their

were caused by a rash of

home regularly to other leading citizens. Several Whittemores followed them to the Saginaw Valley, among them Charlotte “Lottie” Whittemore, who was nineteen years old when she arrived in Bay City in 1870. In the winter of 1870–71, Frank met Lottie and was smitten by her fragile and slim good looks, her long neck reminiscent of many Gilded Age beauties. Her profile was complemented,

No sooner had Frank and

Charlotte “Lottie” Whittemore hailed from a tiny hamlet in upstate New York, where she and Frank Eddy married in 1871 before returning to Bay City. In her later years, Lottie would spend considerable time in Europe, frequenting the opera, art museums, and other cultural institutions.

financial failures in Vienna that quickly spread throughout Europe and overextended several banks in the United States. Federal legislation demonetizing silver was another factor, sharply reducing the

in Frank’s view, by pince-nez glasses that amplified her

domestic money supply and fostering higher interest rates,

intelligence. A photo of the era shows her posing in a fur hat

which damaged businesses like farms that carried high

with a Boston terrier resting in her arms.

debt loads. The failure of Jay Cooke & Company, a major

On September 5, 1871, at the Whittemore farmhouse in

bank, toppled other banks like falling dominoes. Newspaper

Coonrod, a hamlet on the outskirts of Rome, New York, Frank

illustrations depicted frenzied bank runs across the country,

and Lottie married. Lottie wore a demure white bridal gown

panicking the public and breeding additional bank runs. More

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

one hundred thousand dollars in Bay City’s First National Bank in 1873 indicated his confidence in both his business prospects and the bank’s future. First National, chartered in 1863, was the city’s first banking enterprise. The cash infusion helped the bank receive a national charter and build a new edifice heated by steam. It also landed Frank a seat on its board of directors, and he eventually became the bank’s president. At a time when other banks were closing across the nation, First National prospered and grew. But other problems were associated with the Panic of 1873 (Left to Right) Robert B. Eddy, John W. Eddy, and James G. Eddy. Jack and James G. would migrate to the Pacific Northwest to run the Port Blakely Mill Co., while their brother Robert remained in Bay City to oversee the family’s Eddy Investment Company.

beyond economic strife. The recession and the rising poverty it spawned sounded alarms throughout Michigan of potential civil unrest. The ongoing Franco-Prussian War in Europe also raised fears of a possible war. Frank and other leading citizens formed

than eighteen thousand businesses failed from 1873 to 1875,

a Bay City unit of the Michigan State Troops, a forerunner of the

and 89 of the country’s 364 railroads went bust. Although Michigan’s lumber industry fared better than other concerns, it was not unaffected by the economic collapse. As demand plummeted for wood products, prices for the finest grade of Michigan white pine fell from thirty-five dollars per thousand board feet in 1871 to twenty-eight dollars in 1873, a situation that held through 1878. More worrisome was the sharp decline in demand, given the impact on building from the tight credit conditions. Several sawmills in the Saginaw Valley closed during the worst of the recession in 1875. To compensate for the sluggish demand, Eddy, Avery & Company was compelled to cut production expenses and downsize the workforce. Frank had just finishing rebuilding the mill when the recession reared. An optimist by nature, he fully expected the difficult conditions to ease. Certainly, his investment of

Frank Eddy became a director and eventually president of Bay City’s First National Bank, and would invest $100,000 in it to help overcome the financial difficulties caused by the Panic of 1873. His son Robert later became a bank director and similarly assisted it through the effects of the 1929 stock market crash.

Grit and Tenacity

National Guard. They called themselves the Peninsular Military Company, and trained at the Armory on Washington Street under veteran commissioned officers of the Civil War. Frank was named a second lieutenant of the Peninsulars, making him the first military officer in the family since Colonel Jonathan Eddy of the Revolutionary War. Although called to duty to quell a labor strike by rail workers in Detroit, the strike was peaceful and the Peninsulars saw no fighting while Lieutenant Eddy wore its uniform. During this period of military service, Frank also kept his eye on business. In 1874 he sold his interest in F. H. Blackman and Company and purchased another haberdashery, Bailey and Orton. The store at the corner of Center and Water streets enjoyed a prime location in the city’s central retail district. Frank changed the name of the business to Eddy and Company, and brought in Charles

Although Frank Eddy is listed as a director of Bay City’s First National Bank in this document, he would later become the bank’s president.

Vail, who worked at F. H. Blackman, as a junior partner. In succeeding years, Vail purchased a larger share of the business and eventually became a full partner, guiding another name change to Vail and Eddy. Advertisements

banks were closing

promoted the firm as “dealers in furs, hats, gents’ furnishing

across the nation,

goods, etc.” The partners were said to have “one of the finest stores in the city and do an extensive and prosperous business,” and even today, the Bay County Historical Society maintains a Vail and Eddy top hat in its collection, with the firm’s emblem—an eagle perched under the national motto, E Pluribus Unum—still visible. These various diversifications were profitable for Frank, as were his mainstay lumber interests. Anxious for even more diversification, he developed an entire block in Bay

At a time when other

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

First

National prospered and grew, its capital stock repeatedly increased

Frank and the city’s other lumbermen. by

City, named in honor of the Eddy family. Completed in 1878, the block lay within the boundaries of four streets— Center, Adams, Jefferson, and Westover. Frank also invested as a partner in several companies that leased space in his buildings, such as Bassett Seed & Company, a dressmaking supply store. Other tenants included law firms, dental offices, and the local lodges of the Elks and Masons. Frank was a member of both. Shortly thereafter, Frank assembled a group of investors to renovate the former pride of Bay City: the Fraser House Hotel. As his first residence and the location of his crucial early business meetings, the grand hotel long held a special place in Frank’s heart. It had become a ghost of

Bay City’s famed Fraser House Hotel, where Frank Eddy resided upon his arrival to the lumber boomtown in 1866. The Fraser House was a gathering place for the city’s politicians and merchants. It was destroyed by fire in 1899.

its former self, however, as had the entire Fraser Block, now that businesses were relocating to newer environs like the Eddy Block. With other investors, Frank launched the Fraser House Company—with himself as president—which took over hotel operations. Several stores at the hotel’s ground level were widened and fronted with new, arched entryways, including Frank’s haberdashery. Hydraulic elevators were installed inside the hotel, and more rooms—all with steam-heated radiators— were added, including new dining rooms. The Bay City Observer predicted that the Fraser would again be “one of the finest hotels in the state.” Sadly, the hotel was lost to fire at the century’s end.

Frank Eddy was an investor in Bassett Seed & Co. a dressmaking supply shop that leased space in one of his buildings in Bay City’s Eddy block, named for the family.

Among Frank Eddy’s many diversifications in the 1870s and 1880s was Vail and Eddy, a local haberdashery, which is promoted in this 1885 advertisement.

Grit and Tenacity

The Queen Anne mansion of Frank Eddy’s partner and secondcousin Selwyn Eddy and his family was considered among the more impressive along Bay City’s Millionaire’s Row.

In 1878 fire also consumed the recently refurbished Eddy Mill. On April 11 a spark from a tugboat pushing a

Frank vowed to rebuild the mill, and he stood by his pledge.

raft of logs past the mill landed on a nearby pile of lumber.

“The indomitable energy of this firm is shown by the activity

“CONFLAGRATION! An Ocean of Flame Threatens Whole City”

with which the damages of the fire are being repaired,” the

blared the headline of the Bay City Journal the following day.

newspaper reported two weeks later. “The mill started up a saw

The entire Eddy mill, along with Frank and Lottie’s beloved

on Friday and is working away lively now.”

Universalist Church, was destroyed, and the company’s losses

were gauged at seventy-five thousand dollars.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

When the new mill made its debut in the spring of 1879,

it again was considered to be among the finest in Bay City. One thing had changed, though. The company that operated it

1800s,” Arndt writes in his book By These Waters. Through hard work, grit, and tenacity, Frank had come a

was now known as Eddy, Avery and Eddy. Newell Avery had

long distance since first setting foot in Bay City. By the mid-

passed away in 1877, and his son, John H. Avery, assumed his

1880s he had amassed considerable wealth. He, Lottie, and their

ownership interest. John assisted Frank in managing the mill

children—Jack, Lu, Rob, and Jim—lived at 258 Washington

and sales office in Bay City, while Edwin Eddy and Newell’s

Street, where they were soon joined by a fifth child, Caroline,

brother Sewall Avery oversaw business in the company’s East

born November 1, 1885, and named for Frank’s mother, still

Saginaw office.

alive at the time. The family resided in a splendid two-story

With lumber sales still on the upswing, Frank was

Second Empire home with a large wraparound porch and a

encouraged to create a second company in 1880 with his

tower out back that was crowned with a tin finial. Adjacent

younger siblings Charles Freemont and Newell Avery Eddy, and

was a carriage house that accommodated the family’s team

Edwin’s sons, Selwyn and Charles A. Eddy. Not surprisingly,

of horses and carriages. The property was encircled by a

the new company was incorporated as Eddy Brothers &

wrought iron fence, as were many others in the six-block part

Company. The partners acquired the old Chapin & Barber mill

of the city referred to as Millionaire’s Row. Lining the streets

at 2723 North Water Street in Bay City shortly after forming the

were watering troughs and hitching posts to assist visitors’

new company. Selwyn Eddy, previously a lumber inspector in

transportation. Though impressive, the house was not as

Alpena, on Lake Huron’s Thunder Bay, was the mill’s principal manager. In 1882 it produced roughly 18 million board feet of lumber and employed about ninety men. Advertisements promoted Eddy Brothers & Company as “Manufacturers and Wholesale Retailers [of] Lumber, Lath and Salt.” The mill “became one of the most important in the Bay City district of Michigan, and handled enormous quantities of forest products,” states the 1926 book Historic Michigan: Land of the Great Lakes. The two Eddy mills together produced nearly 50 million board feet of lumber in 1882, a year considered the zenith of the Michigan lumber industry. The output represented approximately 5 percent of the region’s total 1 billion board feet of production. “The [Eddy] brothers reigned as one of Michigan’s foremost lumber baron families during the late

One of Bay City’s numerous salt blocks is featured in this photograph from 1888. The Saginaw River and its many tributaries were rife with brine springs traced to a huge body of saltwater that once covered the region and evaporated more than 400 million years ago. Many lumber mills entered the salt business, as did Eddy, Avery & Eddy, burning sawdust produced by their mills as fuel in the salt conversion process.

Grit and Tenacity

The Eddy residence at at 258 Washington Street and Tenth Street in Bay City. The two-story Second Empire home was encircled by a wrought iron fence, as were others in this part of the city called Millionaireâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Row.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

imposing as the Queen Anne mansion built by Selwyn Eddy

Jim took great pleasure in driving his father’s horses up and

and his wife Cornelia a few blocks away at 1400 Center Street,

down Fifth Avenue in the snow. All the children enjoyed

which boasted a third-floor ballroom.

skating the frozen Saginaw in wintertime, and Jim especially

Frank and Lottie were among the first Bay Citians to have electric lighting, and the city itself was the first in the state

liked driving the family’s horse-drawn sleigh on it. Annual trips were made to the Whittemore farm in Rome, New York.

to have electric streetlights. Lottie equipped their new home

Lottie was a typical woman of her class, rearing the

with matching pieces of furniture artfully arranged to engage

children, volunteering for public service, and contributing

conversation. A gentleman’s high-backed chair with arms was

to philanthropic causes. She was a pillar of the new First

in whispering distance of a lady’s armless chair, providing

Universalist Church at Madison and Seventh streets, which

egress for a woman’s voluminous skirts.

she and Frank helped rebuild, and was also was a major

The children enjoyed separate rooms and passions. Jack’s

supporter of institutions like the Bay City Library and Bay

long hours of riding a bicycle indicated future athletic potential.

City Women’s Association. She made significant donations

At sixteen, he and his pals regularly biked to the new Wenonah

to the latter to build an Old Ladies’ Home and operate a

Beach, a forty-acre amusement park that featured “top-flight

Children’s Home.

vaudeville acts” and “games of chance and skill,” in addition to a roller coaster and other thrilling rides. His younger brother

Frank and Lottie’s pastimes included dinner parties with friends, hunting and fishing at the Tobico Hunting Club and the Rifle Club, and enjoying entertainments at the grand Westover Opera House. To their dismay, the opera house burned to the ground along with most of the Westover Block on January 17, 1886. A spark from a gaslight used to illuminate the stage for the prior evening’s performance was the culprit, and the building burst into flames the following morning. Frank and Lottie had attended numerous performances at the theater, and its destruction caused great dismay. “It had long stood as a monument of its own greatness and the city’s pride,” Bay City Tribune reported. The theater had twenty-eight thousand dollars in insurance, which failed to cover the estimated eightythousand-dollar loss. To rebuild the block and erect a new

A hand-colored image of Bay City’s Wenonah Beach amusement park in the 1880s, scene of much pleasure for the Eddy children, Jack, Lucretia, Robert, James G. and Caroline.

theater designed by J. M. Wood, an architect who had previously designed renovations for the opera house, Frank

Grit and Tenacity

joined with other investors in capitalizing the Bay City Building

Avery & Eddy had owned a series of tugboats to deliver logs to

Company. On September 18, 1886, Wood’s Opera House—“Bay

booms along the Saginaw River, and with lumber production

City’s Finest New Temple of Music,” the Tribune called it—was

skyrocketing Frank perceived greater opportunities for this

dedicated. Frank and Lottie were likely in attendance for the

business.

performance that evening of the romantic

Eddy Transportation Company

opera Mignon. The new block in which

gradually branched into other forms

the opera house resided was renamed the

of maritime commerce beyond

Phoenix Block, in recognition that it had

towing. By 1898, when the enterprise

literally risen from the ashes.

was reincorporated as Eddy Transit

Despite skirmishes with labor unions that

Company, it operated a significant

were common at the time, Frank was recalled

fleet of tugs, barges, steamers, and

as a benevolent employer. During one bitterly

schooners, nearly all named to pay

long strike in the late 1880s that shut down

tribute to a family member, such as

the mill at Eddy, Avery & Eddy, he gave from

the tug Edwin Eddy and the schooners

his own pocket to relieve his employees’

John F. Eddy and Selwyn Eddy. The

financial distress. A news article once

ships plied the Great Lakes carrying

observed that Frank treated his employees

iron ore, coal, grain, logs, and other

kindly. “He shared in a way their joys and

commodities.

sorrows. When accident befell them, he paid

Exact figures do not exist for

their doctor’s bills and saw to it that their

the Michigan timberlands owned

larders were well supplied.”

by Frank’s two lumber companies

“His heart was tender toward those

in the 1880s and 1890s, presumably

who suffered,” recalled his good friend, Rev. Stephen Roblin, the pastor at First Universalist Church. Three years before Frank arrived in Bay City, lumber production in the Saginaw Valley

because these landholdings were in Bay City’s original Universalist Church was destroyed by a major fire that also consumed the recently refurbished Eddy Mill in 1878. The Eddy family and many other members of the congregation put their efforts behind rebuilding the church, seen here in 1888.

constant flux. As the trees on the original parcels acquired by Newell Avery in the 1860s were harvested, additional land and stumpage—

had been 215 million board feet. By 1888 production had more

the right to harvest timber on land owned by others—were

than doubled to 451 million board feet. That year Frank and his

acquired in Michigan, California, Louisiana, and Canada. To

kin created Eddy Transportation Company to tow logs, vessels,

process logs close to its stumpage in Canada, Eddy Brothers &

timber, and other commodities. For more than a decade Eddy,

Company bought a mill in Blind River, Ontario, about 180 miles

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

north of Bay City across Lake Huron. Much of its output was

in transition academically, moving away from a pure focus on

transported to the mill in Bay City by Eddy Transit Company

the classics to a more straightforward business and science

ships, for sale locally.

curriculum. Jack benefitted from the change, as his later

Eddy, Avery & Eddy also continued to buy logs from

business exploits testified. Meanwhile, his

Jonathan Eddy’s former partner Simon J. Murphy, whose vast

bicycling skills were put to use in Harvard’s

timber holdings now stretched into Minnesota and Wisconsin.

Freshman Games in October 1892. He

Murphy was said to own half of downtown Detroit, too, where

subsequently joined the university’s cycling

the firm of Avery & Murphy was located in the Moffat Building,

club and finished among the top in several

and later the thirteen-story Penobscot Building, both owned by

meets.

Murphy. His fortune also comprised substantial mining and oil

Jack’s brothers attended Princeton

holdings. Frank honored the great industrialist by naming one of the Eddy schooners the Simon J. Murphy. Other diversifications were in store for the Eddys. In 1895

University. Robert and James G. had graduated together in 1899 from the prestigious Lawrenceville School, founded in 1810. At Princeton, Robert majored in

Frank, his brother Charles F., and Selwyn and his brother

civil engineering, and James was a member of Whig Hall and

Charles A., jointly acquired two parcels of land in Minnesota’s

the University Cottage Club, which promoted political and

Mesabi iron range. The North Eddy Mine and the South Eddy

intellectual discussions during mealtimes.

Mine were part of a new enterprise, Penobscot Mining Company.

All three brothers were well aware that the lumber business

Mined tonnages in succeeding years were significant, increasing

in Michigan was nearing an end. In 1888 more than 4 billion

from fifty thousand tons in 1907 to two hundred thousand tons

board feet of lumber were produced by the mills along the

by 1913. Frank also owned interests in the Tribune Publishing

Saginaw River, enough volume to “build a sidewalk of two-

Company and James Seed & Company, and was a stockholder in

inch planks, four-feet-wide, circling the globe four times,”

Bay City Sugar Company, Fraser House Company, Wood’s Opera

Arndt writes. Most of the state’s pine belt had been

House, and First National Bank, where he continued as the

harvested, and such mammoth lumber production

institution’s president. “He was always a hard worker and a close

volumes could not last. The Eddy mills supplemented

and careful observer of all the details of every concern with

the dwindling supply with timber from Canada and

which he was connected,” the Bay City Tribune reported.

from Simon Murphy’s logging interests in Wisconsin

By the late 1890s Frank and Lottie’s sons John (“Jack”), Robert, and James G. had stepped into adulthood. Jack had

and Minnesota. Jack had other ideas besides a career in his

entered Harvard College in the fall of 1891, and moved into

father’s business. Two years after graduating Harvard in 1895

the freshman dormitory at Harvard Yard, where Theodore

he launched a salt mining business called Anchor Salt Company

Roosevelt had resided just fifteen years earlier. The college was

with a distant relative, David Edward “Ned” Skinner. Five years

Grit and Tenacity

An early black and white photograph of Anchor Salt Company, owned and managed by John W. Eddy and Ned Skinner, the first of several enterprises the friends would lead.

older than Jack, who was twenty-four at the time, Skinner hailed from Hillsdale, Michigan. He later attended the College of

entrepreneurial drive, and it is fortunate he lived to see the

Asheville in North Carolina, and secured work at a salt company

beginnings of his son’s success. On December 13, 1899, the

in Bay City. There, he met and married Jeannette Whittemore, a

great man passed away. He was fifty-one years old. He had

first cousin to Jack’s mother Lottie.

contracted a low-grade fever that autumn, and his doctors

The partners built a salt plant in Ludington on the western

prescribed rest and recuperation in a warm place. He, Lottie,

side of Michigan’s lower peninsula, where the Pere Marquette

and Jack traveled to Florida, but Frank’s health quickly

River empties into Lake Michigan. Anchor Salt was the first

deteriorated.

company in the state to manufacture salt without a dependence

Frank must have seen a bit of himself in Jack’s

The day after his death, Bay City newspapers headlined the

on a lumber mill. Rather than burn sawdust and waste lumber to

story. The Bay City Tribune called Frank “one of Bay City’s

evaporate the brine from their five wells, the partners relied on

most honored and respected citizens.” The long article and

locally mined coal. The venture was a shrewd success, given that

accompanying obituary also noted Frank’s many good works.

lumber companies were running out of timber. By 1899 Anchor

“Wealth did not make Mr. Eddy arrogant,” the Tribune stated,

Salt had planted sales offices in Detroit, Chicago, and Milwaukee.

noting that Frank was “charitable to a large degree although

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

he never displayed an ostentation over the work he quietly performed . . . He did not carry his heart upon his sleeve, and he practiced benevolence by stealth, as hundreds of those in the humbler walks of life will testify.” Frank’s eulogy, given by his friend Rev. Roblin at First Universalist Church, described him as a “man of granitic character . . . firm in his convictions as the eternal hills.” One “looked into his eyes,”

At the services commemorating the life of Frank Eddy at First Universalist Church, Rev. Roblin said of Frank’s humility that he “practiced benevolence by stealth.”

The Newell A. Eddy

In 1992, a research vessel owned by the University of Michigan found the remains of a ship in 165 feet of water north of Lake Huron’s Raynolds reef, just below the Straits of Mackinac. The ship had settled upright, with the tip of its mast about fifty feet below sea level. Researchers had difficulty reading the name of the vessel on its starboard side. Some letters had washed away. What remained was “well A. Eddy.” Later they learned its full name—the Newell A. Eddy.

The schooner barge was one of several owned by Eddy Transit

Company, which plied the Great Lakes carrying commodities like coal and grain. Most of the ships were named in honor of family members like Newell, Frank Eddy’s younger brother. The barge had a cargo capacity of more than twelve hundred tons and was considered a workhorse during the nine months when the lakes weren’t frozen. Three years after

Rev. Roblin said, “and the

her launching, while being towed through the ice floes of the Straits of

unwavering depths told of

Mackinac by a company steamer, the Charles A. Eddy, the towline broke and

the integrity of his nature.”

the ship drifted in rough seas. The wind and waves worsened as the storm

John Franklin Eddy had

“burst upon the two boats with a fury unequaled by any easterly gale,”

combined imagination with

the Chicago Inter Ocean newspaper reported. The nine-man crew was

confidence, hard work,

unable to rig the sails, which were frozen in place. At the helm was Captain

and respect for others.

Burton, who tried to anchor the schooner in shallow waters. The next

As another generation of

day, April 20, 1893, sections of the stern, galley, and cabin washed ashore

Eddys set out on their own entrepreneurial quests, these fine

on Bois Blanc Island. The entire crew had perished. Fortunately for Eddy

attributes went along with them. u

Transit Company, the vessel was insured for ninety-five thousand dollars with Lloyd’s of London.

When divers in 1992 spied the ship, it looked brand-new, its rigging

virtually intact, and the hull, deck, main boom, starboard gunwale, and bow all said to have been in excellent condition, with almost no deterioration or marine growth. A few weeks later, the researchers returned and held a memorial service for the nine crew members. u

Grit and Tenacity

Chapter

Skinner & Eddy employed an innovative modular system for building ships that allowed it to construct vessels in record time. In this image is the so-called â&#x20AC;&#x153;ways,â&#x20AC;? a platform upon which ships were erected.

A Fine Deal

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Frank Eddy was buried in a stately Romanesque mausoleum at Elm Lawn Cemetery, a fitting testament to his stature in Bay City, Michigan. Sixteen years after Frank’s death in 1899 Lottie honored his memory with the construction of the Eddy Rest Pavilion in Wenonah Park. With its tiled roof, marble walls, and pillared portico, the pavilion was a peaceful place for busy people to sit and contemplate. It was situated directly in the middle of the park, within sight of the Saginaw River, a view she knew Frank would have liked. Eddy, Avery & Eddy dissolved after the great lumberman’s passing, and the interests in Eddy Brothers and Company were liquidated shortly thereafter for five hundred thousand dollars. Fortunately, Frank did not witness the closing of his

company and virtually the entire state industry as well. Within a few years, most of Bay City’s sawmills closed, casualties of the region’s timber exhaustion. While Michigan had supplied 23 percent of U.S. lumber production in 1880, ten years after Frank died it provided a comparatively paltry 4 percent. Its

(Top) In the foreground of this “log pond” on Bainbridge Island are Douglas-fir logs en route to the mill for cutting into differentsized lumber products at the Port Blakely Mill. (Center) Square-cut logs called “cants” are readied for shipment in this turn-of-the-century photograph from the Bainbridge Island Historical Museum. (Bottom) In a very short period of time, Port Blakely burst forth as a boomtown, replete with houses, cabins, dormitories, and a school and hotel built by Captain Renton. Various unidentified gentlemen are gathered outside the general store, perhaps awaiting the steamer to Seattle.

forests had not been logged sustainably. The proceeds from his estate were bequeathed to the Eddy Investment Company, a trust fund that Frank had established to provide for his and Lottie’s children, although its primary purpose was to financially assist their daughters Lucretia and Caroline. Men were expected to be breadwinners, and in the Eddy family Jack, Robert, and James G. were no exception.

A Fine Deal

Ships ready for loading, with a log raft in the foreground.

PBC-0368

Jack, the oldest son, inherited his father’s and grandfather’s enterprising, industrious spirit. He and Ned Skinner were in

board and other leading Bay City institutions. The youngest

the swirl of running Anchor Salt Company when Frank passed

brother James G. was still at Princeton when Frank died,

away, and although the business was profitable, its future was

although in summers off from school he assisted Robert in

compromised by an eastern salt monopoly that had slashed

managing the family’s various enterprises.

prices to unsustainable levels in order to capture market share.

The period in which the brothers lived—the fin de siècle,

Jack and Ned decided they had endured enough. In 1900 they

the distinctive closing of one century and the opening of

sold to Joy Morton, who would combine it with other holdings

another—was a time of incredible optimism. Revolutionary

ten years later, and from which would emerge the famous

changes were under way in science and business. The

Morton Salt Company.

automobile, airplane, and wireless radio—three of mankind’s

The middle brother Robert tended the family’s Canadian

most pivotal inventions—were in their infancy or soon to

landholdings and Eddy Transit Company, and managed Eddy

make their mark. The innovations suggested that anything was

Investment Company. Quiet and reserved, Robert adhered to

possible if you were smart, driven, and self-assured.

a conservative investment philosophy, buying preferred stock, bonds, and bank stocks to provide a relatively assured income.

Like his father, he was a director serving First National Bank’s

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Following the sale of Anchor Salt, Ned Skinner relocated to San Francisco, where he continued his long involvement in the

salt business as president of Federal Salt Company. Ned also invested in northern California’s bustling timber industry, and by 1902 he had become a large stockholder and vice president of Hobbs, Wall & Company, a redwood logging operation and milling concern in Del Norte County. Ned likely contacted Jack Eddy, as Jack soon invested in Hobbs, Wall & Company, helping it acquire a key competitor. Jack also bought an interest in Federal Salt. Lumbering prospects in the Golden State drew other Michiganders to the area, like Selwyn Eddy, Frank’s former partner at Eddy Brothers & Company. Simon J. Murphy, who owned vast tracts of redwood timber in California’s Humboldt

Port Blakely homes reflected the prosperity of the times.

County, appointed Selwyn as president of Pacific Lumber Company, more colloquially known as PALCO, and within a short time, both Selwyn and Ned cultivated vital business contacts in the timber business.

forestlands in the Puget Sound region of Washington, home to half of the virgin timber in the United States. Thanks to the transcontinental railroads, lumber could be moved east to serve domestic infrastructure and other industrial purposes.

“We Have Made a Fine Deal.” Eddy Investment Company was earning a modest seventyfive thousand dollars a year from its conservative holdings, and when Jack sought to diversify the portfolio, he looked no further than Ned and Selwyn’s extensive lumber connections. On January 30, 1903, in a letter to his brother Robert, Jack penned, “We have purchased all of the stock of the Port Blakely Mill Co. and now are owners of that concern.” By “we” Jack

The mill’s location on Puget Sound also provided egress to ships bound for the growing cities along the West Coast and to overseas markets in Asia, South America, and Europe. Ned Skinner was Jack’s partner in the enterprise, as were two investors: attorney Louis Titus and W. J. Hotchkiss of Hobbs, Wall & Company. Shares were evenly divided among the four men. Jack’s letter to James G. stated the total cost of the acquisition—$2,025,000 “in round figures.”

meant himself and Ned Skinner. The following day he wrote James G., “I believe we have made a fine deal.” Indeed, it was quite a deal. At the time, the Port Blakely Mill Company was the world’s largest sawmill, and it sat on the western shoulder of hundreds of thousands of acres of prime

As the company’s stationery indicates, orders were sent to the San Francisco office and were then telegraphed to the mill.

A Fine Deal

He added, “I believe we can make it pay that back in ten years. And the same

This 1889 photograph depicts an outing at Alki Beach, south of where Captain William Renton had built his first, failed sawmill.

amount over again in ten more. It all depends on us now.” Jack noted that he would be heading to the mill in a week to manage it, and could use some fraternal companionship. “I shall begin to look around for a nice, hard and dirty job for you . . . when you are through with college,” he wrote James G. “You need not worry about salary, for I thought that after you have worked faithfully for two or three years we may begin to pay you ten cents per hour—when it does not rain.” Jack’s brotherly jousts struck a nerve. That summer James joined Ned in the San Francisco office. Port Blakely Mill Co. was a pioneering lumbering concern in the Pacific Northwest, dating its origins to 1864. The mill was situated on the southeastern shore of Bainbridge Island, across Puget Sound from the city of Seattle. Its founder was the legendary Captain William Renton, who laid out the town of Port Blakely at the same time as he built his sawmill. Born in Nova Scotia in 1818, Renton was the son of a shipmaster. He followed in his father’s footsteps and became a sailor at the age of eleven. Within seven years he was an officer, and by the time he reached twenty-three he was master of his own ship. He arrived in the Puget Sound region in 1852, having sailed his ship, the Mary and Jane, around Cape Horn,

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Although logging and milling were men’s work in the late1800s, women living in Port Blakely stopped by the mill on occasion to visit husbands and boyfriends. Here we see a demurely dressed woman shielding herself from the sun with a parasol, perhaps a gift from the many Japanese workers on the island.

The Good Captain

The Eddy family and Ned Skinner purchased the world’s largest sawmill at

hornet’s nest of difficulties over the years, from a boiler explosion that

Port Blakely from the heirs of Captain William Renton, a man “who came

nearly killed him and left him virtually blind, to major mill fires and the

as near to anyone to personifying Paul Bunyan in the Pacific Northwest,”

emergence of the railroads as the principal conveyor of lumber, a turn of events that eventually forced the mill’s closure.

writes historian William R.

Historian Hubert Howe Bancroft writes

Sherrard in his unpublished history of the Port Blakely Companies.

that Renton “possessed a noble carriage,

was dignified, straightforward, simple and

Born in Pictou, Nova Scotia,

in 1818, Renton was the son of

unaffected in manner and speech. He was

a shipmaster who would make

a picture of manly strength, commanding

maritime commerce his initial

respect by his very presence. Stalwart, of

trade. His father died when he

splendid health, his muscles hardened by the

was a boy, and Renton took to

exposure and toil of a sea-faring life, standing

the seas as a cabin boy, deckhand,

say 5 feet 10 inches tall, and weighing perhaps

cook, and first mate. By the time

190 pounds, he was not a man to be trifled

he was eighteen years old, he

with.” In Bancroft’s book Chronicles of the Builders

had become an officer of a ship, the Harriett Rockwell, plying the

of the Commonwealth, a man who knew the

Atlantic Ocean from Bangor,

captain for thirty-eight years commented that

Maine, to England and later to

he was “a man to be depended on; a man

West Africa and South America.

that it would do to tie to in times of difficulty

In 1841 he became an

or danger; one whose friendship would be

American citizen and married a

valuable. His character was written on his

widow named Sarah Sylva, who

face, which was a picture of sturdy integrity

hailed from Philadelphia. Nine

and honest purpose.”

years later he and his family journeyed in Captain Renton’s

A late-nineteenth century portrait of Captain William Renton, founder of Port Blakely Mill Co.

As for Sarah Renton, Bancroft writes

that she was “a constant worker, never knowing what it was to spend a waste hour . . . Her

brig, the Mary and Jane, around the tip of South America to San Francisco, where he, Sarah, and their three

spirit filled the house. They were ‘two hearts in council, two beside the

daughters settled.

hearth.’”

In 1852 he made his first excursion to Puget Sound. The booming

When Sarah died in 1891, “Those who witnessed the early separation

lumber trade persuaded him to erect a sawmill in what is today West

of these two souls can never forget the scene,” the historian writes. The

Seattle, and another in Port Orchard, Washington, before building the great

following year Captain Renton died at their home in Port Blakely. u

Port Blakely Mill and acquiring neighboring forestlands. He encountered a

A Fine Deal

the southernmost tip of South America, and then northward on to Puget Sound. When he arrived, his life’s trajectory altered, his seafaring days drawing to an end. In 1853 Renton purchased land on historic Alki Point, the first white settlement in the Pacific Northwest. The location was originally called “New York” by pioneers Arthur Denny, Charles C. Terry, Carson Boren, and others, who founded it just two years earlier. They later added the indigenous Chinook tribe’s word “alki,” which loosely translated meant “eventually,” to describe the city they hoped would one day sprout on the land. Like Renton, the pioneers had sought to harvest the region’s dense

Alki Point, in what is West Seattle today, was the location of Captain William Renton’s first sawmill, built in 1853. Depicted is the Alki Point Lighthouse, erected in 1913, and open to public visits today.

forestlands, said to be “as thick as the hair on the back of a dog.” Renton purchased rudimentary sawmill equipment and erected a mill on his property at New York Alki on the shore of Elliott Bay, where it was feasible to raft logs to the mill and load the cut lumber onto waiting vessels. Unfortunately, the captain failed to account for the area’s exposure to inhospitable wintertime weather, “when the north wind, building up the tides in front of it, comes sweeping down the [Puget] Sound out of Canada, piling mighty waves on Alki Point,” wrote historian William C. Speidel in his book Sons of the Profits. Another major challenge was the lack of freshwater to feed the mill’s

Like Renton, the pioneers had sought to harvest the region’s dense forestlands, said to be “as thick as the hair on the back of a dog.”

steam boiler. These impediments proved difficult to overcome, and in 1854 Renton relocated the mill to Port Orchard, about thirteen miles due west of Alki Point. He also took on a partner in the

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Captain William Renton traveled the world as a seafaring ship master before deciding to build and operate the world’s largest sawmill at Port Blakely.

enterprise, Captain Daniel S. Howard. But three years later,

method to determine the depth of the water. Every few yards,

tragedy struck Captain Renton when one of the mill’s boilers

he dutifully noted his depth findings until he was satisfied the

exploded. The accident left Renton seriously injured, a shard of

harbor was deep enough to accommodate the largest ships.

metal knocking him unconscious and causing near-blindness,

Armed with this information, Renton purchased 164.5 acres on

a condition that worsened with the years. Unable to work,

the lower banks of the harbor and then later acquired another

Renton sold his interests in the mill and left for San Francisco

240 acres that encompassed trees and streams to supply the

to recuperate. There he mulled the mistakes he had made.

mill and feed its boilers.

In 1862 Renton returned to Washington and launched a

Within a year he had established a sawmill with the capacity

small wooden skiff into a protected harbor on Puget Sound’s

to produce thirty thousand board feet of lumber per day, built

Bainbridge Island. Called Port Blakely, the harbor had been

adjacent wharves, and acquired a modest fleet of schooners

named in 1841 for Johnston Blakely, an American naval hero

to transport the wood. The Lenora, Oakhill, and Ocean each

of the War of 1812. From his skiff, Renton carefully played out

could carry six hundred thousand board feet of lumber per trip.

a clothesline with an iron weight attached to it—his primitive

As demand intensified, the mill was upgraded to produce fifty thousand board feet per day. Renton managed the mill while his partner Dan Howard oversaw sales in San Francisco, the destination point for much of the mill’s output. When Howard died shortly thereafter, the company’s bookkeeper, Charles S. Holmes, and his assistant Samuel Smith took over Howard’s duties. Port Blakely literally grew around the mill. By 1867 the town comprised a Presbyterian church, public hall, jail, and a company store. Fifty-nine people lived in Port Blakely, most of them in houses, cabins, and dormitories Renton had built for them. Many were immigrants from Canada and nearly all parts of Europe, and later workers included men of Chinese, Japanese, and Filipino descent.

Loading lumber at the Blakely Mill prior to the 1906 fire.

The tiny town was a microcosm of the world.

Following the death of Captain Renton in 1891, his longtime partner Charles Holmes (in the portrait) and the Captain’s nephews, the Campbell brothers, took over management of the company.

A Fine Deal

Despite its founder’s conservative nature, it was a “very wild” place, Renton wrote his mother. That explains the jail. Business flourished from the start. In 1871, “The mill was at times so rushed with orders Their husbands at the mill, the women of Port Blakely tended to their well-kept homes in this 1892 image.

that it was running day and night,” writes Iva Luella Buchanan in

Captain William Renton passed on more than just the Port Blakely Mill and its forestlands to the Eddy family and partner Ned Skinner. Over the decades, as ships from faraway lands docked at the port, the ships’ masters left a token of their appreciation to the captain—exotic animals.

The mill is said to have had a substantial menagerie of animals that lived

just beyond the cookhouse, including emus, koalas, and macaques. They had hailed from Asia, Australia, and New Zealand, among other places. Captain Renton tolerated the animals as a concession to his visitors, but his nephews, the Campbell brothers, who inherited the mill from their uncle upon his death in 1891, were

An Economic History of Kitsap County. She cited “a goodly

ready to see them go.

number of vessels in the harbor loading at one time.”

In 1873 the captain’s nephews, William and John Campbell,

When Jack Eddy visited

the mill for the first time in

migrated from Nova Scotia to assist their uncle at the mill.

1902, he stipulated that the

Renton introduced them to the finer points

animals be removed before

of lumbering, and Will soon became an

possession. John Campbell

John learned mill management. “They

transported the menagerie

are so steady and well behaved that

to Seattle, which was in the process of planning a zoo at the estate of Guy

they are universally liked,” the captain

Phinney, a wealthy mill owner and real estate developer. Phinney named his

wrote his brother-in-law.

342-acre estate Woodland Park, and had it populated with his own menagerie

curtailed lumber orders at the mill, although demand revived the following In 1903, the year this portrait was taken of John Campbell, he and his brother William and their partner Charles Holmes sold the Port Blakely Mill Co. to Jack Eddy and Ned Skinner.

he and his partners took

assistant engineer on a steam tug while

As in Michigan, the Panic of 1873

Zoo Story

year, generating revenues of $1.5 million. The captain plowed the proceeds into land acquisitions, in addition to building the seventy-five-room Bainbridge Hotel,

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

of animals, including black bears and ostriches. Upon Phinney’s death in 1899 the city of Seattle purchased the estate.

In 1903 famed landscape architect John C. Olmsted, whose company

had designed New York’s Central Park, drew up the first plans for Woodland Park Zoo. The same year a small collection of animals owned by Lake Washington Cable Railway arrived, as did a caravan of emus, macaques, and other exotic creatures from the Port Blakely Mill. Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo is now regarded as one of America’s best zoos. u

PBC-0371

This turn of the century image depicts the view of Blakely Harbor from Hall Brothers Shipbuilding’s shipyard, the company’s neighbor and major customer.

which was well attended, thanks in no small part to its tavern

clients as far away as South America for railroad ties. By

and the stagecoach service conveniently supplied by Renton.

contrast, the two Eddy mills in Bay City in 1882 cut about

To entice ship captains to do business with his mill and not

137,000 board feet per day. President Rutherford B. Hayes

others, he constructed four “Honeymoon Cottages” in Port

visited the mill during the nation’s centennial celebrations

Blakely for weary mariners and their wives to relax. He also

and marveled at the plant’s technological sophistication

maneuvered to have a U.S. post office located at Port Blakely,

and output.

and was its first postmaster. The name of the mill’s parent company had changed

On September 11, 1883, Port Blakely Mill Co. was organized and chartered in California as a separate operating

several times since its inception, and in 1875 it changed again,

company. This was the company that Jack Eddy, Ned Skinner,

to Renton, Holmes & Company, following Charles Holmes’s

and others would buy twenty-seven years later.

elevation to partner. By the middle of the year, approximately

The mill obtained most of its timber from independent

110 men were employed at the mill, producing 90,000 board

loggers, thirty-two of these firms under contract during the

feet of lumber per day for local customers and even some

mid-1880s. The captain eschewed investing in his own logging

A Fine Deal

A ship’s hull under construction by Hall Brothers Shipbuilding, which operated right next door to the Port Blakely Mill. The company built some of Hawaii’s first inter-island steamers, in addition to lumber schooners described as “fast, handsome and popular.”

business, preferring to put his money into land acquisitions. Indeed, in just one week alone in 1876, the company invested four thousand dollars for land with roughly 15 million to 20 million board feet of timber on it, “enough to last several years,” Renton wrote. Prudently, he kept his forests largely intact for future harvesting.

“The Best Property to Hold” Charles Holmes urged the captain to keep buying more land. Forests are “the best property to hold, on this coast & certain to increase in value,” Holmes wrote his partner. By 1886 the company’s landholdings were estimated to be worth $3 million, up from a mere eleven thousand dollars in value a dozen years earlier. This land would serve the Eddy family profitably in its future dealings. The mill was given a tremendous boost in 1881, following

The residence of Captain William and Sarah Renton is seen in this photograph from 1882. On a hill behind the home is the school built by Renton for his workers’ children. Next door is the Sackman house. In Katy Warner’s A History of Bainbridge Island, the Renton home is said to have had seven marble fireplaces and fancy woodwork. “It was filled with expensive furniture,” Warner writes. “It was a showplace, and Mrs. Renton liked to show it off to people.”

the decision by Hall Brothers Shipbuilding to relocate operations to Port Blakely from Port Ludlow twenty-five

business for the mill. While fabricating the ships to move its

miles to the north in Jefferson County. Renton had offered

products over the next two decades, Hall Brothers built more

the company free land next to his sprawling mill, and further

than one hundred vessels, including some of the world’s fastest

promised to construct a small rail line connecting the two

steamers, enabling the mill to trim the transport time to San

enterprises. The shipyard provided a near-constant flow of

Francisco by half. Captain Renton’s third try at the lumber business was a masterful triumph. Like Frank Eddy in Michigan, he branched

Hall Brothers Shipbuilding is pictured in this image from 1900.

out into many other enterprises and was a factor in the growth of the local economy. When large coal deposits were discovered at the southern banks of Lake Washington, Renton seized the opportunity, becoming a major investor in what later became Renton Coal Company. He also joined with other successful merchants in organizing the Seattle and Walla Walla Railroad.

A Fine Deal

Although it would never become a Bangor or a Bay City, Port Blakely enjoyed its moment in the spotlight. Four hundred people lived in the town in 1882, the year that electricity generated by the millâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s power plant came to the area. During the early years of the decade, the company funded and built a schoolhouse. The bustling little town continued to grow and other structures soon sprouted, including a Masonic hall, blacksmith shops, and a sidewalk made of planks that arched down to Pleasant Beach, a thirty-acre enclave of parklike grounds. Helping entertain the workers and their families were a May Day festival, an annual operetta, and prizefighting matches staged in a pavilion. As supplies of timber dwindled along the Soundâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s shoreline, Renton dispatched land cruisers to purchase inland acreage north of the state capital in Olympia. More than twenty-two thousand acres in Thurston County, and approximately one hundred thousand acres in Mason County, were acquired, at

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Hall Brothers Shipbuilding, in the shadow of the giant Port Blakely Mill, built the first five-masted schooner ever constructed on the West Coast with lumber provided by its neighbor, Port Blakely.

prices much less than acreage closer to shore. According to the Journal of American Forestry, Port Blakely Mill Co. “led the industry in the acquisition of extensive timberlands away from the waters of the Sound, and in the construction of logging railroads to tap these holdings.” To build the first of these railroads—the Blakely Line— Renton hired Sol G. Simpson, who had graded the bed for the Seattle and Walla Walla Railroad. When completed, the railroad connected Mason County to Kamilche Point on southern Puget Sound, where the cut logs were greased with lard to permit easier skidding, assembled into rafts, and towed to the Port Blakely mill. The Blakely Line transported enough logs to produce 225,000 board feet of timber per day—more than the mill could actually handle. Simpson subsequently came to an

Crackaloo

In its heyday in the 1880s Port Blakely was a sailors’ paradise. Many stayed at the seventy-five-room Bainbridge Hotel and Tavern built by Captain Renton. The sailors arrived in large sailboats called windjammers from points all over the world, including China, Japan, Spain, Sweden, Italy, and Norway. They came to buy lumber, for which they paid in gold coins.

The sailors joined the men of the mill in the amusements the island

offered. The hotel, managed by a man named Malcolm McDonald, had a fancy dining room with waiters who served more affluent guests like Renton and his managers. The tavern or barroom was a different place altogether. Anyone could drink at McDonald’s saloon, which became noted for its daily brawls. As historian William Sherrard reports, “Captain Renton complained about the saloon, apparently because it was mill policy to pay the hospital bills of its workers, whether injured on the job or in barroom brawls.”

Not that the offenders got off scot-free. “Men who were arrested for fighting

or a crime were put in jail,” writes Katy Warner in her A History of Bainbridge

agreement with Renton to be his primary independent logger.

Island. “The jail was called the ‘ten by ten’ . . . because it was ten feet square and

While he would sell his logs to other mills, Simpson gave Port

made out of planks ten inches wide and ten inches thick.”

Blakely the option of first refusal to buy the timber at lower

prices. From these humble origins, Sol Simpson built what

world, a mini–United Nations. “On a Sunday morning, it was not uncommon

eventually became the mighty Simpson Timber Company.

to find ships’ captains from all over the world standing on the wharf playing

In many respects, Port Blakely during the 1880s was a microcosm of the

Ten years after the Eddy Mill burned to the ground in

‘crackaloo,’ a game in which they would toss their gold coins to see who could

1878, the same fate befell the Port Blakely mill. Overheated

get closest to a crack in the planking,” the Seattle Times reported in 1974. “The

machinery was the cause. “The only thing that could have

winner took the coins.”

saved the mill was to have immersed it in Puget Sound,” Renton

wrote. Fortunately, a shift in the winds saved Hall Brothers

club was established, as was a baseball team to compete against a rival team at

Shipbuilding next door.

the Port Madison Mill, on the opposite end of Bainbridge Island. The company

The captain immediately directed the building of a new plant—what he called the “Great Mill.” It boasted two sawmills housed in a single 430-by-100-foot structure, powered by three mammoth three-hundred-horsepower steam boilers. It was (Right) On the grounds of the destroyed Port Blakely Mill, workers erect what will become the world’s largest sawmill.

By the 1890s more tranquil pastimes were evident at Port Blakely. A country

sponsored concerts and dances. One wonders how the rough-hewn sailors liked the changes. Certainly, many begrudged another change in policy during the decade—the prohibition of sales of alcohol within town limits. u

A Fine Deal

hailed as the largest such facility on the planet, with a capacity

Renton died, just one year after the death of his beloved wife

of cutting three hundred thousand board feet of lumber per day,

Sarah. The mill closed for three days to mourn the captain’s

assuming that it ran night and day, which it often did. To reduce

passing. His body lay in state at his nephew John Campbell’s

the risk of fire, the building’s roof was made of corrugated

home, and more than one thousand people filed by to pay

iron, and a labyrinthine system of water pipes coupled to 850

their respects. The southern shore of Lake Washington, where

sprinkler heads was installed. An early visitor described the mill

Renton Coal Company had provided employment to many, was

as a “monstrous thing alive, pouring out freight for deep-water

later named in his honor. In 2010 the city of Renton would be

vessels waiting to transport it to the four corners of the globe.”

home to more than eighty-six thousand people.

Within five months, the new mill was cutting lumber. So were four hundred other mills in Washington state at the

operation in San Francisco, John Campbell succeeded his

time. Demand soared, especially following a massive inferno

uncle as the mill’s manager and continued his land acquisition

that engulfed Seattle on June 6, 1889, destroying the central

strategy, buying choice timberlands from private owners near

business district. Twenty-five city blocks were consumed by

the Blakely Line railroad. Times were tough, however. The

the blaze, in addition to four wharves and adjacent railroad

Panic of 1893 lessened the company’s business in western

terminals. The loss to Seattle was devastating, estimated at

coastal states and its shipments to Australia stagnated,

$20 million. Rebuilding began immediately, with supplies and

although additional overseas markets like China and Japan

funds coming from all over the West Coast to support the city’s

helped pick up the slack. Other lumber producers, however,

reconstruction. People also arrived from across the country to

could not weather the panic, and as the situation became dire,

offer their skills, time, and effort. The city’s population quickly

many of them closed. “There are wrecks of mills all along the

doubled in one year to forty thousand, making Seattle the

Coast,” Holmes wrote. “We are . . . in better shape than any

largest city in Washington.

other mill plant on the Coast.”

Port Blakely’s population also grew, reaching one thousand

Still, there were some intricate problems facing the

people by the beginning of the 1890s. Millworkers formed

company, chief among them the new transcontinental

bordering communities like New Sweden and Yama, the latter

railroads. The Northern Pacific Railroad now linked the Great

created by the island’s burgeoning Japanese population. When

Lakes region to Tacoma, while the Great Northern Railroad

a state law banning liquor sales closed up the hotel’s saloon,

connected Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota, to Seattle. The

Renton established a country club to fill the social void. He was

railroads made it infinitely more effective to transport lumber

a respected, even revered figure in his adopted town, described

from the Puget Sound region to eastern markets, but as an

as a “plain, unassuming, earnest man of business.”

island-based cargo mill relying on maritime commerce, the

On July 18, 1891, having “put life into the commerce of Puget Sound,” the Seattle Press-Times reported, Captain

While Charles Holmes remained in charge of the sales

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Port Blakely mill was at a decided disadvantage. Making matters more challenging was that its export business also fell.

“We never have had less inquiry in any of the foreign markets than at this time,” Holmes wrote John Campbell in 1895. “Unless orders come in more freely, we will have to draw in our horns a little on manufacture.” Nonetheless, profits were strong, thanks to the advantageous arrangement with Sol Simpson’s logging company, of which Holmes and the Campbell brothers owned a two-thirds stake. During the worst of the recession in 1895, the company still managed to gainfully produce 105 million board feet of lumber and load nearly two hundred ships. At the mill’s request, Hall Brothers the following year built the first fivemasted schooner ever constructed on the West Coast. At 215.5 feet in length, the Inca could haul more wood than any other ship in the world, enabling greater productivity gains. Profit margins were further widened by new band saws that cut 40,000 board feet of lumber during a ten-hour shift, much

The Port Blakely Mill can be seen in the rear of this image. As more ships were built by its neighbor and customer, Hall Brothers Shipbuilding, ships traveling from many parts of the world came to call. The mill grew year after year to accommodate the rising demand, eventually becoming the largest indoor sawmill in the world.

more than the older circular saws. The company also erected a quarter-mile-long elevated tramway that transported lumber from the mill to the ships calling at its docks, cutting the time to load cargo in half.

Squeezed by the Railroads Despite these many enhancements, the inability to ship by rail gradually squeezed revenues. Holmes and the Campbell brothers were compelled to consider novel ways to compete. In 1897 a berthing slip was built at Blakely Harbor to load railcars packed with lumber onto a barge. The vessel was then towed to a wharf in Ballard, a city to the northwest of Seattle that

At 215.5 feet in length, the Inca could haul more wood than any other ship in the world, enabling greater productivity gains.

was a nexus of both the Great Northern and Northern Pacific railroads. There, the railcars literally rolled off the barge and onto the tracks. Since the railroads priced cargo by weight, the

A Fine Deal

mill installed a dry kiln to evaporate moisture from the lumber prior to shipment. This unique rail connection to eastern markets was a factor in Jack Eddy’s interest in acquiring the company, given the family’s considerable lumber contacts in Michigan. Far more important was its vast timber holdings. Like the captain before him, Campbell had resisted harvesting the company’s trees. In 1902 Charles Holmes turned seventy years old. Both he and the Campbell brothers were ready to move onto other pastures. They put the mill up for sale, in addition to more than 120,000 acres of prime forestlands. The company, John Campbell boasted at the time, was “never in better shape than it is today.” He wasn’t exaggerating. When Jack Eddy made his first visit to the mill in late 1902, it was shipping nearly 120 million board feet of lumber per year. Two hundred vessels annually called at

sixty-acre site. A much smaller shipbuilding concern took over

its ports, bound primarily for San Francisco but also Australia,

the abandoned location.

China, Japan, Peru, and even South Africa. Hall Brothers

Jack negotiated with several mills that the Eddy family knew

next door was building its second five-masted schooner, and

in Michigan to buy the company’s lumber by rail. He took great

finishing off four four-masted schooners.

pride in producing only the highest-grade product, in part to

After Jack and Ned Skinner bought Port Blakely Mill Co. in 1903, Jack—by then thirty years old—returned to Port Blakely

maintain optimal pricing. One of Jack’s first decisions at the mill was to institute

to manage the new acquisition while Ned remained in San

new logging and land purchasing practices. Sol Simpson and

Francisco, where he assumed overall sales responsibilities

his associate, H. O. Siler, cruised inland timberlands and then

from Holmes. James G. Eddy soon joined Ned at the office.

estimated the volume of lumber that could be produced from

But no sooner had the new owners taken possession of the

The five-masted Inca’s size and rig attracted great attention during its construction. When launched in 1896, schools were closed so students could attend this important shipbuilding event.

these properties. Jack felt the surveyors were underestimating

company than they experienced a major setback—an abrupt

the merchantable timber by 35 percent. He directed Siler to

decision by Hall Brothers Shipbuilding to relocate to Eagle

reconsider his assessments, believing there were far more trees

Harbor one and one-half miles north of the mill. There, it

that were merchantable than the cruiser calculated. By having

planned to manufacture steel-hulled ships that required much

a better grasp of the merchantable trees on a property, the

less wood. Ironically, Port Blakely Mill Co. had sold the firm the

company could negotiate a more accurate price to acquire it.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Jack also prudently departed from Renton’s practice of hiring only independent logging companies. In 1909 he set up a subsidiary called Florence Logging Company, capitalized in

was ever formally presented to Weyerhaeuser is unclear. In any event, no transaction took place. Rather, ownership of the company altered. On August

part by Siler, to cut logs for the two mills at a fixed price of $4

16, 1905, the capital stock of Port Blakely Mill Co. was

per thousand board feet. Siler could sell on the open market

increased from 600 shares to 25,000 shares. At the same time,

any logs not wanted by either mill. Over the next twelve years,

Robert and James G. invested $350,400 of Eddy Investment

Florence Logging would cut more than 400 million board feet

Company funds into the Port Blakely Mill Co., each acquiring

of lumber.

2,190 shares of the total 25,000 shares. Certainly James G.’s

The early years of Eddy family ownership were profitable,

optimism must have played a role in Robert’s willingness

as the national economy rebounded. Domestic industrial

to invest. In a letter to Robert earlier that month, he wrote,

output grew rapidly, tripling from 1900 to 1910, and the lumber

“The lumber business is on the boom here as elsewhere. We

industry shared in the recovery. Washington mills produced more than 4 billion feet of lumber in 1905, making the state the top lumber producer in the country. Prices for Douglas-fir were on an upswing, soaring from around $9 per thousand board feet in 1899 to $14.40 by 1907. Not all was upbeat for Port Blakely Mill Co., however. As rail became the preferred mode to transport lumber domestically and to Canada, more mills opened along rail lines to accommodate the demand. Many competitors shipped 70 percent and more by rail, while the Port Blakely Mill Co. still transported 79 percent of its lumber production by ship. It soon dropped from being the state’s number-one lumber producer to fifth place. Nevertheless, it continued to make money, reporting $101,000 in profits in the first six months of 1905. In August of that year, management considered offering one-half of the stock in Port Blakely Mill Co. for $1 million to Weyerhaeuser Timber Co., which owned more than nine hundred thousand acres of timberlands west of the Cascade

Several ships loading lumber on the wharves of the Port Blakely Mill, circa 1905.

Mountains. Weyerhaeuser also would be given the option to buy all the stock for a total of $2.1 million. Whether the offer

A Fine Deal

are swamped with sailors and steamers.” Evidently, the export business had picked up significantly. Within months, domestic sales also would grow sizably. The Great San Francisco earthquake and fire on April 18, 1906, generated enormous demand for lumber from Puget Sound mills, although the disaster also had destroyed the company’s offices in the city, forcing James G. and Ned to set up temporary facilities in Berkeley. San Francisco’s ultimate rebuilding consumed nearly 3 million board feet of lumber per day, an unknown percentage of this volume from Port Blakely Mill Co. One can assume its superior position as a cargo mill with some of the world’s fastest schooners gave it the upper hand, and it scurried to send as much wood as possible to the ravaged city. Unfortunately, with so much lumber already on hand in San Francisco, demand gradually fell off. Other challenges surfaced. In May 1906 Sol Simpson died, ending his company’s longstanding agreement to provide less expensive logs to the mill than other mills paid. The following year delivered even bleaker news. On the night of April 22, 1907, the world’s largest sawmill burned to the ground. As with the previous fire, overheated machinery

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The headline in the Seattle PostIntelligencer tells it all—the destruction by fire of the world’s largest sawmill April 22, 1907. Flames could be seen from miles away, “howling into the heavens,” the newspaper reported. Two years passed before it was rebuilt.

was the culprit. The next day, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer described “flames screaming and howling into the heavens . . . illuminating the whole country round about.” In Seattle when the blaze erupted, Jack tried unsuccessfully to secure a ferry to the mill, and glumly watched the flames light the sky from across the sound. Without pause, he contacted James G. and Ned to express his resolve in rebuilding the plant. Losses were estimated at $300,000, and Jack was confident that the company’s $200,000 insurance policy would defray the costs. Although the insurers initially disputed the claim, a judge eventually ruled in the company’s favor. Two years passed, however, before the mill was again up and running, at a cost of $273,000. While smaller and no longer the world’s largest, the mill was more nimble and productive following the installation of more efficient saws and an aerial cable that expeditiously transported cut lumber to the kiln for drying.

(Top) The Great Seattle Fire of June 6, 1889. The photograph was taken from Railroad Avenue looking east. The fire, caused by a worker heating glue over a gasoline stove, destroyed the entire central business district. The fire could be seen by residents of Port Blakely eight miles away. (Center) The original Port Blakely Mill lies in ruins following a devastating fire in 1888. “The only thing that could have saved the mill was to have immersed it in Puget Sound,” Captain Renton said, as he vowed to rebuild it into what he called a much larger “Great Mill.” (Bottom) The world’s largest sawmill burned to the ground in 1907 and reopened two years later, more productive but smaller.

A Fine Deal

By the time the mill reopened in 1909 the Eddy brothers also owned another mill, acquired that July in Everett, twentyeight miles north of Seattle on Puget Sound. The Ferry-Baker Lumber Company was ten years old when Jack, Robert, and James G. purchased it for $265,000. Ned Skinner was not involved in the deal. Although the acquisition did not include any timberlands, it comprised the sawmill, an office building, planing mill, machine shops, several scows to ferry logs and lumber, and a sales office at the terminus of the Great Northern Railroad in Minneapolis. Unlike the Port Blakely mill, FerryBaker enjoyed prime railroad access to eastern markets. James G. was named president of the company, prompting him to move from Berkeley to Everett; Jack was named vice president. Certainly, it was not the ten-cents-an-hour job that Jack had jokingly envisioned for his younger brother six years earlier, and James G. was eager to take it on. Within two years, he had modernized the mill, transitioning it from steam power to electric power. At the time, it was believed to be the first and only sawmill in Washington running entirely on electricity. More challenges surfaced in 1913, as yet another national economic recession hit. For the first time in its history, the company lost money. Then it got worse. The next year Port Blakely Mill Co. nearly drowned in red ink, losing more than four hundred thousand dollars. Meanwhile, the forest conservation movement had erupted, with pivotal support S.S. West Elcasco hull under construction in scaffolding in Skinner & Eddy shipyard, Seattle, July 26, 1918.

from a crusading president, Theodore Roosevelt. The federal government declared 149 forest regions protected, and concern mushroomed among lumbermen that their holdings would soon be subject to strict regulations. When war broke out in Europe in June 1914, following the assassination of the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, the industryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s export business

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

also faltered, as foreign ships were tied up by the conflict.

High rez ordered

These many challenges faced the Eddy brothers as they struggled to put their lumber interests on firmer financial footing. Little did they realize in that summer of 1914 that the United States would join the “war to end all wars” in three years. Nor could they have imagined that the country’s involvement would sharply increase demand for lumber to build military boats, barracks, bridges, airplanes, and other materiel. Undoubtedly, they also had no idea that World War I would entice them into a new enterprise—shipbuilding—that would forever associate the words “Skinner & Eddy” with America’s triumphant victory overseas. All that now lay ahead, as a new era beckoned. u The S.S. Edgefield, manufactured by Skinner & Eddy, launched on December 7,1918. It was the most recent of an incredible string of ships the company built—all in record time.

Undoubtedly, they also had no idea that World War I Logo of the great Skinner & Eddy of Seattle, America’s foremost shipbuilder during World War I.

would entice them into a new enterprise—shipbuilding— that would forever associate

“Skinner & Eddy” with America’s triumphant victory overseas. the words

A Fine Deal

Chapter

Forests owned by Port Blakely Tree Farms stretch for miles and cover some of the most scenic landscapes in North America. This particular piece is the Morton block, located in Lewis County, south of Seattle.

Building Tomorrowâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Company 72

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of the Port Blakely Companies

It was tough going for America's lumber industry during World War I, but Port Blakely Mill Co. saw opportunity on the horizon. Most oceangoing ships were engaged for wartime uses, causing a dearth of available vessels to ship lumber overseas and domestically. For Port Blakely Mill Co., which operated a cargo mill on Bainbridge Island, the impact was significant: exports fell to less than one-fifth their prewar levels. The Eddy brothers and Ned Skinner realized a decisive response to the war was required, if only to protect their investments in the Port Blakely and Everett mills. They had discerned that the war had correspondingly increased the value of their ships—a tenfold rise from prewar levels. Following the 1907 acquisition of Moe Brothers Transportation Co., which operated steamers between Seattle (Left to Right) In this portrait are John W. Eddy; Stanley Lane Eddy, Mary Ford Eddy’s father; Edwin Milo Eddy, Selwyn Eddy’s son; and James G. Eddy.

and the sound’s mill ports, the company owned numerous vessels, from the four-masted Blakely schooner, with a capacity of nine hundred thousand board feet of lumber, to a variety of different-sized steamships. As governments began tying up most of the world’s oceangoing ships for wartime uses, the company purchased Globe Navigation Company’s entire fleet of five wooden schooners for $90,000 in 1914 to augment its existing capacity. “The buying and selling of ships was a constant interest of the partners,” writer William Sherrard notes in an unpublished early history of Port Blakely Mill Company. Building Tomorrow’s Company

A newer and far more intriguing interest of the partners was manufacturing their own steel ships. The Eddy brothers certainly were familiar with shipbuilding. Their father Frank had organized Eddy Transportation Company, which middle brother Robert managed. Jack Eddy, an inveterate seafarer, also owned the Favorite, the only side-wheel towboat and freighter on Puget Sound. And all three brothers had acquired broad knowledge and experience in commercial shipping. Still, starting a shipbuilding enterprise from scratch took nerve and daring. On January 5, 1916, Skinner & Eddy Corporation was formed to manufacture primarily steel-hulled ships for the company’s use and for sale to private and public concerns. Three thousand shares of stock valued at $100 per share formed the paid-in capital of the corporation. Jack held 1,000 shares, Ned, as the company’s president, held 999 shares, and James G. and chief engineer C. B. Lamont held 500 shares each. L. B. Stedman, the company’s secretary, owned a single share. Additional capital—a $750,000 loan from the Bank of California—was obtained that May. The loan represents the

The Eddy brothers and Ned Skinner realized a decisive response to the war was required, if only to protect

Port Blakely and Everett mills. their investments in the

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

No shipbuilder during World War I earned as many records and accolades as Seattle-based Skinner & Eddy. As many as 15,000 workers put their efforts behind building dozens of vessels, many in record time.

first time the Eddy family, from its days in Maine and Michigan to its years in Washington state, financed one of its many

Ships in Record Time

business undertakings with debt.

Ned moved from San Francisco to Seattle to join Jack at Skinner & Eddy, while James G. continued to manage the Ferry-Baker mill. The new company hit the ground running. Within a year, it would become one of the most efficient and expeditious shipbuilders in the world. An existing 25.5-acre facility in Seattle to build ships, Seattle Construction and Dry Dock Company, was leased north of Atlantic Street. It had previously been known as Moran Brothers and had built ships bound for the Klondike Gold Rush. David Rodgers, an experienced shipbuilder whose father owned a shipyard in Ireland, was recruited to manage the concern. He had been in the trade since he was ten years old. Prior to his hiring, Rodgers had run the yards at Seattle Construction and Dry Dock. He had very specific ideas about how to vastly improve a ship’s construction, which he presented to Ned and Jack. The facility encompassed the customary fabrication buildings, drafting rooms, mold lofts, powerhouse, and toolsheds. But with the war under way, the owners sought swifter methods to address the anticipated rush of orders from foreign governments. Rodgers introduced a novel concept: instead of building one ship at a time, they would build sections of a ship in different shops. Each shop thus could direct its energies to prefabricating a single module. When the section was finished, an aerial tramway much like the one at the Port Blakely mill was erected to move the module quickly and efficiently to the yard for final assembly.

Skinner & Eddy’s innovative foreman David Rodgers, credited with the modular shipbuilding system, listens to a speech by Charles Schwab of the Emergency Fleet Corporation, commemorating another of the shipyard’s record-breaking successes.

For the first time in ship construction history, separate sections of a vessel could be worked on at the same time by

Building Tomorrow’s Company

Only one of the many ships built by Skinner & Eddy during World War I sank; many others remained in service through the Second World War.

different groups of tradesmen. “When Skinner & Eddy began, it

630,000 rivets. The company ordered two more ships of the

was believed that only the members of one [shipbuilding] craft

same size after receiving the first vessel. Orders for another five

could work on a vessel at one time; by war’s end, Rodgers had

ships subsequently flew in over the transom, all from private

so organized the tasks that fourteen crafts could work on a hull

contractors. It was quite clear to Jack and Ned that building

simultaneously,” Sherrard writes.

ships for companies other than Port Blakely Mill Co.—at

While this manufacturing method was faster, it took great management skill to direct and supervise it. Fortunately, Ned,

least for the time being—held more financial promise than constructing its own ships.

Jack, Rodgers, and their workers were up to the task. Their

That first vessel set the stage for all that followed, earning

inaugural effort, the Niels Nielson, an eighty-eight-hundred-

Skinner & Eddy a growing reputation for building high-quality

ton steel freighter that was sold for approximately six hundred

ships quickly—so fast, in fact, that it would consistently break

thousand dollars to a private shipping concern in Norway, was

the world’s shipbuilding records. Its first world record was the

assembled from more than 19,000 steel pieces and as many as

eighty-eight-hundred-ton West Haven, turned out in sixty-four

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

working days, from keel to launch, in November 1917. Prior to

ton freighters more quickly than competing shipbuilders on both

the war, it took roughly twelve to eighteen months to build and

coasts. It was not the only shipbuilder in Seattle; five companies

deliver a ship of this size and class. The following April, the

built steel ships, and another twelve built wooden ships. But no

company smashed its own record, building and shipping the

shipbuilder could match this productive output: the West Alsek,

eighty-eight-hundred-ton West Lianga for the U.S. government

built in fifty-eight days, the West Apaum and West Cohas in fifty-

in fifty-five days. “55-DAY LAUNCHING BREAKS WORLD

five days, and the West Ekonk in fifty-seven days, all eighty-eight-

RECORD,” The New York Times blared in capital letters.

hundred-ton freighters. The company’s thirty-first ship in the

It was just the beginning. After the United States declared

eighty-eight-hundred-ton class, the West Mahomet, was launched

war on Germany on April 7, 1917, following the sinking of

only forty-six days after its keel had been laid, shattering Skinner

seven U.S. merchant ships by German submarines, Skinner

& Eddy’s previous world record. Forty-three of its first fifty ships

& Eddy became a much-sought-after builder of ships for the

were launched within one hundred days.

military effort. Thanks to Rodgers’s ingenious modular system,

The competition was astounded at the record yield. M. E.

the company turned out a succession of eighty-eight-hundred-

Farr, president of American Shipbuilding Company, the leading

So long as demand for lumber continued, the Port Blakely Mill supplied it, until railroads came on the scene and made shipments of inbound lumber competitively difficult for mills that relied primarily on waterborne commerce.

PBC0046.jpg

Building Tomorrow’s Company

The crew of the Favorite, one of many towboats owned by Eddy Transportation Company, which plied the Great Lakes.

shipbuilder at the time, wrote to Jack, “I wonder how you

and foreign commerce. Seventy percent of the country’s

worked it, to establish a new yard and get so many ships in the

shipbuilding capacity was soon committed to producing

time you had.”

battleships and other vessels. The shipping board immediately

Jack replied, “It has not always been a question . . . as to how cheaply we could construct the vessels, but more of a question

& Eddy, and in May 1918 gave the company the largest single

of how soon we could turn them out in this emergency.” The

shipbuilding contract awarded during the war: $100 million

war, of course, demanded speedy construction. Self-effacing

to construct thirty-five ships, most of them destined for U.S.

as always, Jack gave credit to “the men working in our

Navy service. The massive unemployment caused by the Panic

plant . . . from the president down to each common laborer.”

of 1913 was eased. In Seattle a scant five years later, more

Ten days after the United States declared war, Congress created the U.S. Shipping Board Emergency Fleet Corporation, which was granted broad powers to acquire merchant ships to meet national defense needs, and to help maintain domestic

ordered six eighty-eight-hundred-ton freighters from Skinner

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

than thirty-five thousand people worked at the city’s twenty shipyards. At Skinner & Eddy, the government’s orders necessitated larger shipbuilding facilities and more workers. Fifteen acres of

contiguous Seattle waterfront property were purchased from two companies for a total of $2.1 million. The larger piece of property was acquired from Seattle Dry Dock Company for $1.5 million, believed to have been the largest real estate transaction in the city’s history at the time. On these fifteen acres, the company built a second shipyard and called it Plant No. 2. When the second plant was completed, it comprised a dry dock capable of servicing vessels of up to fifteen thousand tons and a fifty-ton floating crane to move the modular ship sections.

At Skinner & Eddy, the government’s orders

With money flowing in from the government, Skinner & Eddy

necessitated larger

in June 1918 purchased Plant No. 1, the existing facility that

shipbuilding facilities

it had formerly leased. Its two shipbuilding plants collectively covered approximately fifty-seven acres of waterfront property, with ten slipways (five at each plant) and four outfitting blocks. The second objective—more workers—was also realized. Skinner & Eddy employed 1,900 workers in 1917. The following year it employed nearly 10,000 people, and at the peak of construction 13,500 workers, although some reports indicate

and more workers.

Fifteen acres of contiguous Seattle waterfront property were purchased

as many as 15,000 people worked for Skinner & Eddy. To

from two companies for a

recruit prospective employees, special trains were chartered

total of

and dispatched to the rural farms dotting eastern Washington,

$2.1 million.

leading many farmers to complain about the pirating of fruit pickers. Constructing ships, the workers were told, was a far more prosperous enterprise. “To get and hold workers, wages and salaries were made generous, to the extent that union leaders sought the wage scales paid by Skinner & Eddy Corporation for workers in all Pacific Coast shipyards,” Sherrard notes. Rather than fight spreading unionization, Jack and Ned became proactive regarding workers’ benefits. They staunchly believed their company was a benevolent employer—for good

Building Tomorrow’s Company

reason. It had maintained a modern hospital that provided free hospitalization to employees and their families. Supervisors were involved in a profit-sharing plan—an incentive to speed ship construction—and those at the highest levels were given a percentage of net profits. Consequently the company “had less trouble with labor” than the competition, The New York Times reported. Skinner & Eddy also was an “open” organization, Sherrard writes. “Any employee was free to make any suggestion for work improvement.” They did just that, culminating in two pivotal shipbuilding innovations: a scarfing or skiving machine used to cut steel plates prior to their joining, and a pneumatic ram for bending frame bars to fit a vessel’s form. Other shipyards soon adopted the new technologies. Workers returned these various benefits by organizing the Employees Relief Association of Skinner & Eddy, which

and fastest shipbuilder not just along the

Pacific Coast; it was the national standard-bearer. Speed was of the essence,

pledged more than ten thousand dollars per month to the war

and the company made an

effort, a very generous amount.

extraordinary effort in

The Times article further noted that the company “made more money than any other [shipbuilder],” citing its unique business arrangement with the shipping board. Unlike other shipbuilders that had agreed to a cost-plus contract, Skinner & Eddy was paid a lump sum for each ship constructed. Chalk it up to Jack’s business acumen and Ned’s negotiating skills.

“Let’s Build a Ship” Skinner & Eddy was the most profitable, prolific, and fastest shipbuilder not just along the Pacific Coast; it was the national standard-bearer. Speed was of the essence, and the company made an extraordinary effort in this regard. When Rodgers learned that his production crew would not receive

Skinner & Eddy was the most profitable, prolific,

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

this regard.

The Other Partner

an order of turbine engines on time, he reported the news to Jack, who chartered an entire train to transport the engines from New York to Seattle—in eleven days. When Jack found out that several carloads of steel had failed to arrive by rail as scheduled, he dispatched a locomotive to find out where the

David Edward “Ned” Skinner was as close as a brother to Jack and James G. Eddy, and was a distant relative, in fact, by marriage. He had spent his early career in Bay City’s sprawling salt industry and had inked his first partnership with Jack in the salt business. When Ned moved to San Francisco, he continued in this trade and in the lumber

errant railcars were. Ultimately located in Texas along a rail

business, until he and the Eddy brothers

siding, they were hitched to the locomotive and pulled directly

acquired the great Port Blakely Mill Co.

to Seattle. In modern supply chains predicated on just-in-time manufacturing philosophies, such feats are a routine matter. Ninety-two years ago they were virtually unknown. The company became so famous for its record production rate that songs were written about it. As one melody goes: “Come on my lads, let’s build a ship,”

Skinner was born in Hillsdale,

Michigan, in 1867. After high school he went to Weaver College in North Carolina, a school he would later benefit generously. In 1911 he relocated to

PBC-0338

Seattle to be closer to the mill, and in 1916 incorporated Skinner & Eddy with Jack, the fastest, most productive, and

shouts kindly David Rodgers.

most celebrated shipbuilding company

“That Kaiser guy is too darned flip

on the West Coast during World War I.

and all his bloody codgers.”

Then rivet-hammers start a tune,

the Eddy brothers, his business career

the hopes of free men voicing;

continued on an upward trek. A born

the ship is launched and very soon

salesman, he had little difficulty migrating from one industry to another, and

Goes on its way rejoicing.

enjoyed stints running a salmon fishing company in Alaska, a salmon packing

When Skinner parted ways with

Ned Skinner joined his friend Jack Eddy in guiding two enterprises—the Port Blakely Mill Co. and the Skinner & Eddy shipyard.

concern, a steamship company, and various real estate ventures. Skinner

Newspaper cartoons trumpeted its efforts, and letters poured

and his wife Jeanette were early patrons of Seattle’s Children’s Orthopedic

in to Jack and Ned from a thankful government. “The U.S.

Hospital, and Jeanette served on the hospital’s board of trustees. Like the

Shipping Board wishes to express to your workmen, first, our

Eddy brothers, Ned had a profound work ethic. “He reached the age of sixty

sincere appreciation for their great effort,” wrote shipping board chairman Edward N. Hurley. “And then to you and the Skinner & Eddy Corporation for the pace you have set in the launching of steel ships . . . Other shipyards will have a hard time to equal it.” Hurley was correct in his pronouncement. No other shipbuilder came close to the company’s production or its

and yet would not, or could not retire, so great was his zest for work and the thing that lay just ahead,” Jeanette wrote in her 1935 memoir, Skinner and Allied Families.

At a memorial following Ned Skinner’s death in 1933, Rev. W. F. Major

cited his and Jack’s contributions to their adopted city, “building ships in such perfection as to call the attention of the world to a marvelous production and soon his city of Seattle was on the map in a blaze of international glory.”

Building Tomorrow’s Company

many records. Rodgers hung the congratulatory letter on the

naval ships. Battles continued to erupt in the former Russian

shipyard’s bulletin board.

Empire following the overthrow of the czar, and in parts of the

Longstanding eastern shipyards marveled at its success, and

Ottoman Empire as well. The United States also had stepped

keen rivalries developed between Atlantic and Pacific coast

onto the world stage as a global power for the first time,

yards. Assisting Skinner & Eddy, however, was something most

and sought to increase its military capacity. In the postwar

competitors lacked: access to its own lumber to supply the

period, the shipping board signed four additional contracts

wood needed to make ship interiors and other parts. James G.

with Skinner & Eddy to construct forty-three ships—much

transported lumber from the Everett mill by both barge and rail

more than the government later realized it needed. The board

to the shipyard, an output that would reach more than 1 billion

subsequently canceled some of the orders, and then sued

board feet before the war’s end.

the company for work it allegedly had paid for but was left

When the armistice was signed in Europe on November 11,

unfinished. Jack and Ned countersued the board for the loss of

1918, Skinner & Eddy stood alone as the shipyard most vital

anticipated profits. The dispute ended up in the U.S. Supreme

to America’s war engine. The company had delivered fifty-six

Court in 1923, which ruled against Skinner & Eddy.

ships to the shipping board during the war, more than any other shipbuilder in the country. Only one of its vessels was lost during World War I, and several would remain in U.S. Navy service through World War II. Partly because of the company’s contributions, President Woodrow Wilson selected Seattle as a stop on his nationwide campaign to lobby for a League of Nations. Wilson viewed a parade of fifty-one navy vessels that assembled on Elliott Bay, several pieced and riveted together at the Skinner & Eddy shipyards. The official end of the war did not end wartime orders for

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Logs waiting to be milled in Port Blakely.

Despite this bitter postscript, the company deserved the high praise accorded for its remarkable wartime achievements. In less than four years, David Rodgers and his crews had constructed seventy-six oceangoing vessels. Pacific Shipping Illustrated extolled their “unparalleled war period feats,” among them a final keel-to-launch record of forty-two days, “one of the great high-water marks in industrial America.” Skinner & Eddy, the publication stated, was the “shipbuilding pacemaker for the world.” In 1920, however, with all its government contracts either fulfilled or canceled, and prospects for orders elsewhere bleak because of over-tonnage on the seas, Skinner & Eddy began the process of shutting down and dismantling its shipyards.

Fishing in Puget Sound joined logging and milling as a primary enterprise in the Pacific Northwest. The vessels in this image are anchored in Blakely Harbor.

The previous year the corporation had become the holding company for Port Blakely Mill Co. Now, Ned had decided he

to be reaped from the tremendous investments in modern

no longer wanted any part of the lumber business, and the

machinery required to effectively compete. When the decision

Eddy family felt the same way about shipbuilding. The partners

was made to shutter the mill, “All knew the fate of the town was

worked out a stock swap in 1923 whereby they split up the

sealed,” Sherrard writes.

various assets, more or less, according to these wishes. Ned

In 1924, the mill was torn down and its obsolete machinery

later founded the Metropolitan Building Company in Seattle

sold for salvage value. The hotel was boarded up and burned

and became a force in the Alaska fishing and salmon packing

to the ground four years later. When the general store closed

industry as chairman of Alaska Pacific Salmon Corporation. He

its doors, most of the homes in town were put on the block.

had come a long way from his days as a salt merchant.

Few of them sold. Once-promising plans by the company to

Not only was the shipyard shuttered, but the famed Port

sell beachfront lots soon faded, though a version of this idea

Blakely Mill also neared the end of its useful life. No longer

would be revived decades later. Today, all that remains of the

under Jack’s supervision, the former grand dame of sawmills

town and the world’s largest sawmill is a decaying cement

was leased in 1916 for fifty-five thousand dollars a year to

structure that had housed the power generating units, stubs

Dominion Mill Company, which operated it for the next seven

of pilings where there had once been wharves, a dam built in

years, finally announcing that it would cease operations. When

the late 1880s to provide a dependable supply of freshwater to

the arrangement ended, Jack and James G. reviewed their

the boilers, and a residential home that once was the town’s

options, ultimately concluding that there was very little return

firehouse. Nature has reclaimed the historic town. A plaque

Building Tomorrow’s Company

used to be affixed to a boulder alongside the main road— named 3T Road—that described Port Blakely as it once was.

After the closing of the shipyards and the Bainbridge mill,

the Eddy brothers turned their attention to their forestlands, which had remained largely intact during the war—even with the 1 billion board feet in lumber shipped to Skinner & Eddy. While Jack and James G. could have withdrawn from business life and enjoyed well-earned retirements, the thought apparently never occurred to them. Work was the fabric of their being, not that they and their siblings did not lead interesting, full lives. It was the 1920s after all—the Jazz Age, the Roaring Twenties. Having inherited the wanderlust that enticed their forebears across oceans and continents, they traveled the world via luxury steamships, private railcars, fine automobiles, and the new passenger airlines that had come on the scene.

Wedding Bells Robert had been the first of the brothers to marry. In June 1903 he and Ethel Elizabeth Randall, daughter of a prominent Bay City physician, tied the knot. In 1913 Ethel gave birth to a daughter Elizabeth, known to all as Libby. Ethel had attended the prestigious Liggett School in Detroit and was considered a Gibson Girl beauty, the personification of the era’s feminine physical ideal—tall, curvy, and impossibly narrow-waisted, a feat of physics performed by the swan-bill corset. Her hair was piled high in a fashionable burst of curls. She graduated from Vassar College. Robert’s best man was his brother James G., who announced his own engagement to one of Ethel’s bridesmaids, Mary Horton Cooley, at the wedding reception. The affair was the major social event of the season in Bay City.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

(Top) With two sawmills powered by three giant steam boilers, it was not surprising that an early visitor would describe the Port Blakely Mill as a “monstrous thing alive, pouring out freight.” (Center) These small houses along the shoreline of Port Blakely were built by Captain Renton to house millworkers and their families, as well as visiting seamen, some perhaps aboard the ships in the rear. (Bottom) These unidentified men at the mill’s docks are thought to be managers at the Port Blakely Mill or possibly ship masters awaiting supplies of lumber, given their attire and confident manner. Indeed, the gentleman second from left appears to be wearing clothing and sporting facial hair suggestive of a foreign land.

After the closing of the shipyards and the Bainbridge mill, the Eddy brothers

Garrett Eddy successfully persuaded his father and uncle to consider thinning some of Port Blakely Mill Company’s forest lands, using innovative practices that Garrett pioneered.

turned their attention to their forestlands, which had remained largely intact during the war—even with the

1 million

board feet in lumber shipped to

Skinner & Eddy.

Building Tomorrow’s Company

Mary’s father was Edgar Cooley, a founder and partner in the Cooley and Hewitt law firm. In April 1904 she and James G. also

and music recitals. Recalled as spirited and charming, she

were married in Bay City, though the wedding and reception

nonetheless remained close to her mother Lottie. In 1906

were more subdued. James G. and Mary over time welcomed the

she married Lieutenant Walter Victor Cotchett in Berkeley,

birth of three daughters—Adaline Seymour in 1907, Charlotte

California. The young couple subsequently moved to St. Paul,

Whittemore in 1911, and Mary Anne in 1916—and when it

Minnesota, and then migrated during the outbreak of war in 1914

appeared that all they would ever have were girls, they adopted a

to Vienna, where Walter was an attaché at the U.S. embassy.

son born in 1919, whom they named for his dad, James Garfield Jr., though the family called him Jack.

Upon their return to Bay City in 1916 Lu gave birth to a son, Walter Jr. By 1918 the family was again across the Atlantic,

Jack followed his brothers into matrimony in April 1908.

this time living in France, to assist wounded French soldiers.

His bride was Ethel Garrett, a rather artistic-minded young lady

Lu and Walter were later awarded the rank of chevalier in the

who lived in Enetai, a community near Bremerton, Washington,

French Legion of Honor for their steadfast altruism. The family

on the Kitsap Peninsula. Jack courted Ethel in fine fashion. A

decided to stay in France after the war ended, and purchased

tidal strait called “Rich Passage” separates Bremerton from

a down-on-its-heels fifteenth-century château—the Château

Bainbridge Island, and Jack romanced Ethel by rowboat,

St. Hilaire—in Louvier, France, that today is a highly regarded

launching the craft from the island in rowing to her home and

winery. Lottie lived with her daughter at the chateau for many

back. Ethel was born in Vienna, Louisiana, and later became a

years, until her death in 1939 at the age of eighty-seven. An urn

painter of local renown, winning several prizes for her still-life

with her ashes was placed above Frank’s coffin in the Eddy

works in oil. She also was a serious collector of rare books on

mausoleum in Bay City.

diverse subjects and developed an extensive library. During the

Caroline, the youngest of Frank and Lottie’s children, married

war, she founded a Seattle chapter of the American Merchant

Fred Johnson, a manager at Ontario Trader’s Bank, in May

Marine Library Association, which distributed books to sailors

1908. Fred was a close friend of her brother Robert, who was

bound for Europe.

managing the Eddy mill in Blind River, Ontario, at the time. After

In 1909 Ethel gave birth to their first child, J. Franklin Eddy,

their wedding, Caroline and Fred moved to Blind River to be

named in honor of Jack’s father Frank. Three years later a

close to Robert and Ethel. They soon returned to Bay City, where

daughter, Jasmine Lucretia, was born. In 1916 the family was

they adopted a daughter, Janet, in 1911. Sadly, Caroline passed

blessed with the birth of another son, Garrett, an extremely

away from acute appendicitis before Janet’s second birthday.

gifted and precocious child with a keen interest in animals.

(Right Page) 1. Elizabeth (Libby) Eddy 2. Franklin and Garrett Eddy 3. Franklin, Garrett, and Jasmine Eddy 4. Adaline as a teenager

The Eddy sisters, Lucretia and Caroline, moved in different circles. Lucretia—often called “Lu”—relocated in the early aughts from Bay City to San Francisco, where she enjoyed

big-city life and the cultural climate of art openings, the ballet,

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

5. Wedding invitation of Adaline Seymour and Alan Moore Starr 6. Ethel Garrett Eddy 7. Lucretia Eddy Cotchett 8. Poem by Charlotte Eddy 9. Franklin, Jasmine, and Garrett Eddy

3 8

Building Tomorrowâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Company

The Eddys enjoyed privileged lifestyles but never took this for granted, appreciative of the sweat and toil across generations that had delivered the bounty. While the women hewed close to the traditional roles of their class, the men sought to balance their hard work with enjoyable pastimes. Jack, for instance, owned an oceangoing steel yacht, the Aquilo, and wrote compellingly and colorfully about his Alaskan hunting expeditions in two books published by Putnam, Hunting on Kenai Peninsula and Hunting the Alaska Brown Bear, respectively. James G. raised thoroughbred horses at his Southern California ranch and citrus orchards, and raced them in several circuits. Robert built a beautiful summer vacation cabin at Higgins Lake in Michigan, its interior ornamented by mission-style furniture handcrafted by his uncle, Newell Eddy. The war over, the Eddy brothers reviewed their options. In a letter to Lucretia in April 1919 Jack wrote that the acquisition of Port Blakely Mill Co. almost seventeen years earlier had failed to pay back the family’s original investment. Still, it was far from a losing bet. A timber company was a “slow return” business, he explained, “paying little or nothing for years, and then the harvest.” The family’s considerable landholdings in the Pacific Northwest would provide a guaranteed annual income, Jack assured Lu. Managing these forestlands sustainably and for the long term was the strategic goal. In this quest James began looking for a buyer for the Ferry-Baker mill in Everett, while Robert sold off the family’s remaining landholdings in Michigan and Ontario.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

(Top) Jack Eddy’s beloved yacht, the Aquilo, is pictured. On board, Jack and Ethel kept a movie camera for filming silent movies of them and their friends. (Bottom) Jack Eddy was a big game hunter non pareil, who wrote about his exploits in two books. Here Jack is seen with a bear trophy from 1930.

The corrective use of herbicides to control invasive plants and trees to permit healthier growth of Douglas-fir ensures optimal trees for tomorrow. In this image from the 1980s, a helicopter sprays herbicides near Washingtonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Mount St. Helens.

Building Tomorrowâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Company

A Timber Company for Today . . . and Tomorrow

which is how the industry had treated forestlands in the past.

There were benefits to being out of the mill business. Free

resource. Although James G. did not coin the term, Port Blakely

of mill ownership, Jack and James G. did not have to force production beyond what markets could bear. Thus, they could leave the logs on the stump, until demand and price

After all, trees, unlike copper or iron ore, were a renewable Mill Co. would become what he called a “tree farm.” Rather than cut trees, move on, and then leave the land to nature, James G. urged that the company’s forestlands should be

encouraged their harvesting. Now that the principal means of generating revenue was logging, the brothers reexamined their logging subsidiary, Florence Logging Company, set up before the war to cut trees for the two mills. During the war, Florence partner H. O. Siler had supplied most of the timber that went into Skinner & Eddy’s ships. Jack and James G. wanted a more modern logging operation. They got it via a partnership with Weyerhaeuser. The parties agreed in 1923 to invest $1.25 million each in a joint venture, Siler Logging Company, which Siler would manage as president in return for a share of the profits. The partners transferred ten thousand acres of land to the company for harvesting in the years ahead. Florence Logging was later dissolved and its equipment sold to Siler Logging. James G. now mulled what a modern timber company might look like. The subject of reforestation had come under industry scrutiny as a way to prevent the barren fields left in the wake of the loggers and to provide lumber for tomorrow’s needs. James G. had a keen scientific mind—an inheritance, he often said, from his maternal grandfather, a scientist. He began to consider the timber business scientifically and economically, conferred with his former professors at Princeton, and assembled his thoughts in a business plan. His conclusion: A modern timber company needed to be managed more like a farm than a mining operation,

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Port Blakely Mill Co. and Weyerhaeuser transferred 10,000 acres of land to their jointly-owned Siler Logging Company for harvesting in future.

The WFPA

In 1902 Washington state’s largest recorded fire to date, the Yacolt Burn,

The WFPA today can look back with satisfaction on its record of fire

struck and burned more than 370 square miles of timber worth more than

prevention during its first half century. As the WFPA Annual Report noted

$30 million at the time. The disaster struck home with area timbermen

in 1970, the twenty-year average between 1950 and 1969 of total acres

like George Long at Weyerhaeuser Timber Company. Letters were mailed

burned in fires annually on members’ land was 4,480 acres. This represents

to eight hundred timberland owners, inviting them to form a voluntary

a commendable 96 percent decrease from the fifteen-year period of 1920

association to suppress forest fires. Twenty-two companies responded and

to 1935, when the annual average of acres burned exceeded 120,000. u

incorporated the Washington Forest Fire Association in 1908. Among the four founding company members was Port Blakely Mill Co. The others were Weyerhaeuser, Simpson Resource Company, and Merrill & Ring. James G. Eddy was the company’s official representative at the founding. The Washington Forest Fire Association would transform into the Washington Fire Protection Association in 1958. Over its more than onehundred-year existence, the company and the WFPA have enjoyed a close relationship. Company CEO Garrett Eddy would serve as its president for a longer tenure than any other person, while John “Onny” Warjone, the grandson of James G. Eddy and the president of the forestry division in the 1990s, also would voluntarily take the helm of the organization.

In its early years the association established a team of seventy-five

firefighters, armed with axes, hoes, and ten-quart water bags to fight fires in seven fire districts, from the coast to the Cascade Mountains. The men trekked into the blazes on horses and later on bicycles. “Between the steep hills and impassable roads, I was carrying the bike half the time,” recalled William Entwistle, one of the early firefighters, in a history of the WFPA on its Web site. Entwistle was relieved when motorcycles were introduced in 1909.

Lookout towers also were built on top of mountaintops to enhance

detection of fires. In succeeding decades, dozens lined the area, until they were replaced by aerial reconnaissance in the 1960s. The advent of tank trucks and the use of two-way radios in the 1940s, and chemical spraying in the 1950s greatly reduced the number and severity of forest fires. By 1958, after many regional fire associations were formed, the WFPA was

The illustration is a stamp produced by Weyerhaeuser Timber Company in the 1940s, noting the industry’s efforts to preserve forests from the ravages of fire.

reborn as more of a public information and political organization to reflect its members’ concerns and needs.

Building Tomorrow’s Company

replanted, postharvest, for another harvest some day in the future. It was that “some day” that ignited James G.’s intellectual firepower. Since trees take a lot longer to reach maturity than agricultural crops that are harvested after a single season, reducing this long growth cycle held the key to more frequent harvesting, and thus a quicker, more predictable financial return. James G. had bred horses and knew something about the role of genetics in improving desired traits. He hypothesized that the breeding of trees was as important as environmental influences in their health and growth. He studied the available scientific literature and was convinced that the genetic principles guiding the creation of new flowers and garden plants could be successfully applied to forestry. Then he did the extraordinary: he introduced his ideas to none other than Luther Burbank, the famed American botanist and pioneer of agricultural science, who had bred and developed more than eight hundred strains and varieties of plants. James G. literally showed up at Burbank’s doorstep in 1918. Cautiously optimistic, Dr. Burbank advised James G. to gather more scientific data. James G. took the advice, digging more deeply into the scientific literature and conferring with other scientists. He eventually accumulated a huge body of

Convinced his plans for the Eddy Tree Breeding Station had merit, James G. Eddy turned to botanist Luther Burbank (seen at his desk) and asked, “If you head the program, I will finance it.” Of advanced age at the time, Burbank declined and suggested twenty-six year-old Lloyd Austin, a fruit tree specialist, in his stead.

scientific evidence on the efficacy of tree breeding. James G. again visited Burbank. The botanist was now fully convinced of

of reforestation, he took a deep breath, stood up, and conveyed

the concept’s scientific merit. Even better, he was committed to

his revolutionary ideas about tree growth cycles and genetics

guiding James G. through the next phases of research.

to the legislators and the other private timber company owners

Persuading Dr. Burbank of the vital importance of tree breeding was one thing; convincing the forestry industry

in the room. He started out by affirming that the country had a

was quite another. James G. did not blanch at the prospect,

tremendous need for lumber, which would require more

however. In 1923, at a meeting of the Select Committee on

than just reforestation. While the planting of seedlings was

Forestry of the U.S. Senate, which was examining the subject

imperative, there was much to be gained by planting superior

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

seedlings, he explained. To reestablish the nation’s forests,

to head the facility, but Burbank, in his mid-seventies at the

faster-growing and healthier trees were required, and James

time, declined. Instead, he introduced James to Lloyd Austin,

G. believed this goal could be accomplished through plant

a twenty-six-year-old fruit tree specialist at the University

genetics. The goal, he asserted, was the development of “bigger

of California College of Agriculture, with whom he had

and better trees, to ensure a proper reforestation of the cutover areas of the timber country.” His “was the

Austin was intrigued by the possibility of enlarging his fieldwork to include conifers, and James G. was captivated by the man’s knowledge and youthful zeal. Austin got the job and

most unusual and

put his brainpower to the task ahead—a mission of breeding

surprising statement

forest trees to improve their qualities for use as lumber. In the

of the entire two

next six years the Eddy Tree Breeding Station experimented

days, and it made a

with the breeding of the ninety different varieties of pine trees

great impression,”

that could be cross-pollinated to produce superior strains.

American Forests magazine reported. The positive

The facility quickly distinguished itself in scientific circles as the most complete arboretum of pine trees in the world. Several researchers from fields as diverse as cytology, ecology,

reception that he

and taxonomy joined Austin, their salaries—not to mention all

received at the hearings

necessary scientific equipment and the continual expansion of

from both the government

the research station—paid for entirely by James G.. His tireless

and his fellow timbermen

efforts on behalf of the institution would pay off scientifically,

urged James G. to do

and to the betterment of humankind, in the years ahead.

more than just talk about James G. Eddy’s interest in tree genetics was spurred, in part, by the foundational work of the great botanist Luther Burbank. Burbank would become James G.’s mentor as he undertook plans to create the Eddy Tree Breeding Station.

collaborated on fruit tree hybridization.

tree genetics. Two years

Meanwhile, other productivity improvements emerged in the forestry industry. The widespread use of trucks to haul logs,

later he took Burbank’s

and better roads to accommodate this mode of transport, made

advice and personally funded

logging railroads like the old Blakely Line superfluous. Tractors

the experimental Eddy Tree

and bulldozers also displaced oxen and other more primitive

Breeding Station in Placerville,

methods of moving logs. Attached to the backs of tractors were

California. Placerville

steel arch hoists that could lift the front end of a log and then

was chosen partly because blowing pollen from local tree

skid it to a landing or mill. The days of greasing logs were a

species was different and because of its varied elevations

quaint reminiscence.

and consistent soil quality. James G. asked the great botanist

Building Tomorrow’s Company

The 1920s were not without upheaval for the Eddy family. In April 1926 Robert died, the victim of a self-

PBC-0710.jpg

The investors

inflicted gunshot wound. Whether he had taken his own

borrowed the funds

life or accidentally died while handling the shotgun is

to acquire twenty-

unknown. Seven years earlier he was under the care of

seven thousand public

a psychiatrist for severe depression, but in more recent

acres on Vancouver

years had seemed in good spirits. He, Ethel, and Libby

Island, across the

were to leave for an extended European vacation in

Strait of Juan de Fuca

two weeks, making Robert’s untimely death even more

from Washington’s

inexplicable. Ethel later moved to New York City,

Olympic Peninsula.

where Libby enrolled at the Spence School for Girls.

They quickly put in

Robert’s friend, attorney John C. Hewitt, took over

place the infrastructure

management of Eddy Investment Company.

for harvesting and transporting logs from the

When the stock market crashed in 1929 the

island to local mills.

reverberations shook the lumber industry in the

But the business never

Pacific Northwest, which was already in bad shape. Prices for Douglas-fir had fallen by a third through

really gained traction,

the decade, a consequence of overproduction,

and the stock market

declining demand, and intense competition, some of it from

collapse in 1929 and the

Canadian producers in British Columbia that were shipping lumber by rail to Atlantic Coast markets duty-free, with only a marginal tariff on logs. Jack and James G. decided to seize this advantage. They

of sawmill equipment.

The image is from the Web site of the Institute of Forest Genetics, founded by James G. Eddy as the Eddy Tree Breeding Station in 1925.

Great Depression it spawned put a halt to the company’s ambitions. Like many American ventures during

joined in 1928 with Canada’s International Timber Company

the era, the Campbell River Timber Company went bankrupt.

and other lumbermen and bankers like Joshua Green, a close

Another family business also closed: the Ferry-Baker mill. It

friend of Jack’s and his frequent hunting companion, and Jack’s

had been sidelined for the past four years from the industry’s

brother-in-law Edward “Gunk” Garrett, in the launching of a

mounting problems and was finally liquidated in the last days

logging operation, called Campbell River Timber Company.

of the 1920s. At the same time, the timber harvest in the state

Green, a former sternwheeler captain, was the president of

of Washington evaporated to 2.3 billion board feet in 1932,

Seattle’s People’s Bank and Trust Co., having purchased the

down from 7.6 billion feet three years earlier. Losses from both

bank at a veritable fire sale in 1925. Gunk was a manufacturer

Campbell River and Ferry-Baker, and the impact of falling

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The Eddy Tree Breeding Station

Like many within the Eddy family, James G. Eddy had a scientific bent. His

father’s brother, Newell Avery Eddy, with whom he had spent considerable time

most complete arboretum of pine trees in the world. Its researchers

in Bay City, was a member of the American Association for the Advancement

would invent novel ways to remove pollen from pinecones for breeding

of Science. His nephew, Garrett Eddy, inherited the same gene, becoming a

purposes. Its seedlings were the first ever to be planted in a clear-cut

nationally renowned ornithologist, despite not having a degree in the field.

forest. The institute has received numerous awards and citations over the

years, including the Distinguished Service Award, the highest honor given

James’s scientific curiosity was aroused by the newly emerging field of

Within its first six years the tree breeding station had amassed the

life sciences, in his particular

by the U.S. Department of

case the breeding of trees to

Agriculture in 1962, an award

produce taller, healthier, hardier

that James G. himself had

specimens. With the vital approval

received ten years earlier.

of his ideas by the famed botanist

Luther Burbank, James personally

of this could have turned out

funded and in 1925 built from

quite differently were it not

the ground up the Eddy Tree

for James G.’s belief in the

Breeding Station in Placerville,

value of tree genetics and his

California.

tenacity; he had waited several

days in California to obtain an

The station transformed in

Suffice it to say that all

1932 into the Institute of Forest

appointment with Burbank,

Genetics, a nonprofit organization

who lived in the California city.

run by a distinguished board of

The two men soon became

trustees and financed by private

kindred spirits, despite a more

donations. In 1935 James and the

than thirty-year difference in

board donated the institute to the

their ages. James G. was no

U.S. Forest Service so that forest

dilettante, either. He had done

genetics studies would continue

his homework and retained

with stable funding. His gift to the people of the United States was

Jeff Madsen, Port Blakely Tree Farms forest manager, and Chris Whitson, Port Blakely Tree Farms forester, inspect seedlings at a vendor’s nursery.

deep interest in the subject over the course of his lifetime.

not only all the property of the institute, but also the scientific staff that he had

As he wrote to the institute’s head, Lloyd Austin, in 1938, “I am a

recruited and a wealth of experiments in the breeding of trees.

believer in letting these forests grow up and conserve the moisture, slow

down the rapid erosion of soil, provide recreation centers for humankind,

The institute remains one of the world’s top forestry science research

organizations in the world, now administered by the U.S. Forest Service. In its

protect the sources of streams and the fish and animal life that naturally

employ today are more than five hundred scientists and several hundred technical

live in the forests.”

and support personnel.

James G. could very well have been describing the views of Port

Blakely Companies today.

Building Tomorrow’s Company

stock prices on the family’s investment portfolio, while not devastating, nevertheless were substantial. Although the Eddy family remained financially secure and its timberland holdings promised future income, for the time being, economic prospects appeared bleak. “I have been on

Author and Sportsman

If a movie were made about Jack Eddy’s life, the actor William Holden would play him. Holden possessed just the right amount of sophistication, ruggedness, intelligence, and humor that characterized Jack’s life as much as his prowess in business and politics did.

the coast now twenty-six years and I have never seen a blacker outlook for the immediate future in the lumber business,” James G. wrote to John Hewitt in November 1929. Despite a deep understanding of these economic exigencies, James G. and Jack retained their natural optimism. Experience is the best teacher; they had endured their share of business setbacks, upended economies, prolonged recessions, mill fires, the loss of a dear brother and sister, and other financial and emotional calamities. They would persevere—without compromising their principles, integrity, work ethic, and steadfast belief in the promise of their own initiative. As James G. wrote the beleaguered Hewitt, “Of course, Father Time will cure it. But, you have to wait on that gentleman.”

Jack Eddy with a trophy of a lioness from his safari in Africa.

As the Depression tightened its hold around the American people over the course of a decade and more, Father Time waited. The Eddys pushed on. u

Jack wrote two books—Hunting on Kenai Peninsula, which is based on

letters Jack wrote his sister Lucretia while hunting in Alaska, and Hunting the Alaska Brown Bear. The first book “met with such a kind reception,” Jack wrote in the introduction to his second book, that he was “doubly inspired” to write another for fellow hunting enthusiasts. “To the sportsman, the pelt of the Big Brown Bear is the supreme trophy,” Jack explained, “the preeminent trophy of the American continent.” The Alaska Department of Fish and Game still lists the book as recommended reading for prospective big-game hunters in the state.

Jack was from among the class of affluent people who found great

adventure in hunting some of the world’s most dangerous animals. He also felt service to mankind in bringing back the trophies for others to study and

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

view. His “boon companions” on the bear hunt were his brother-in-law

the Highlands [another affluent neighborhood then at Seattle’s northern

Edward I. Garrett and his lifelong friend Joshua Green, a wealthy banker

fringe] into town,” John says. “They got dressed up in masks like bandits

who lived next door to the Eddy mansion on Boylston Avenue.

and pulled off a robbery, stealing the wealthy women’s jewelry.”

The books are well written and insightful, and both include several pages

of photographs.

to their charade. “They were fun-loving people,” John says. “Joshua Green,

who lived to be 101 years old, always called the two of them ‘us

When not running a business, running for office, and running for

cover, Jack and his wife Ethel, to whom he dedicated his books, enjoyed

When the carriage arrived in downtown Seattle, the “thieves” fessed up

old pirates.’” u

leisure pursuits aboard their yacht, the Aquilo, named after the Roman personification of the North Wind. Jack boasted to a cousin in a letter that “she is one-hundred and fifty feet long and much more of a luxury craft than [Tacoma newspaper publisher] Sam Perkins’ small yacht; where his will carry comfortably only three or four, the Aquilo handles seven to ten” He and Ethel had such love for the vessel they once had a Christmas card printed with a full-color depiction of the yacht. They also kept a movie camera on board, and they and their guests enjoyed writing scripts and making silent films they would later watch and roar over.

Other favorite pastimes included automobile racing—well, when he

was young. In the early years of the twentieth century he participated in

(Right) Many of the trophies gathered by Jack Eddy and his frequent hunting companion, banker Joshua Green, were donated to museums and educational institutions.

a race at a track in Grosse Pointe, Michigan. The event featured famed racecar driver Barney Oldfield, who raced Henry Ford’s early cars. Jack entered into a five-mile race involving automobiles with gasoline combustion engines; others featured steam-powered vehicles. All we know is that he didn’t win, finishing out of the money.

Like many people who worked hard their whole lives, Jack had a

(Below) Jack Eddy on the dilemma of horns, 1924.

businessman’s perspective when it came to money. He once purchased an automobile and asked the dealer to remove the names of the maker from the wheel covers since he wasn’t receiving any money for advertising. He disliked chitchat and trivial conversations, hated cocktail parties, and couldn’t stand to go to the cinema, as certain films would make him emotional. But he also had a lighter side, as his grandson, John Eddy II, recalls. “He and Joshua Green had learned about this fancy event where the society ladies would get all dressed up in their finest and would ride a horse-drawn carriage from Broadmoor, where the upper class lived, and Building Tomorrow’s Company

Chapter

PBC-0111. jpg

Crew of the USS Amber at Petersburg, Alaska. WWII. Garrett Eddy is far right.

A New Era

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

As the timber business languished during the Great Depression, John W. Eddy and James G. Eddy turned their attention to other pursuits. While James G. put his scientific curiosity and his money to work at the Eddy Tree Breeding Station, Jack mulled public service of a different kind—politics. The older Eddy brother was indignant over what he considered to be excessive and ill-advised taxes against private This campaign flyer for Rep. John W. Eddy touts his service to constituents as he seeks reelection to the Washington House of Representatives. Jack served the 43rd District from 1932 to 1943.

landowners. Port Blakely Mill Co. in the early 1930s owned between fifty thousand and sixty thousand acres of cutover land in Washington, property that would not yield another harvest for decades. Yet, to Jack’s agitation, the company was paying as much as two hundred thousand dollars in taxes each year on this land. He was so incensed that he considered simply not paying the taxes, and thereby letting ownership of the properties revert to the state. To Jack’s thinking, the state had things backward. Rather than tax cutover forestlands with no immediate value, incentives should be extended to the owners to replant the acreage. In this assessment he had his brother’s full support. As one of the region’s most outspoken promoters of reforestation and its value to the economy, James G. agreed with Jack that Washington state should pass a progressive law supporting replanting. Convincing the state legislature was problematic, so Jack decided to take matters into his own hands. In 1932, fueled by his sincere concerns over corporate preservation, Jack ran as a Republican to represent the

A New Era

The Great Depression was at full throttle when Jack announced his candidacy. The national unemployment rate had risen from 3 percent to 25 percent, while industrial production had fallen by almost half and housing starts by four-fifths. As one of the two largest industries in the state (agriculture was the other), the timber business was in the doldrums. Production plummeted from 7.6 billion board feet of lumber in 1928 to 2.3 billion board feet in 1932. More than half the state’s loggers and millworkers were unemployed. Jack offered hope to them and other state citizens. As his campaign touted, “Elect Eddy to Help Bring Prosperity Back.” Burdensome taxation, Jack explained in a leaflet, was behind much of the unemployment. “Every dollar of (Left to Right) Jack Eddy, a hunting guide, Jack’s brother-in-law Edward “Gunk” Garrett, lifelong friend and banker Joshua Green, and another guide in this 1929 photo of the men on a hunting trip.

Forty-third District in the Washington state legislature. He, Ethel, and their sons

Jasmine Eddy in the1930s.

available for the employment of labor and stimulation of trade and prosperity,” he proclaimed. “I fervently desire to see industry revived and employment available for all.” The same year that Jack announced his candidacy,

Franklin and Garrett and daughter Jasmine

Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt was

lived in the district at 1117 Boylston

running for president. In the November

Avenue North, a relatively short drive

8 general election, a Democratic

from the company offices at 6100 Arcade

landslide swept FDR to office and

Square (the family also kept an apartment

altered the political landscape

at 875 Park Avenue in New York City). As

across the country. A Republican

Jack later commented, his family, friends,

enclave since territorial days,

and business associates “convinced me I

the state’s legislature now had a

should offer myself for public service.”

Democratic majority. Of the ninety-

As he noted in his early campaign literature, “Men who have

100

taxes from which industry and trade is relieved will be

nine seats up for grabs in the

made a success in business owe an obligation to the public

state house of representatives, the

which can be paid only by public service.”

Republicans held but twenty-nine.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Washington State Rep. John W. Eddy in a portrait from the 1930s.

As owners of Port Blakely Mill Co., the Eddy family received regular dividends in years of good company performance. Given the exigencies of the Great Depression, the year 1933 would not provide for a dividend, as the resolution indicates.

The announcement cites Jack Eddy’s reelection to the Washington State House of Representatives, where he was one of but a few Republicans in the legislature. Jack took aim at what he considered were burdensome taxes impeding the growth of business and commerce.

One of the seats went to John W. Eddy. Jack was determined to make a difference, despite overwhelming Democratic opposition. Unemployment tore apart the nation’s fabric and doused the human spirit. Jack needed no explanation of this toil. The remnants of the former Skinner & Eddy shipyards had become a settlement of ramshackle shacks, sheds, and tents, populated by homeless men, women, and children. Similar shantytowns, or Hoovervilles, the colloquial expression rebuking former President Herbert Hoover, had erupted like boils across America. What began as a financial crisis had become an existential threat. Jack interpreted the dire situation in business and human terms and fully appreciated how the uncertain economic environment fostered a climate of fear. Americans stopped buying products and services, curtailed investing, and hunkered down in the trenches, afraid the situation might worsen. Jack was certain that when demand for American goods returned, the productivity of U.S. companies would rise and with it the national employment rate. In the state capitol in Olympia, he hoisted the trampled flag of business and industry virtually single-handedly.

Jack Eddy is at the far left of a group of skiers on Washington’s majestic Mount Rainier in this 1934 photograph.

A New Era

101

His was a lonely crusade, however. Roosevelt’s New Deal had captivated the public and state legislators. Jack saw FDR’s

the pollen, this risk was greatly reduced. Jack was extremely proud of his younger brother’s noble

policies as social welfare—a handout funded by taxing U.S.

cause, and had personally funded the construction of a new

businesses, which in turn diminished their profit margins to

administration building in Placerville. In a letter to a cousin,

near-unsustainable levels, forcing them to lay off workers. It

Jack wrote, “My brother James [G.] has a tree breeding

was axiomatic to Jack that only work could restore the human

institution in California that [Luther] Burbank got him started

spirit, the legacy of his father’s and grandfather’s example and

in. He says reforestation is hardly possible until an economic

his own experience. “Our greatest need is to place increasing

tree is produced. Nobody else has ever undertaken such an

numbers of men on industrial payrolls,” he declared.

idea, so perhaps you may someday hear of the Eddy Tree Breeding Institute.”

“No Other Place in the World” The same year that Jack ran for office, James G. was busy reorganizing the Eddy Tree Breeding Station to confront the

Jack had penned this letter in 1929, before the stock market crashed. Now, in the early 1930s, the station’s survival was a matter of great concern. The personal financial pressures

economic exigencies of the Depression. The station’s primary objective, as James G. explained to its director Lloyd Austin, was to develop “rapid-growing and better quality producing seed.” Almost from the start this goal was being realized. Francis I. Righter, a geneticist who joined the station in 1931, remarked shortly after visiting the site, “There was no other place I knew [that] had such a well-developed and perfect method of nursery experimentation with tree seedlings—no other place in the world.” Since its inception the station had earned scientific recognition in forestry, horticultural, and other scholarly journals for its pioneering work in tree genetics. It had invented methods to collect and organize the flowers and pollen within pinecones, and had introduced an efficient, productive way to introduce pollen into cones. Previous methods created the risk of the wrong pollen fertilizing a cone. By covering the ovulate flowers with a cloth bag and then puncturing the bag with a hypodermic needle to inject

102

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The Great Depression spawned shantytowns across America, including this one in Seattle, which erupted like a boil on the same tract of land where Skinner & Eddy formerly ruled the shipbuilding world. For Jack Eddy, scenes such as this prompted him to pursue a career in public service.

caused by the Depression made it difficult for the Eddy family to continue to solely fund the station’s research efforts and pay the staff’s salaries. For years the station had provided free seeds and seedlings to other horticultural institutes like the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh, Scotland, despite the annual tenthousand-dollar cost. This, too, was now in jeopardy. James G. initially considered donating the station to the

Rep. John W. Eddy

In the thick of the Great Depression, bothered by what he considered to be ill-advised tax measures that posed greater burdens on struggling businesses in Washington state, Jack Eddy ran for political office as a Republican, winning a seat in the State House of Representatives in 1932. When he arrived in the state capital of Olympia to represent the 43rd District in which he lived, and looked around at his fellow legislators, most were Democrats riding the coattails of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s landslide

University of California at Berkeley, but the university, although

victory at the November general election.

extremely interested in the opportunity, had its own economic

problems and would require an endowment to operate the

constituents through 1943—was not a smooth ride. He introduced several

station. James G. latched onto the proposal as the only remedy.

bills to block or overturn legislation imposing extra taxes on businesses, yet

“Undaunted, Eddy set about to raise such an endowment,

the overwhelming Democratic opposition thwarted his attempts. In 1936,

forming a board of directors constituting a ‘who’s who’ of

for instance, there were only six Republicans in the House; ninety-three

forestry,” William Sherrard wrote in his unpublished history of

were Democrats. Jack did not give up, however. Every two years he ran for

the company.

office on the same principles, and handily won victory.

Rather than seek money for an organization that carried his family’s surname and thus might be perceived as self-serving, James G. decided that a name change was in order. The station was incorporated as the Institute of Forest Genetics. Its distinguished trustees subsequently beat the bushes to raise the six hundred thousand dollars needed to establish the endowment. The effort largely failed, but there was a silver lining when the Carnegie Institute of Washington funded a one-time ten-thousand-dollar grant. At the very least, the money

Jack Eddy’s long tenure in politics—he would serve his district’s

Obviously, the populace of the 43rd District shared many of his views.

As he wrote in 1937, “Months ago I was invited to a luncheon by several residents of the Forty-Third District. They persuaded me to file again, even though I believed I had completed my duties to the community. These constituents pointed out that the last Legislature was overrun with crackbrained radicals (and) that these radicals have now been banded together by demagogues . . . and that sensible, sound-thinking men will be needed in the next Legislature.”

Jack consented to run again and enjoyed another victory at the polls.

“Everybody in my home district seems to always vote for me,” he wrote

would keep the organization alive for a few months until a

a friend. “There is no particular honor in being a Representative, and no

more sustained form of income was secured.

pay to speak of connected with that office. But, I get satisfaction in [the]

James G. was committed to finding the money. So was

continual support of my home district.”

William B. Greeley, former chief forester of the U.S. Forest

Service and at the time the president of the American Forestry

trials of government service. “I have to give up everything at home and

Association, an organization that promoted forest planting

leave Franklin alone in the big house, desert my business, and work day and

and conservation. Greeley staunchly believed in the work of

night in a political atmosphere, mostly trying to prevent bad bills introduced

In another letter, this one from 1939, he wrote a relative about the

from becoming the law of the land.” u A New Era

103

the institute, and pled its case before the U.S. Department of the Interior. The federal agency was then seeking measures to combat soil erosion following the severe dust storms in the 1930s that devastated the ecology and agriculture of the American prairie. Greeley argued that tree genetics could play a role in developing more robust root structures to better withstand future drought conditions. With him the day of his presentation was a slice of a 175-year-old Douglas-fir that James G. had suggested Greeley use for dramatic effect. As James G. wrote in a letter accompanying the gift, within “five or ten years of intensive activity by the young men now operating the Institute, a practical and economic fast growing strain of tree will be a long ways on William B. Greeley

the road to being placed in the hands of successful timber growers.”

Impressed by Greeley’s arguments, the interior department dispatched several staff members to Placerville to inspect the institute. In 1934 a telegram arrived on Lloyd Austin’s desk; the request for federal funding had been approved. An excited Austin dashed off a letter to James G.: “This means an allotment of $40,000!” It was just the beginning. When the grant expired, Congress authorized the U.S. Forest Service to accept the Institute of Forest Genetics as a gift to the government and people of the United States. By the time this transfer officially transpired in August 1935 the institute had been given another life-sustaining infusion of cash—more than $250,000. The donor was James G.

104

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

A perfectly healthy Douglas-fir tree at the beginning of a long journey toward the skies. Unlike many other forestry concerns, Port Blakely Tree Farms endeavors for its trees to live sixty years, promising much taller, more robust specimens, which yield greater volume and quality of products.

Eddy. The paterfamilias of the tree breeding station wanted to be sure it would not falter again. “He had long felt that federal ownership and responsibility were required for the far-sighted planning and stability necessary in carrying his undertaking

A cable yarder, a system of power-operated winches used to haul logs from the stump to a landing, is depicted.

through the long years ahead,” American Forests reported. “The Institute at Placerville is still in its infancy; but its ultimate promise to American forestry is beyond calculation.” The magazine added, “All American forestry is indebted to his foresight.” Such was the stuff of character in the two Eddy brothers, then in their sixties. One was determined to improve the lot of Washington’s unemployed by freeing business and industry from the era’s oppressive taxes and other constraints; the other sought ways to grow higherquality trees faster as America’s forestlands were reseeded. Both men saw it

He half-jested that he and his family would continue living

as their duty to make personal sacrifices toward the betterment

on Boylston Avenue, until their house was foreclosed by

of humankind, despite the workload this entailed. Others their

“confiscatory taxes.” Such was his commitment to providing

age had retired; not Jack and James G.. There was work to do.

work for the unemployed.

Certainly this was the case in Olympia. Left-leaning

His stance resonated with the electorate, which put him

Democrats in the state legislature outnumbered Jack and

back in office again and again. Jack was the only Republican

his fellow Republicans and were determined to thwart their

legislator in the state to be so honored, and he would ably and

objectives of low taxes to spur business growth and thus

energetically serve his constituents through 1943. During his

employment. Jack chided the legislators for considering “every

long tenure as a public servant, Jack introduced several bills

form of taxation ever invented since the dawn of civilizations.”

seeking to block or overturn legislation promoting what he

A New Era

105

considered to be onerous taxes—as he put it, “to combat in a

bounteous charitable and philanthropic endeavors. She was

small way the forces that would destroy our present form of

the chairwoman of the Seattle Symphony Orchestra and held

government.”

voluntary positions with the Cornish School of the Arts, the

Many of the bills failed, given the stiff opposition, but Jack

Children’s Orthopedic Hospital, and the Seattle Garden Club.

was resolute in his convictions. As he explained in a letter to

She was also a founder and leader of Seattle’s Lighthouse

his nephew, Walter Cotchett Jr., in 1939, “I often have to deal

for the Blind, as was her friend Nellie C. Cornish, for whom

with some Representatives who think and believe in principles

the arts school is named. Ethel’s many devoted friends

that are abhorrent to me. . . . Perhaps it is worthwhile and I may

remembered her as a cheerful, caring person, who lived “a life

be contributing something to the general

of high purpose,” as one wrote. Many recalled the Thanksgiving

welfare.”

holidays when she and her children

As the Eddy brothers attended their

personally delivered

separate causes, they also cooperated

baskets of food to

in the running of a timber company

PBC-0568

in what were obviously challenging

the remembrances in a

times. James G., as vice president of

folder tied with a black

Port Blakely Mill Co., was essentially

ribbon.

in charge of operations because of

With Jack in mourning,

Jack’s legislative responsibilities,

James G. took greater

which required his presence for

operational control of the

months at a time in Olympia. When

company. Nevertheless,

Jack’s wife Ethel passed away in

he continued to solicit his

1937 after a valiant two-year battle

brother’s opinions before

against breast cancer, he retreated further into his political work. Ethel had just returned from a trip to Shanghai with Jack and their sons to celebrate the wedding of their daughter

When World War II broke out, Jasmine Eddy, daughter of Jack and Ethel Garrett Eddy, was in Shanghai with her husband, Stephen Fairchild Jensen, a dentist. Jasmine reported on the invasion of China by Japan, which was printed in the Seattle Star newspaper. Not long after her article was written, she and her husband fled the war-engulfed city for the Philippines.

Jasmine to Stephen Fairchild Jensen, a dentist. Ethel’s death was deeply felt throughout Seattle. She was a regular feature in the society pages of local newspapers, which lauded her talents as a painter and especially her

106

the needy. Jack kept

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

reaching a decision, and the two men corresponded regularly. Not that James had much to report, business-wise. “Nothing new on the desk to speak of,” he wrote Jack in 1937. “No cash.

No sale of logs.” To generate income, James G. mulled the idea of building another sawmill. He had successfully managed the Ferry-Baker

mill, knew the business inside out, and had some compelling reasons for suggesting another try at it. One was the fact that many mills had foundered in recent years, thereby reducing competition. A more expedient rationale was the thicket of felled trees that lay in the wake of the massive storm that struck western Washington in October 1934. The hurricaneforce storm posted eighty-three-mile-per-hour winds, the strongest gusts recorded in the region at the time. Twenty-one people were killed, and three large ships, including a transPacific cruise liner, capsized in Puget Sound. In the forests the disaster created a giant blowdown of Douglas-fir and hemlock trees, a good portion within the company’s Wausau Tract. Although H. O. Siler and his men had hauled off most of the big trees following the storm, a year later many trees of all sizes remained on the ground at risk of rotting. “It hurts my feelings to see even one acre cut over [when] one third of the fir and twothirds of the hemlock is left in the woods,” James G. wrote Jack. Rather than continue to harvest standing trees, James G. urged his brother to take advantage of the fallen timber on company land, quickly building “a portable band and edger

Entertainer Bob Hope at a rally in Seattle urging the purchase of War Bonds in 1942. Jack Eddy's sons Franklin and Garrett, and James G.'s son, James G. Jr. (“Jack”) served the nation during the war, as did several other family members.

mill close to the Wausau tract in order to save the unrealized hemlock stumpage that will otherwise be wasted,” he explained. “Based on my experience, it would pay out well in

Staying Alive

the next ten years. . . . Sooner or later, and slowly, this country

Like so many other companies during the dark financial

will have to increase its demand for construction lumber.” In one of the rare occurrences where the brothers did

period, Port Blakely Mill Co. carried on and persevered. James G. gauged its assets in 1938 at half the value of ten years earlier.

not see eye to eye, Jack demurred. He was unsure about the

His grim letters to Jack continued. “There are practically no

return on the investment. Constructing a mill was a costly

checks coming in,” he wrote that year. He might have simply

venture despite the downed timber’s value, he wrote James G.

written, “See last correspondence.”

Adding to the financial risk was the growing unionization of millworkers. The mill was never built.

Only a new pro-business administration in Washington, D.C., would alter the economic situation. Yet, to the brothers’

A New Era

107

astonishment, FDR, just like Jack, kept getting elected and elected, and would ultimately be elected to an unprecedented four terms in office. The company stayed alive by harvesting and selling its timber, cutting from 50 million board feet to 100 million board feet of timber per year. James G. reasoned that if Port Blakely Mill Co. continued to harvest its forestlands at this rate it would cease to exist in five years. To stave off this possibility he directed Siler Logging to cut no more than 30 million board feet of timber annually. Even at this reduced rate James G. had trouble imagining the company still in business by the 1950s; the trees would be gone by then, he reasoned. Nevertheless, he regularly rebuffed prospective buyers who offered what James G. considered to be fire-sale prices. All letters were met with the respectful but terse reply, â&#x20AC;&#x153;We would prefer not to disturb the timber at this time.â&#x20AC;? James G. and Mary lived well, on a beautiful five-acre estate in Medina on the shore of Lake Washington, due east of Seattle. Mary oversaw the planting of the formal gardens by the renowned landscape architect Otto Holmdahl, who had

108

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The first of the two floating bridges crossing Lake Washington. Seen here is the Lacey V. Murrow Memorial Bridge connecting Seattle to Mercer Island. Prior to its construction in 1940, James G. Eddy, who lived in Medina, west of Bellevue on a peninsula, traveled to and from work by boat.

previously designed parts of Seattle’s majestic Washington Park Arboretum. The formal gardens gave the house its name: Tree Top Terrace. Out back was a stable for James G.’s cherished horses. He and Mary’s pastimes included tending the citrus groves in Southern California and watching their trotting horses at events like the National Horse Show in New York’s Madison Square Garden. Each business day, James G. piloted his boat across the lake from a private dock to a berth at Madison Street, where he would take the streetcar to the office at 6100 Arcade Square. It was a long commute made easier once a bridge across Lake Washington was constructed in 1940. That year, sixty-eight-year-old Jack Eddy was seriously injured in an automobile accident that required the replacement of one of his kneecaps. James G. was now fully in charge of the company, although his older brother remained the titular head. Jack’s energy dissipated, although he continued to make the annual trek to Olympia, “ten pounds lighter and quite a cripple,” he wrote a friend. When longtime logger H. O. Siler died the following year, James G. dissolved the

When longtime logger H. O. Siler died the following year, James G. dissolved the company’s logging subsidiary, abandoning logging altogether. Nevertheless, he remained hopeful for the future.

company’s logging subsidiary, abandoning logging altogether. Nevertheless, he remained hopeful for the future. James G. spent a goodly part of his work commute each day thinking about the alarming events in Europe. Nazi Germany had invaded Poland in September 1939, compelling France and Great Britain to declare war. Within two years the Nazis had conquered or politically subdued all of continental Europe, other than Great Britain. As war fever gripped Europe, the timber industry in America readied for another upsurge in demand. Labor unions even approached James G. and Jack about resuscitating the shipbuilding industry in Seattle to address the projected need

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Crew of USS Amber at Petersburg, Alaska, WWII. 1943. Garrett Eddy is on the back row, second from the right.

for wartime ships. Neither brother had any interest in such a

soared. President Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9024 creating a

massive undertaking—not surprising, given their ages. Tacoma

War Production Board in January 1942 established lumber as a

and California became shipbuilding centers instead, their

critical war necessity. Uncle Sam planned to buy a lot of lumber

shipyards leveraging David Rodgers’s inventive modular construction methods. Then, on December 7, 1941, the Japanese

year during the war). William B. Greeley, still heading the American Forestry Association, stated that

attacked Pearl Harbor, catapulting the United

the war so thoroughly absorbed the focus of the

States into war. A few months earlier, James

West Coast lumber industry that it seemed as if

G. and Jack had permitted the Fourth Army

“we are part of the armed services.”

stationed at Fort Lewis to make use of the company’s forestlands in Thurston County for military maneuvers. Following the surprise attack the Eddys allowed the U.S. Navy to winter eighteen

The downside to this demand, from the industry’s standpoint, was that the government’s Office of Price Administration set the price. Although James G. and Jack were

barges in Blakely Harbor, and the U.S. Army was given

perturbed by the government’s fixed prices for their

permission to harvest company timber as a fuel source.

timber and the high wages charged by the unions to harvest the

With the war now in two theaters, military need for lumber

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(more than 8 billion board feet would be consumed each

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

trees, the war nonetheless stirred their sense of patriotic duty.

Jack’s sons Franklin and Garrett were both in the military, as was James G.’s son James G. Eddy Jr., whom the family called Jack. All had come of age during the Great Depression and Second World War. Like his father, Franklin graduated from Harvard College. When the Depression and the era’s bank runs took a toll on First National Bank in Bay City, Franklin assumed a seat on its board. His namesake and grandfather—president of the bank for so many years—would have approved, especially since Franklin and his fellow directors were successful in reorganizing and reviving the ailing institution. The same could not be said for eleven thousand other U.S. banks that failed during the decade, taking with them the savings of some 10 million depositors. Franklin subsequently returned to Seattle to work at Joshua Green’s People’s Bank, where his younger brother Garrett also eventually landed a job. Garrett went to high school in Ojai, California, at the Thacher School, where he was a scholarBruce “Bucky” Elmore, longtime director on the board of Port Blakely Mill Co., and the husband of Charlotte W. Eddy, in an early 1930s image.

athlete. He excelled in track, and his time in the 440-yard dash in 1933 would hold as the school record for thirty years. In 1934 he followed Franklin to Harvard, where he again ran track, rowed, and was a member of the Mountaineering Club. Like his Uncle James G., he had a keen aptitude for science and majored in biology. At Harvard, Garrett studied under Ludlow Griscom, one of the world’s great field ornithologists, who sparked Garrett’s lifelong interest in birds. He eventually became a world-class A proud Jack Eddy is flanked by his sons, who served the country during World War II. Franklin is to Jack’s right and his younger brother Garrett is to his left.

ornithologist, despite not having a degree in the field. He could

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identify thousands of bird species and was knowledgeable about their respective habitats, and eating and mating rituals. He even developed a scientific system of identifying the nuances within each species, measuring the varying shades in their coloring to learn more about their origins and evolution. Garrett wrote often to his father about his ornithological discoveries, and Jack was delighted and impressed by his son’s scientific inquiry. Jack had written with equal curiosity and precision about his hunting expeditions in two books, and had recently donated his estimable collection of African birds to the University of Washington. The two corresponded regularly while Garrett was at Harvard. In a 1936 letter, Jack offered his reflections on intelligence: “It prolongs life, wealth and happiness. You can load your intellect full of birds, math and history, that will all help you—it is what I call education but is not intelligence. Education and study must be combined with experience before you have intelligence.” Garrett would take these words to heart in all his future endeavors. Although away quite a bit in Olympia, Jack spent as much time as he could with his children. Always he sought to pass on his abilities and knowledge. Both sons, for example, learned how to hunt, fish, and sail. Franklin and Garrett became accredited sailors and frequently piloted their father’s yacht, the Aquilo, in Puget Sound, among the San Juan Islands and up the inside passage as far as Alaska. When America entered the war, these skills would prove invaluable. Garrett Eddy’s years at Thacher School included activities ranging from marksmanship (fourth from right in photo at top), equestrian sports, and track and field.

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

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Both brothers enlisted in the U.S. Naval Reserves and were among its

While Garrett was at Harvard, Mary Ford studied literature

sixteen thousand reserve officers, an

at Vassar College and later graduated from UCLA. They married

elite crew that included five future

on Valentine’s Day 1942. Three weeks later Garrett was a naval

American presidents: John Kennedy,

officer. Mary Ford also played a vital role in the war effort. A

Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon,

defense technician at the military’s Combat Information Center

Gerald Ford, and George H. W. Bush. Garrett Eddy, c. 1940

and became an excellent markswoman.

in Seattle, she tracked ship movements in Puget Sound. One of

Franklin served on board the USS

these ships was the USS Amber. On board the vessel was her

Boxwood, a vessel designed to defend

husband.

against an attack by enemy submarines.

Lieutenant Garrett Eddy patrolled the waters of Puget

It was stationed in the Aleutian Islands when Japanese

Sound between Olympia and Port Townsend. In early 1944 he

bombers struck the island of Attu in 1942. Franklin had hoped

was transferred to a much larger ship, the USS Key, a destroyer

to see some excitement during the war. “He got all of that when

escort that sailed “in and out of the various harbors along the

his ship entered on the first day of the attack on Attu and bombs fell all around the ship,” Jack later recalled. Franklin eventually was promoted to lieutenant commander of his own ship, the USS Cornel. Before Garrett took off for war he proposed to the young woman he’d been dating since high school. Mary Ford Eddy, a fifth cousin known to all as Mary Ford, shared his love of athletics. A competitive swimmer and an accomplished skier short-listed for the Olympics, she was also a college football fanatic who could recite the current standings at the asking. During their courtship Garrett took Mary Ford with him on numerous birding expeditions. She would record the species he identified in a notebook she carried with her.

During World War II, Franklin Eddy initially served on the USS Boxwood in the Aleutian Islands, before commanding his own ship as a lieutenant commander.

In later years she joined him on hunting trips

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Among the U.S. Naval Officers of the USS Key, stationed near Leyte Gulf in the Philippines during the war, is Garrett Eddy.

to the war zone in the South Pacific. The USS Key sniffed out Japanese submarines near Leyte Gulf in the Philippines, and later destroyed an important Japanese military base at Piso Point. Garrett received his own command and like his brother was promoted to lieutenant commander. He captained the USS Ulvert M. Moore, a destroyer escort with a crew of 250 men that was stationed in the Dutch East Indies. His service on various ships included deployment from northern California to the Aleutian Islands of Alaska. During his years in service, Garrett missed the birth and the christening of his son, Garrett Edward Mary Ford Eddy and Garrett Eddy, married on Valentineâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Day, 1942.

Atlantic Coastâ&#x20AC;? seeking out enemy submarines, his father Jack wrote admiringly. By the end of the year, both Eddy brothers were headed

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Eddy, though his father

Promoted to lieutenant commander, Garrett Eddy captained the USS Ulvert M. Moore, a destroyer stationed in the Dutch East Indies during the war. The illustrations behind Garrett commemorate the Japanese airplanes and vessels downed or sunk by the Moore.

hosted a small gathering to celebrate the event at the home on Boylston. James G. and Mary’s son Jack was seriously injured during the war. His left leg developed gangrene and had to be amputated below the knee. A second operation was required, and Jack lost his entire leg. Other Eddy family members, such as Jasmine’s husband Stephen Jensen, also served the military. Hans Warjone, who was married to Mary Ann Eddy, one of James G. and Mary’s daughters, was a lieutenant at the world’s largest naval base in Norfolk, Virginia, which supported naval forces overseas. Hans was subsequently dispatched to the Pacific theater, where he, too, eventually graduated to

MA and Hans were married at Tree Top Terrace, the Eddy family home in Medina, Washington. Their sons John and James would become future leaders of the company.

the rank of lieutenant commander. On February 23, 1943, Mary Ann gave birth to a son, James Eddy Warjone. James G. Eddy received the news of his grandson by telephone, while sitting in the chair at the barbershop. Just a few days earlier, he and Mary were told of the birth of a granddaughter, Charlotte Barbara Elmore, the child of Charlotte Eddy, whom the family called Gar, and Bruce “Bucky” Elmore. “It is a thrill and comes to very few grandfathers to have two grandchildren in one week,” James G. wrote. In 1944 Mary Ann gave birth to a

James G. and Mary Cooley Eddy’s youngest daughter Mary Anne “MA” Eddy and Hans Warjone, a lieutenant in the U.S. Naval Reserve, cut the cake at their 1941 wedding.

second son, John, or “Onny,” as his older brother pronounced the name. John and Jim, like the men they were named for, John W. Eddy and James G. Eddy, were another formidable

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pair of brothers who would both play vital roles in the future of

he and Jack believed, was as tree farms. Weyerhaeuser had

Port Blakely Mill Co.

established the industry’s first tree farm—the Charles L.

When the war ended, the Eddy men and women returned to civilian lives in a country much changed. The United States was the preeminent world power, the desperate years of Depression finally giving way to sustained economic prosperity. A new generation of men honed by the field of battle was poised to take charge of American business and industry. NEED LARGER OR TAKE OUT

James G. Eddy

With the war now over, the Eddy brothers assessed their landholdings. During the war the company had cut only

enough timber to fulfill

Clemons Tree Farm—on cutover land in Washington’s Grays Harbor County in 1941. This, in turn, prompted the National Lumber Manufacturers Association later that year to establish the American Tree Farm System. The voluntary conservation program had as its goal the provision of trees for future generations. In 1946 the federal government jumped on the bandwagon with the Sustained-Yield Forest Management Act, also known as Public Law 273. The goal of the legislation was to “promote the stability of forest industries, of employment, of communities and of taxable forest wealth through continuous supplies of timber.”

the government’s needs and financially support its logging contractors and employees. As James G. urged Jack in 1942, “We have got to do something along the lines of perhaps logging a few M [thousand board feet of lumber] for the other fellow . . . and not be guided 100% by what our books might reveal.” They now realized they were the owners of a substantial second-growth forest.

A Future in Farming Having once estimated that the company would not last until 1950, James saw that it indeed had a future, one that lay in the productive, long-term management of the land. The way to manage these forests,

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Frank Eddy’s daughter Lucretia Eddy Cotchett with her brother James G. Eddy and his wife Mary Cooley Eddy with James G.’s grandchildren: Mary Ann (Garby); Bruce and Charlotte, children of Charlotte Whittmore Eddy and Bruce Elmore.

Uncle Franklin

Most every family has a colorful relative, but how many can say they had

took her to the Shelton racetrack. “I was in high school, and he took me for

an uncle or cousin who was fluent in French, an expert on porcelain and

a spin in the Gull-Wing around the track,” Charlotte says. “He got the car

fabrics, a brilliant mathematician, wore a deerstalker hat on occasion, and

up to 150 miles per hour on the back straightaway—much to my mother’s

regaled entertainer Gypsy Rose Lee on his sailboat, the Dorade? Such were

horror when I told her the story!”

the life and times of Franklin Eddy, the oldest son of John W. Eddy.

money could buy. He found it in the yawl, designed by Olin Stephens, one

Where his brother Garrett was interested in ornithology, hunting, and

With regard to the Dorade, Franklin had long wanted the best sailboat

business, Franklin’s pastimes were of the more rarefied sort. Although he

of America’s great naval architects. The Dorade was sleek and fast, winning

worked at neighbor Joshua Green’s People’s Bank, where he was in charge

the 1931 transatlantic race from Newport to England. When the crew

of foreign currency exchange, and later at Port Blakely Mill Co., these were

returned, they were feted in New York City with a tickertape parade.

mere concessions to having an occupation. Franklin would rather partake of life’s many pleasures, giving back the same in return.

In 1975, Franklin Eddy traveled by express train from London to Oxford. He was going to Blackwell’s Bookshop to interview the binders who were undertaking the job of restoring the three Vancouver volumes on his explorations.

Franklin took possession of the boat in 1946. In true fashion he equipped

He loved practical jokes, as long as they

it to catch the eye; it was

had an intellectual twist, an inheritance

the first sailboat on Puget

from his father. From his mother Ethel

Sound to have a colored

he learned to love hosting and going

spinnaker. In their later years,

to parties. Ethel Garrett Eddy, an artist of local prominence, hosted costume

Franklin and Garrett

extravaganzas that were the talk of

occasionally crewed

Seattle. “My grandmother would hire

together on the Dorade.

the art students from Cornish School

One of their last outings

of the Arts, which she had helped get

together was at the 1971

off the ground, to dress up the house,”

World Championship

John Eddy II recalls. “One time she had

Regatta for Star Class boats.

a slide hooked up outside, and when

Following his death in 1978

people got out of their carriages or

the boat was bequeathed to

cars they climbed up these steps and

the Mystic Seaport Museum in Connecticut. It later

slid through a window into the house. Certainly, it made an impression on Uncle Franklin.”

changed hands several times before its purchase a few years ago by Edgar

Cato, a Rhode Island yachtsman, who said, “It was a piece of history that I

A confirmed bachelor, other than his nieces and nephews Franklin’s

pride and joy were fast cars and the Dorade. He owned and raced a rare Mercedes Gull-Wing sports car, which a local Mercedes dealership sponsored in races. Franklin’s cousin Charlotte Lamp recalls the time he

had read about most of my life.” Among his nephews and nieces, who sat on his lap as the great raconteur spun his tales, Franklin’s memory will live on, as well. u

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Tree farms were the industry’s future, and leading the

“In the case of timber, this is a fairly good gamble over the

effort at Port Blakely Mill Co. would be Garrett Eddy. After

long term since the timber resources of the world are dwindling

his discharge from the navy he joined the family business and

and so the demand and price should continue on an upward

took off for the woods, a familiar place for a man accustomed

trend,” Garrett opined. He also noted the risks to the invested capital—fire, disease, windstorms, and the

to birding. As his father had advised in

uncertain costs of taxation.

his reflections on intelligence, Garrett

The traditional method of managing a

would need to augment study and education with actual experience.

timber company was to wait for favorable

With the same passion that he had

prices and then log the land clear. Garrett

previously applied to ornithology,

saw this strategy as no different than a

Garrett exhausted the literature on

short-term buyer of stock “who counts

modern forestry practices.

on the increased value of his investment between purchase and sale to make his

A report by Burt P. Kirkland, a forestry professor at the University

profit.” Kirkland’s alternative was to yield

of Washington, caught his attention.

a small profit each year by harvesting

The study, “Forest Resources of

a fraction of the forestlands, while

the Douglas-fir Region,” espoused

maintaining the remainder. Rather than

“selective timber management.”

cash in the principal, a company would

Kirkland touted the concept as an

live off the interest. “The profit comes not

“economically advantageous” system

from a gamble on increased market price,

of logging, in which marginal trees

but on managerial ability and the growth of the trees,” Garrett explained in his

were harvested or “thinned” to allow healthier trees to grow faster and more robustly.

John W. Eddy and Joshua Green were granted University of Washington permission to gather biological specimens in Africa, 1930.

Shortly after reading the 1946 article, Garrett typed up his conclusions in his own

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report. By managerial ability, he meant careful, selective thinning—removing and selling the “poor trees,” which

report, “Arguments for Selective Logging.” Evident throughout

“crowd out and infect the sound ones.” This was the science

the document are his twin interests in science and business.

part of his proposition; the business argument was a substantial

He equated an investment in tree growing to an investment in a

growth in timber volume. “If a constant average of small profits

non-dividend-paying stock. With both investments the investor

is realized, then this reduction in income is more than balanced

is gambling on an increase in the ultimate selling price.

by the perpetual nature of the income,” Garrett wrote.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

He advised thinning between five thousand and ten

Siler Tract in King County; the Olney Creek Tract in Snohomish

thousand board feet per acre every ten to fifteen years. In

County; and the Kamilche Tract, which straddled Grays Harbor,

June 1947 he composed another report, “Suggested Steps

Thurston, and Mason counties. Each was a potential tree farm,

to Start a Forestry Management Program.” In it he urged his

Winn stated.

uncle and father to hire an “experienced, competent forester”

With this information in hand, senior managers and the

as a permanent employee. This forester’s first task would be

board of directors made a historic decision in December

to take a complete inventory of the company’s forestlands—

1947—to “extend the operations of the company into a

determining the species, age classes, and quality of the trees,

systematic and scientific tree-farming program,” according to

and then recording, mapping, and cataloguing this data. Once

company board minutes. This epochal transformation required

the inventory was completed, the forester would then designate

that Port Blakely Mill Co. invest a portion of its earnings into a

specific areas to be thinned, clear cut, left as is, or possibly

“large cash reserve” to cover the “unknown and experimental”

sold.

aspects of tree farming, such as thinning.

Most important, each area would be subject to a detailed

No longer would the company log trees on the basis of

long-range management plan. As Garrett put it, “Unless it

market dynamics alone. No longer would cutover land be left to

is known exactly what is on our lands, plans or action for

the whims of Mother Nature. No longer would the Eddy family

managing that land will be groping in the dark.” He estimated

simply buy forestlands and harvest the trees. For the first time

it would take at least eighteen months for the long-term

since the days of Ware Eddy in eighteenth-century Maine, they

management strategy to reach fruition.

were back in the business of farming—tree farming.

Senior management and the board of directors, which

Garrett Eddy ably led Port Blakely Mill Co. into this new

included Eddy family members like Bruce Elmore, liked what

era, in which science and business were closely intertwined

they’d heard and gave Garrett the go-ahead. In June 1947 he

in the management of timber resources for a sustainable

hired the company’s first full-time forester, Jack Winn.

yield. The first tract of trees to be certified as a tree farm was

Winn’s experience was crucial to the company’s plans

Olney Creek. Years later, to honor the man who had guided the

to operate as an owner of tree farms. After graduating from

company’s pivotal transformation, it was renamed the Garrett

Washington State University’s forestry and agriculture

Eddy Tree Farm. u

school, he had planted America’s first certified tree farm for Weyerhaeuser. Winn’s inventory of company forestlands indicated that Port Blakely Mill Co. owned about twenty-seven thousand acres of second-growth forests and other lands that had not yet reseeded. The latter properties included the Kitsap Tract in Kitsap County, in which Bainbridge Island resides; the

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Chapter

Forward Thinking

Company

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of the Port Blakely Companies

Like many tree farmers, Port Blakely derives a substantial portion of income from log exports, primarily to Asia. Here the logs are gathered for shipment via containerized vessels.

It was 1947, and William B. Greeley, now manager of the West Coast Lumberman’s Association, summed up forestry’s frustrations: “This industry has, almost overnight, been thrust into second-growth forest management without any adequate technical preparation.” Greeley was responding to the financial pressures on timberland owners to manage their forests for sustainable long-term benefit and not the traditional “cut and run” logging methods of the past. At a few forward-thinking companies like Port Blakely Mill Co., preparations already were under way to effect more sustainable forestry practices when Greeley made these observations. Garrett Eddy’s innovative selective thinning program made its much-anticipated debut in 1948. Two experimental thinning plots, dubbed XT-1 and XT-2, were established near McCleary, Washington. Each plot was set on a ten-acre section of land supporting fifty-year-old stands of Douglas-fir. One plot was measured, thinned, and re-measured. The companion plot was left natural and measured as well. As these plots were thinned, a wealth of research was accumulated. “We decided to attempt a thinning program that was new and, as far as we could determine, had not been attempted at that time in this region,” Garrett later said. “Two objectives were set out. First, to not damage our second-growth stands but to improve them through a partial selective thinning. Second, to make money at this.” The same year the company’s newly formed forestry department made its first report to the board of directors. It noted that logging of old-growth timber had ceased, in order

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In this 1949 photograph, tree saplings are planted at the company’s Siler Tract. The bags hold the saplings enroute to their new home.

to concentrate on salvage operations—commercializing dead

be apparent once Winn had completed the forest inventory,

trees that otherwise would decompose or be lost to fire.

indicating which stands should be logged immediately, within

High-grade peeler logs went to plywood; high- and low-quality

five or ten years, fifteen or twenty-five years, and so on. The

hemlock went to paper.

goal, of course, was to have a selection of mature trees to

The board was further apprised that new acreage had been acquired to round out the company’s tree age classes. Garrett and chief forester Jack Winn, the report’s coauthors, urged

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harvest each year, with the gaps in age classes filled in by new land acquisitions. The report recommended several “next steps,” chiefly the

the board to restrict additional land purchases until more

completion of the inventory in the next six months and the

knowledge about the current age classes of the company’s

launching of the replanting program on cutover lands. More

second-growth forest was obtained. This information would

than one hundred acres at the Siler Tract near Redmond,

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

east of Seattle at the north end of Lake Sammamish, were designated for replanting, at a cost of two thousand to five The Keep Washington Green organization worked from 19401995 to prevent human-caused forest fires via public education.

thousand dollars per acre. Other lands also would be replanted after the inventory was done. “Nearly all can produce forest products, both major and minor,” the report noted. Several challenges also were identified, especially the threat of forest fires, which the report attributed more to trespassers than Mother Nature. Intruders caused other problems like trampling recently replanted lands, thereby impeding tree growth, and illegally logging smaller trees as Christmas trees. To reduce trespassing, Garrett and Winn hired watchmen and constructed gates and roadblocks at all entrances. They also built more roads to provide greater access to firefighters and firefighting equipment, a prescient move that would provide unexpected value to the company in the future. A final recommendation to the board of directors—which

PBC0714.jpg

by now included Jack, James G., and Franklin Eddy, and James G’s son-in-law Bruce Elmore—was to invest in educating the public about the timber industry’s vital importance to commerce, industry, and humankind. The report suggested that the company assist programs like Keep Washington Green and the proposed More Trees for Washington. The latter was launched in 1949 by the Washington State Forestry Conference, which comprised more than a dozen public agencies and industrial groups. Local newspapers touted the campaign as the “first all-out educational effort of its kind in the state’s history.” Kurt Lunnum, director of More Trees for Washington, asserted that the forty-five thousand private timberland owners holding approximately 5.5 million acres in the state “could double the income from their timber growing land by handling it as a cropland . . . making their trees a cash

The company leads the industry in supporting conservation and education efforts.

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crop, not just one crop through liquidation but repeated harvest

agitated by the hidebound state tax system. Timberlands in

through good management.”

Washington were considered property for tax purposes, and

This was exactly the tree-farming strategy that Port Blakely Mill Co. now pursued. As foresters undertook the thinning and

they would someday produce. Newly planted areas thus were

reseeding programs, they noted a particular challenge—the

subject to the same taxes as mature forests. In effect, the tax

overcrowding of desired Douglas-fir and hemlock by fast-

codes inhibited owners from growing more timber. As Garrett

growing shrubs, weeds, and deciduous trees. While the conifers

put it to the board, “Land taxes, especially those on cutover

would eventually “shade out” the competing vegetation,

and second-growth lands, will make or break the tree farm

decades would pass in the interim—not the best tree-growing

industry.”

tactic. Garrett confronted the challenge in typical fashion. He

The arcane system also was rife with abuses. Many owners underestimated the timber they owned to reduce the tax

dug into the literature on newer classes of herbicides that

burden, and tax assessors often made overly broad estimates of

government and industry were developing. Shortly thereafter,

the number of trees. Garrett recommended that the company

the company pioneered the use of herbicides to contain

take an activist stance with regard to changing the tax laws,

undesired plant growth. Pilots of vintage biplanes were

a suggestion that resonated with his father, given Jack’s long

recruited to spray newly planted and thinned forests with

legislative battle against oppressive taxes. More than two

2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid, a synthetic plant hormone

decades would pass, however, before the state legislature

that today is the most widely used herbicide in the world,

finally addressed the industry’s arguments.

despite lingering concerns over its long-term effects on the environment.

After nearly a two-year wait the much-anticipated Forest Inventory Report was ready for the board’s perusal in

As the forestry industry gradually metamorphosed

November 1949. Literally glued to the first two pages were

into legions of sustainable tree farms, the nation’s media

several black-and-white photographs of the experimental

took notice. Harvard Business Review stated in 1948 that

thinning plots, testifying to both Garrett’s and Winn’s deep

companies like Weyerhaeuser, Simpson, and Port Blakely Mill

pride in their innovative approach to tree farming. The

Co. had “become integrated, processing-oriented industries,

inventory covered 15,775 acres of company forestlands in three

using more of what had formerly been left on the forest floor or

counties—Grays Harbor, Mason, and Thurston. Although the

disposed of at the mill as waste, hiring more people to process

acreage represented less than half the company’s 36,390 acres

timber than to cut it, [and] orienting themselves more and more

at the time, it was enough to draw some early conclusions and

toward manufacturing.”

management directions.

Although private timberland owners adopted more modern and ecologically responsible tree-farming principles, they were

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were assessed in terms of the expected board feet of lumber

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Roughly 16 percent of the inventoried land was designated “unstocked,” essentially bereft of trees. Another 16 percent

What Is a Tree Farm?

To much of the American public, a tree farm is where Christmas trees

grow until they’re harvested, sold, and displayed in the living room over the

Garrett Eddy’s keen mind naturally was aroused by the concept of scientific

holidays. This is not the American tree-farming system, as it is understood

principles of forest sustainability. He was especially interested in forest-

in the forestry industry. In fact, the concept of tree farming marks a critical

thinning practices to remove weaker trees and undergrowth limiting the

turn in the history of the business toward sustainable forestry practices.

growth of hardier specimens. Garrett achieved the approval of his father

and uncle to direct the company’s first experimental thinning program near

The term “tree farm” was first used in the 1940s to link the production

of trees to the production of food crops. Farming, the mainstay of

Among early advocates of tree farming was Port Blakely Mill Co.

McCleary, Washington, and to establish its first forestry department. He

American production

read everything he could on

since the eighteenth

tree farming, conferred with

century, connotes ongoing

other industry leaders on

stewardship of the land and

their respective progress,

consistent production of

and was the guiding force

goods. The industry wanted

at Port Blakely Mill Co. in

to get the message across

establishing a long-term

that it no longer would cut

tree-farming program. In

trees down, leave the land

succeeding years, one large

barren, and then move onto

plot of forestland after

the next forest and do the

another that was owned by

same. Thanks to the advent

the company would achieve

of herbicides during World

ATFS certification as a tree

War II, it was possible to

farm. Each was named for a

replant trees and manage their growth; previously, cutover lands would sprout a variety of shrubs, brush, and

These seedlings, in time, will become valuable timber for Port Blakely Tree Farms. The concept of tree farming is relatively new in the United States, dating only to the 1940s. With the concept of “farming” came stewardship of the land, which included replanting of trees with seedlings like these, instead of the former practice of letting the land regenerate itself with brush and other wind-blown tree seed like alder, maple, cottonwood, and hemlock.

member of the Eddy family.

How important

is sustainable tree farming to human beings? In a

hardwood trees of little value at the time.

word—extremely. Because tree farms are managed to promote the rapid

growth of trees, the practice sequesters within trees a greater volume

The first tree farm was begun by industry giant Weyerhaeuser Timber

Company in 1941 in Washington state. The same year the American Tree

of greenhouse gasses like carbon dioxide. Fast-growing plants like trees

Farming System (ATFS) was established to provide a certification system

convert carbon dioxide to biomass and release it when they decompose. An

for each tree farm to achieve this designation by complying with specific

established old-growth forest, however, doesn’t remove much carbon from

guidelines and standards. ATFS is the oldest third-party forest certification

the atmosphere. A rapidly growing new forest, on the other hand, absorbs

organization in the world. It recently celebrated its seventieth anniversary

far more carbon. Next time you’re standing in an immature forest, breathe

and is recognized globally for its leading-edge forest certification system.

deeply. It’s good for you. u

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was considered “low stocked.” Both types of land were ready for replanting, the twenty-nine-page Forest Inventory Report stated. More than 3,800 acres were catalogued as “mediumto-well stocked,” with trees forty to eighty years old that “are now ready for partial harvest”—thinned immediately to reduce overcrowding and thus improve the quality and growth of the remaining trees. This land “can begin producing an income as soon as intensive management is applied, providing market conditions are favorable,” the report recommended. “The sooner this big job of thinning is done, the larger the profit in future years.” Most of the company’s old-growth forests had been logged, other than some “scattered trees” on the Kamilche Peninsula in Mason County, and nearly all “dead salvage” had been removed. Fourteen percent of the surveyed forestlands were overwhelmed by minor species like vine maple, willow, and alder, and the report advised that these trees be cut and sold and the land replanted with Douglas-fir or hemlock. The method for inventorying the forests also was described. Foresters had divided the land into forty-acre plots that were individually surveyed and mapped. As each plot was surveyed, foresters addressed five questions—the condition of the stand as to vigor, the volume of dead salvage, the past fire and logging history, market prices for the various products within the area, and what could be done to improve the land to effect better growing conditions. All in all, it was a remarkable document. A separate pullout listed the number, type, species, age, and stocking percentage of every stand on each forty-acre plot. Based on the systematic inventory, Garrett and Winn recommended to the board that the company replant more than five hundred acres of cutover

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

A five-year-old Douglas-fir plantation.

lands “as soon as possible,” and begin thinning more than 4,000 acres. Both men acknowledged that thinning was still partart and part-science, or as Garrett put it, “trial and error.” The experimental thinning plots would help determine how best to proceed, they reported. It was up to the board’s discretion to pursue what Garrett called “administrative thinning.”

A Green Light to Move Impressed with the depth and clarity of the inventory, the directors gave Garrett the green light to move forward with plans for thinning and reseeding cutover lands. Port Blakely Mill Co. stood at the vanguard of the timber industry’s transformation. Like rival shipbuilders awed by Skinner & Eddy innovations three decades earlier, foresters now marveled at the company’s pacesetting thinning practices. Among them was a group of expert Norwegian foresters who visited the company’s two experimental thinning plots in 1951. Garrett had personally invited the foresters to survey the plots in recognition of their “experience and past history of intensive forestry,” he later said. Although the Norwegians had no experience with Douglas-fir—their forests were predominantly stands of spruce they had thinned—they were “well read on our forestry literature,” he noted. Garrett confessed to the Norwegians that the company was unsure whether it was doing the “best possible job” in the “technique of thinning.” He openly sought their frank advice, and they gave it freely. The discourse that commenced was revelatory. At XT-1 the visitors remarked that the company had thinned too heavily, which surprised Garrett and Winn, since other foresters had thought they had not thinned enough to “obtain release”—freeing the healthier trees from competing

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vegetation to experience more robust growth. Garrett pointed

stands,” wrote one forester. Another stated that Port Blakely

out that Douglas-fir grows faster than spruce—hence the

Mill Co. had created the “thinning showplace of the region.”

heavier thinning. At XT-2 the foresters were shown a stand of trees marked for thinning. A technical discussion ensued over

3, XT-4, and XT-5. Before the decade ended, the company

which trees to thin and why, culminating in the visitors stating

supported nearly a dozen experimental thinning plots.

that the marked trees were “almost 100 percent the way they

Research persisted in determining which trees to cut, when

would do it,” Garrett recalled.

to cut them, and how far apart the remaining trees should

The Norwegian foresters also discussed the problem of tree

be, producing a treasure trove of scientific information. For

root competition. “They emphasized . . . thinning to remove

example, the data indicated that a two-step thinning process

such competition from the better stems, more than any other

—a precommercial thinning followed by a commercial

foresters we have had in our stands,” Garrett said. “In asking

thinning—produced the fastest-growing, hardiest specimens.

them questions whether we were correct in taking this tree

Precommercial thinning called for cutting approximately

or that tree and leaving another one, they looked more at the

150 of the inferior trees in a stand of 500 trees to reduce

spacing on the ground than they did at the crown, which is

competition for water, sunlight, and nutrients. Much of this

not the way we have been doing it.” Thinning practices were

timber was left on the forest floor to decompose and thereby

altered to address root competition in addition to other factors

augment the nutrient base. A second commercial thinning

like crown spacing.

followed several years later, and the trees, in this case, were

The visit affirmed that Garrett’s theories of thinning and his criteria for success were correct. The foresters had effectively

harvested and sold. The industry’s logging practices also entered the modern era

blessed the company’s tree-farming methods, confirming that

in the 1950s. Wartime research had guided a reduction in the

they were grounded in both science and economics to produce

size and weight of chainsaws. These were powered either by

the most effective and sustainable yields. The “foreign experts

gasoline or electricity—in the latter case an electric generator

are able to find very little wrong” with the thinning techniques,

was lugged to the logging site by a Caterpillar tractor. Gasoline-

Garrett commented. “It is with considerable pleasure that the

powered saws typically were of the two-man variety, used to

Forestry Department obtained this concurring viewpoint.”

cut especially big timber.

Other expert foresters stopped by to examine the Forest

128

By the mid-1950s XT-1 and XT-2 had been joined by XT-

Worker safety improved along with the machinery. Port

Experiment Station, as Garrett called it, in succeeding years.

Blakely Mill Co. and other timber companies formulated strict

Each came away better educated and highly respectful

rules for its contracted loggers, required to wear hardhats and

of the company’s innovative efforts to manage its forests.

boots, and to restrict their smoking habits. Before falling a

Commendatory letters arrived at 6100 Arcade Square. “Your

tree, a faller had to inspect its condition for rot, the direction

company has pioneered much of the work in thinning young fir

of the lean, and the slope of the ground below, among other

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

considerations. “Fatalities were reduced radically from what they had been in the highball days early in the century,” writes Joseph H. Pierre in his book When Timber Stood Tall. As the decade progressed, Jack and James G. Eddy infrequently stopped by the office. Both men had reached an age when they sought more restful pastimes than running a rapidly evolving timber company. Sometimes months would sail by before one or the other came by to check on things. Jack’s health was failing, although he appeared chipper and pleased to be surrounded by family on his eightieth birthday in 1952. That year he made official what had been evident for several years—he appointed thirty-six-year-old Garrett Eddy to succeed him as president of Port Blakely Mill Co. Garrett’s older brother Franklin became vice president, succeeding James G., who took on the title of treasurer. Jack retained the title of chairman. Although the older Eddy brothers had managed the company in tandem over the decades, the younger Eddy brothers would not. Garrett was in charge, and there would be no brotherly sharing of opinions before decisions were reached. This was fine with Franklin, a man of refined tastes who preferred to read histories or indulge his passions in art and rare automobiles—he owned a Mercedes Gull-Wing sports car—than trek through the woods. An intellectual and lifelong bachelor, he was the spirited uncle to Garrett and Mary Ford’s children—Gary, born in 1944, and John Whittemore Eddy II, born in 1947, and daughter Barbara Ethel, born in 1951. How many uncles could regale their nephews about trips aboard their yacht, the Dorade, with entertainer Gypsy Rose Lee in attendance? When John W. Eddy II was born, his grandfather and Dorade, Franklin Eddy’s beloved yawl, in the Hat Island race, 1953.

namesake wrote the infant a letter, which he was not permitted

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to read until his twenty-first birthday. “I was delighted to learn that you were born into this world last night,” Jack wrote, “and that you are a strong, healthy human being, weighing eightand-one-quarter pounds.” Jack then made note of the threethousand-dollar check in John’s name that he had deposited at Washington Mutual Savings Bank, “with the hope that you will learn to handle property and lead the better life happily,” he wrote. “With love and affection, I am your Grandfather, JWE.” On August 5, 1955, Jack Eddy passed away at the age of eighty-two, having led an accomplished and rewarding life. Tributes poured forth for the former state legislator, noting his purchase of the world’s largest sawmill at Port Blakely, his wartime contributions to the country at Skinner & Eddy, and that company’s shipbuilding records. Others commended his two books and numerous articles on hunting, noted his early days at Anchor Salt, and lauded his many philanthropic and charitable contributions. The Seattle Times cited Jack’s gift of a giant elephant’s head to the Rainier Club, where it hung in the rotunda for many years. Jack shot the elephant decades earlier on a big-game hunting expedition in Africa with his lifelong friend, banker Joshua Green. James G. Eddy during the 1950s achieved much industry acclaim for his origination and support of what had become the Institute of Forest Genetics. In 1952 James received the Distinguished Service Award from the U.S. Department of Agriculture for his “unique and individualist contribution to American forestry.” At the ceremony, William Greeley, who nominated James G. for the honor, said, “This man out of the logging camps and sawmills told us we should study the possibilities of growing better trees, and backed up his preaching with his own money and personal interest.”

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

(Above) The Rainier Club, Seattle, 1907. Jack Eddy, as well as other family members, belonged to the club for years. (Below) James G. and Mary Cooley Eddy on the veranda of their estate in Medina, Tree Top Terrace. The gardens were designed by famed landscape architect Otto Holmdahl.

James G. continued to invest in the industry’s future, forming with others the Forest Genetics

As young men Jack and James G. had invested capital from the Eddy Investment Trust their father had formed to

Research Foundation in 1952.

acquire Port Blakely Mill Co. Looking back from the vantage

The foundation provided

point of the middle of the twentieth century, the venture “was

financial support to students

an extraordinary and even, to many, a reckless act,” historian

to further their educations in

William Sherrard writes. “But, they succeeded, both in holding

forest genetics. The same year

the family together and in enlarging its resources. They had to

the American Forestry Association bestowed upon James G. its highest James G. Eddy

its groundbreaking research to this present day.

award for outstanding service to

save to build capital [and the] earnings were passed on from one generation to the next. Not by chance was this family fortunate in producing individuals who developed management skills.”

American forestry, “in recognition of Mr. Eddy’s effective efforts, continued for more than twenty-five

The Strong Shoulders of Garrett Eddy

years, in the field of forest genetics,” the plaque reads. “His

One such individual, Sherrard notes, was Garrett Eddy,

creative and tireless work has given to this country the Institute

entrusted now with the company’s future and the family’s

of Forest Genetics at Placerville, California, and a much greater

financial prospects. Garrett took this responsibility to heart.

interest in the opportunities for enlarging and improving the

His chief goal was to manage Port Blakely Mill Co. as a safety

useful forest species of North America.”

net for the family so its individual members could enjoy their

James G. Eddy died in 1964 at the age of eighty-three,

own lives free of the company’s business concerns. Fortunately,

six years after the passing of his dearly loved wife Mary. A

he had strong shoulders to bear the weight of accountability.

telegram of condolences sent by the assistant chief of the forest

He also was accustomed to excelling on his own merits—in

service to their children proclaimed James G. “the founder of

track, at Harvard, in his ornithological studies, in the war, and

the forest genetics movement in America.” Forty-two years

in the forests. Like many other hard-charging and self-reliant

earlier he had sat in the home of a dubious Luther Burbank

chief executives of the period, he made all decisions in the

expressing his creative thoughts about a tree-breeding station.

traditional buck-stops-here mode, an inheritance of his years as

In 1982, that station, the Institute of Forest Genetics, similarly

a navy commander.

received the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s highest award

One of the new president’s first acts was to reinvigorate

for service. “One cannot forget that this is the product of one

the company’s land acquisition program. Between 1954 and

man’s refusal to admit defeat,” American Forests reminded

1957 Port Blakely Mill Co. purchased 6,827 acres at a little

readers at the time. Out of this persistence, “A new era in

less than an average of one hundred dollars an acre. The low

forestry was born.” The Institute of Forest Genetics continues

price reflected the type of land acquired, much of it cutover

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131

second-growth forest earmarked for replanting. Buying such

Research reported that Port Blakely Mill Co. was in much

property at the time was unprecedented, since decades would

better condition than comparable companies, and the outlook

pass before the land became commercial. Garrett was buying

for the timber industry was bullish. “Growth in population,

property that would not earn back a penny until well after his

households and national incomes [are] expected to continue,”

death. Obviously, he had profound conviction in the merits

the consultancy reported.

of the tree-farming strategy, despite continuing outrage over burdensome taxes. As he wrote shareholders in 1957, “Our

nearly 41,000 acres with a capacity of 309.6 million board

greatest danger is not fire, insects, tree diseases, or wind

feet of lumber. At company headquarters, new hires included

damage—it’s the possibility of excessive taxation on tree crops

George Thomson, a graduate of the University of Washington

which take 80 years to mature. Our whole tree farm program

Forestry School, who became Winn’s second-in-command. A

could be wiped out by inequitable tax rates.”

tall, powerfully built, ex-navy ship fitter, Thompson had worked

Still it did not hurt that the American economy was on

with Winn at Weyerhaeuser’s original tree farm. Forester John

an upswing in the late 1950s. The timber industry was a

Colley also joined the forestry department, and accountant

beneficiary of the building boom that reverberated across the

Barry Sheppard hired on in finance.

country. Sales of Douglas-fir lumber in the Pacific Northwest

Colley estimates that Port Blakely Mill Co. owned

increased 27 percent from 1946 to 1955, according to an

approximately 45,000 acres by the end of the 1950s. Sheppard,

analysis by Standard Research Consultants. Sturdier types

who joined in 1959, says, “Garrett was buying land all the

of inexpensive plywood soared 242 percent in sales over the

time. George [Thompson] would bring him these properties,

same period. Best of all, the prices for all types of lumber and

typically twenty to thirty acres each, and he’d turn half of them

plywood jumped appreciably. For example, Douglas-fir prices

down—he only wanted land of good value that would stead

per thousand board feet of lumber increased from $6.60 in 1946

the company through the next generations. His plans were to

to $16.20 in 1954.

grow far more trees than would be cut. He was always forward-

Garrett had hired Standard Research to undertake the aforementioned analysis, in large part to assist the valuation of

132

By the middle of the decade, Port Blakely Mill Co. owned

thinking.” This approach was certainly evident when Garrett

the company’s common stock. There were 4,107 shares of stock

recommended to the board in 1961 to diversify the company’s

in Port Blakely Mill Co. spread among two generations of Eddy

American holdings by acquiring forestlands in Liberia. He,

family members. Determining the fair market value of the stock

Thompson, board director Bruce “Bucky” Elmore, and head

was necessary to give the shareholders a truer sense of their

accountant Larry Wells had visited the African country to

holdings for investment purposes, and by extension to provide

determine the feasibility of land acquisitions. The board

an equitable rate for selling the shares back to the company.

approved the expenditure of twenty-five thousand dollars

Not that the latter was anticipated any time soon: Standard

to acquire an option in a joint venture with Liberian Timber

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The images on this page comprise photographs snapped during the company’s visit to the African country of Liberia. Garrett Eddy sought to diversify the company’s forestlands and acquired an option to acquire 350,000 acres from the Liberian government. Although the option ultimately would not be exercised, the effort underscored the company’s resolve to expand its holdings beyond the Western United States. In the top photograph, George Thomson, Port Blakely’s chief forester, measures a log spanning nearly seven feet.

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Industries Company, which had been granted a concession on

beyond the trees growing on them. Real estate development

350,000 acres by the Liberian government. Although the option

became a subject of much interest to Garrett.

was never exercised, it suggests the global sweep of Garrett’s strategic vision. He had other bold plans in mind, too. The nation’s

Jack and James G. Eddy had dipped their toes into real estate development in the 1940s, trying unsuccessfully to develop a residential community of homes along the waterfront

population was swelling fast in the postwar era, with a much

in Port Blakely. Only a couple houses were sold, and the plans

larger than expected generation born between 1946 and

were shelved. Garrett now mulled developing logged-over

1964—the baby boomers. At the same time, many families were

land and other developable parcels to capitalize on spreading

relocating from crowded inner cities to the peace and calm

suburbanization, while also diversifying the company’s

of the suburbs, made more accessible by the building of the

business. To more fully assess the opportunities and risks, he

nation’s interstate highway system in the 1950s and 1960s. As

formed a real estate division within Eddy Investment Company,

Seattle’s rising population encroached upon the rural areas,

which had relocated to Seattle from Bay City. This way Port

their value for property tax purposes increased, making them more expensive to maintain as timberlands. Some forestlands owned by Port Blakely Mill Co. suddenly offered more value Blakely Mill Co. could retain its focus on tree farming. Then in 1960 Puget Sound Power & Light came calling. PSP&L, a large regional electric utility, was looking for a partner to share the risks and rewards of developing twentytwo acres it owned in Renton, the fast-growing city named for the founder of Port Blakely Mill Co. Aircraft manufacturer Boeing Co. had opened a plant in the city during the war, as had Paccar, a maker of trucks and tanks. Renton’s population expanded, and PSP&L believed the city could easily support a major retail center, which the utility planned to call Renton Village. Garrett met with PSP&L vice president Larry Hall, and the two men inked a joint venture in which Port Blakely Mill Co. held a 51 percent ownership stake. PSP&L would manage the project, although Garrett could veto any decisions. (Left to Right) Onny Warjone, Garrett Eddy, Jim Warjone, Tom Elmore, George Thomson, and Barbara Eddy.

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Accountant Sheppard explains that PSP&L took the minority

position for tax reasons. “By owning less than half of Renton Village, they could report it as an investment rather than as an operating business, which would have affected their rate base,” he says. Over the next several years Renton Village blossomed on the twenty-two-acre parcel, where PSP&L previously had stored power poles and related utility equipment. A

At Sacred Heart Seminary in Los Gatos, California, Bruce Elmore, shortly after becoming a Jesuit, is flanked by (left to right): sister Sister Charlotte, O.P.; mother Gar; brother Tom; and his father Bucky. Both Bruce and Charlotte later left religious life.

supermarket, office building, hotel, retail shops, and a movie theater sprouted. Port Blakely Mill Co. gained valuable experience in real estate development, which would be put to use in several other projects in the years ahead. As the 1960s greeted America, a youthful president and his picture-perfect family occupied the White House. President John F. Kennedy had pronounced that the torch of freedom had been passed to a new generation. At Port Blakely Mill Co., the next generation of Eddys had joined the family business, although they were still in their teens and were working summer jobs. Bruce Elmore, James’s G’s grandson and son of board director Bucky Elmore, worked at the experimental thinning plots near McCleary in 1960, measuring the size of trees to gauge their future growth on subsequent summer visits. “Back then what we were doing was pretty novel stuff,”

Charlotte W. Eddy Elmore and her first three children (left to right) Charlotte, Bruce, and Mary Ann (Garby).

Bruce says. “I gained tremendous appreciation for what my grandfather had done with tree genetics and what my mother’s cousin [Garrett] was doing at the company.” Much to the chagrin of female Eddy family members like

John “Onny” Warjone, another of James G’s grandsons,

Charlotte Elmore and Galen Sherlock, who would have loved

worked during his summer vacation from high school in 1962

working in the forests, the summer jobs were restricted to male

at the Olney Creek Tree Farm, “listening to the radio for the

family members. By the early 1970s the company opened up

most part for reports of fires,” Onny recalls. “I was pretty much

employment opportunities to all family members, regardless

isolated, but I found to my everlasting pleasure that I loved

of gender.

being in the woods. As a boy in Riverside [California],

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135

I always liked to hike and search for snakes and spiders. I rode

more than 15 billion board feet of timber in Washington,

horses, motorcycles, and four-wheelers. Guess you could say

Oregon, and California, with Washington getting the brunt.

I was a bit of a wild child.” Onny would attend seven colleges over the next nine years, finally graduating with a degree in

Port Blakely Mill Co. estimated that 15 million board feet of timber had fallen at its Olney Creek tract, with another 5 million board feet scattered throughout the rest of its holdings. It could have been worse. “Our thinned stands—some thinned now for the third time and first thinned fourteen years ago—withstood the typhoon in excellent shape, and there is no doubt now in our minds that as long as we stay with our ‘Blakely Standard’ of marking, we have licked the ‘blowdown bugaboo’ in thinned stands,” the forestry department reported. Still, the total 20 million board feet of downed trees represented more logs than the company harvested in a

Chief forester John Colley in the foreground of an old growth Douglas-fir tree in the 1970s.

anthropology. In June 1972 he joined the company’s forestry department full-time as an assistant to John Colley. Both Onny and his brother Jim were in school and missed the massive typhoon that struck the Pacific Northwest on Columbus Day, October 12, 1962. Typhoon Frieda killed forty-seven people and destroyed or damaged more than fifty thousand buildings. With winds whipping up to 150 miles per hour, the typhoon is still considered the most powerful nontropical storm in the history of the lower forty-eight states. Frieda caused a great blowdown of timber, reminiscent of the 1934 storm that had pummeled the region. The storm flattened

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

On Columbus Day, October 12, 1962, a major windstorm attacked the Puget Sound region and caused a massive blowdown of Port Blakely trees. The National Weather Service later designated the storm as Washington’s worst weather disaster of the twentieth century.

Most likely these logs cut in Mason County were bound for Japan.

single year. To avoid economic disaster, this timber had to be

The solution was to export the logs, much like William

salvaged immediately or it would decompose. Fortunately,

Renton had done a century earlier. A week before the

the companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s novel thinning program and fire prevention

Columbus Day storm, Japanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Crown Prince Akihito and

practices had required the building of a road system that

Crown Princess Michiko had visited the Pacific Northwest to

no competitor matched. This unique grid gave it a decided

commemorate the first trade and friendship treaty between

advantage; it could buck and haul the timber and get it to

the United States and Japan. The door was opened to a freer

market more quickly than other companies. Less fortuitous was

trade climate with the former enemy nation, prompting the U.S.

the economic climate: the domestic market was slumping after

government to lift its log export restrictions. Port Blakely Mill

several years of stellar returns.

Co. sold most of its downed timber to Weyerhaeuser, which

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For the Port Blakely crew, the New Zealand scenery—from the mountains to the sea—was stunning. In his dozens of trips to the country, John “Onny” Warjone never tired of the dramatic landscapes, many of which reminded him of the Pacific Northwest. New Zealand was one of several countries— including Australia and Fiji—that Port Blakely explored looking for new opportunities.

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of the Port Blakely Companies

then shipped the logs to Japan. Out of disaster came financial reward. Within ten years, Japan would become the world’s largest importer of logs, and only recently was it overtaken by China in this regard. As the new decade took shape, changes were in store at company headquarters. A defined contribution pension plan was provided to employees, and annual Eddy financial family planning sessions were instituted. The latter would help family members better understand and appreciate the direction of the company and its business objectives. The Port Blakely Training Class was developed to introduce other members of the younger Eddy generation more formally to working at the family business. The first class included Garrett’s sons Gary and John, Tom Elmore (Bruce’s younger brother), and Rob and Randy Almirall, the grandsons of Robert B. Eddy. Forestland acquisitions remained a strategic priority, both domestically and internationally, in part to fill in the

(Left to Right) Jasmine Eddy Jensen, chief forester George Thomson, board director E.A. “Bud” Howard, Martin Lowther, and Ken Trautman, another company forester.

tree age classes in the company’s land inventory. To reduce regulatory risks in the United States possibly restricting domestic harvesting, Garrett made several exploratory trips overseas, traveling to Australia, New Zealand, and Fiji looking for promising opportunities but finding none at the time. The company continued to snap up small parcels of privately held land at home, “always buying the best of the best,” says Barry Sheppard. “To reduce the possibility of large-scale fire losses, much of the land we acquired was ‘here and there’— not contiguous for the most part. In the 1960s is also when we moved beyond Western Washington to buy parcels in Eastern Washington, Oregon, and Idaho.” Not all the acquisitions were small plots. In 1969 Port Blakely Mill Co. bought seven thousand acres of forestland

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139

in Pacific and Grays Harbor counties for $3.5 million. The

to have a Sheraton Hotel in the immediate vicinity. An airplane

seller was a descendant of one of the founders of the Saginaw

affixed to the hotel’s roof was installed in the 1980s to attract

Timber Company, which gave the land its name—the Saginaw

comment and notoriety. Garrett now firmed up plans to develop

Tract. The company paid cash for the property, beating out the

the company’s forestlands in Redmond, where it owned

rival bidder, Weyerhaeuser, which had insisted on paying with

fourteen hundred acres, and on Bainbridge Island, where it

stock. To help capitalize the purchase price, Garrett sold three

held sixteen hundred acres. Both properties were considered

major tracts of land and borrowed $2.8 million from Joshua

viable high-end residential communities, with associated retail

Green’s People’s Bank. Although he detested debt as his father

and leisure amenities.

had—Garrett never forgot Jack’s anxieties after borrowing money in 1928 to acquire Campbell River Timber Company—

environmental movement in America stirred in motion. Nightly

he had absolute confidence in the financial prudence of the

newscasts depicted fouled beaches, contaminated water

transaction.

systems, and smog-laden cities. Garrett warned shareholders

Indeed the acquisition presented an unexpected tax bonus.

of the threat of increased government regulation of the timber

As Sheppard explains, “We were able to mitigate some of

business, despite the industry’s vastly improved, intensive

the damage from the huge Columbus Day storm by treating

management of the forests. “Good forest management is good

the proceeds we received as an ‘involuntary conversion,’ the

environment management,” he repeatedly stated. Caught up in

replacement property being the Saginaw Tract.” As long as

the fever of the environmental crusade, few listened.

the cash from the downed timber went into the acquisition

The vehemence of the attacks against the industry was an

of more forestland, the proceeds were tax-exempt. Any gains

affront to Garrett. As a leader of America’s tree farming system

on the new property would be deferred until sold. “This was

and a trained and serious ornithologist, he had enormous

a very new strategy at the time, and we were able to save a

respect for the nation’s woodlands and their diverse species.

considerable sum that otherwise would have gone to the IRS.”

“The right and ability to manage forestlands are being taken

Port Blakely Mill Co. subsequently renamed the Saginaw Tract

away from the professional foresters on public and private

the Robert B. Eddy Tree Farm.

lands by people who do not understand the situation,” he

The second strategic pillar—real estate development—also

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Just as these projects were gathering steam, the

argued.

progressed, despite some misgivings about the strategy among

As an example, he noted the chorus of voices seeking to

a few Eddy family members. Renton Village took root in 1967,

curtail the burning of wood because of resulting air pollution.

and in succeeding years sprouted additional office buildings

Yet, as Garrett pointed out, the “burning of logging slash has

and shops. The venture was an outstanding success. The

two purposes—to reduce wildfires that could blacken the skies

bursting city desperately needed the commercial outlets, which

of half the state all summer, and to prepare the soil for the

soon teemed with people. Nearby businesses were delighted

next crop.” He cited many other instances where a significant

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

change in industry practices to reduce harm to the environment would, in fact, incur the opposite. Nevertheless, as he had intuited and warned about, a wave of environmental legislation surged forward as the 1970s began. Although the strategic priority at Port Blakely Mill Co. remained tree farming, real estate development now took on greater importance. Like his father before him, Garrett shifted gears into a second enterprise, while always keeping his eyes trained on the family’s principal business. Given the dire challenges ahead, such intense scrutiny was necessary. u

Master Builder

Renton Village was the first successful, large-scale real estate development undertaken by Port Blakely Mill Co. The project, a joint venture with Puget Sound Power and Light Company, ultimately encompassed a variety of buildings on more than fifty acres in the former coal-mining village of Renton, named to honor the founder of the world’s largest sawmill at Port Blakely, the indomitable Captain William Renton. Perhaps the captain’s spirit watched over the development, as it proceeded smoothly under the guidance of Garrett Eddy and accountant Larry Wells, manager of the Eddy Investment Company.

From the 1960s into the 1970s Renton Village, located at Interstate 405 and

Rainier Avenue South, grew into a formidable commercial development of office buildings, a hotel, restaurants, and a multiscreen cinema. The partnership with Puget Sound Power and Light was solid, and neither partner sought to dominate the other. Puget approached Port Blakely first to procure the proceeds for the subsequent acquisition of Montana Power’s coal strip operations. Eventually Port

“Good forest management is good environment management,”

Garrett repeatedly stated.

Blakely Mill Co. offered to buy the utility’s share in the project, but instead the partners agreed to sell Renton Village in its entirety for cash to another party.

Although the project was a great success, it was stymied early on by

problems with the 188-room Sheraton-Renton Inn, which had fallen on hard times. Jim Warjone, head of the company’s real estate division in the 1970s, says the company made a mistake it hoped not to make again. “We had negotiated a one-sided lease to our benefit with the first hotel operator, which took a toll on the hotel,” he says. “Then we did the same thing with the second hotel operator. It resulted in us having to take back management of the hotel, which had become run down. Our reputation suffered. We learned that a partnership is a two-way street. Each party has to come away from the table feeling treated fairly by the other party for the partnership to have any chance of long-term success.”

The company brought in an experienced hotel executive named Christine

Anderson to turn things around at the beleaguered hotel. Anderson, one of the first women to reach such a high-level position in the hotel industry, put the enterprise back on track via a series of successful strategies, and it finally turned a profit. In 1988 Renton Village was sold. The lessons it taught helped redefine Port Blakely Mill Co. in its future real estate projects. u

Forward Thinking Company

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Chapter

Port Blakely Tree Farmsâ&#x20AC;&#x201C;

A Modern Organization

Falling a tree in one of PBCâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s U.S. holdings.

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of the Port Blakely Companies

The 1970s rang in with great discord and divisiveness. The war in Vietnam had split the nation generationally, and inner cities were overcome by race riots, spurring white flight to the suburbs. College campuses were a tempest of protests against the war and in support of civil rights and environmental causes. And the economy was in a downward spiral, taking the timber industry with it. Such was the state of the country as Port Blakely Mill Co. released its annual report in April 1970. Inflationary pressures were squeezing the economy. The consumer price index— the cost of goods and services to consumers—had risen by 7.2 percent, and the buying power of the dollar was a dismal seventy-three cents. “Unless we all begin to holler, we soon may have a five-cents dollar,” Time magazine cautioned. Garrett Eddy certainly was not keeping silent. The CEO of Port Blakely Mill Co. expressed his concerns to shareholders that the high mortgage interest rates—8.5 percent and growing—had put the brakes on the housing market. This, in turn, had depressed prospects for the timber industry. “No one at this time expects these interest rates to decrease (Top) Protecting an identified wildlife habitat “leave” tree. (Bottom) Trees planted in rows in one of the farms that was purchased by Port Blakely Tree Farms.

substantially for some time,” Garrett warned. He believed that the economic conditions were forcing businesses and people to conserve capital rather than invest or spend it, thereby spurring economic growth. Until then, the timber industry would be on life support. As Garrett noted, “Demand for logs is almost nil, except for export to Japan.”

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Gary Eddy, center with sunglasses, Quoc Tuan School, Vietnam, c. early 1970s.

More than the nation’s economic woes were weakening the industry. Runaway taxes continued to eat up profits.

the Nineteenth Tactical Air Support Squadron stationed near

The momentum of the environmental movement picked up

Saigon in Bien Hoa, South Vietnam. He and his fellow airmen

also, attracting more and more legislators to its cause. A

were assigned to report on the effectiveness of the military’s

“tremendous social revolution is on us now,” Garrett opined.

secret B-52 bombing raids on Cambodia. On Gary’s ninety-

“The sociological rate of change is accelerating beyond all

seventh mission on October 1, 1970, to survey the scene of a

comprehension.” Certainly the strident protests against

bombing raid on the village of Tang Kouk, his plane was shot

the war were a new phenomenon. Garrett took this dissent

down by small-arms fire and crashed into a hillside. Both he

personally—his and Mary Ford’s sons had both enlisted, Gary

and his copilot were killed instantly. “They ran out of altitude,

in the air force and John in the navy.

ideas, and time,” his brother John says.

Gary had joined the Reserve Officers Training Corps at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma. Upon his graduation with

144

a degree in physics in 1969 he became a first lieutenant with

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The aircraft was the first acknowledged U.S. plane to be shot down over Cambodia during the war. Garrett was at

the office at 6100 Arcade Square when he received the news. “Two men in military uniforms walked through the door, one of whom was a chaplain,” recalls accountant Barry Sheppard. “Garrett was visibly crushed. He took it pretty hard but held in his emotions. All he said was, ‘I need to drive home and tell my wife.’” The funeral was at St. Mark’s Cathedral, a short distance from the Eddy estate on Boylston Avenue, where Franklin Eddy now resided. Garrett and Mary Ford lived in Magnolia, a Seattle neighborhood northwest of downtown. The massive

In the aftermath of his son’s premature passing, Garrett invested more of his energies in running

Port Blakely Mill Co.

Episcopalian church brimmed with weeping mourners. Months earlier it had been the scene of joy—the wedding of Gary’s brother John, who was home on leave from Vietnam, where he

changed its posture on taxing timber companies. The law was

served aboard an ammunition ship, and Constance “Tantsie”

altered from the annual Ad Valorem property tax on a growing

Tarcea. They would receive Gary’s wedding gift a few weeks

timber crop to an excise tax system based on the value of

after his death.

the yield and collected at the time of harvest. For a timber

An article about Gary in the Seattle Times praised his

company with an estimated seventy thousand acres of land

kindness and compassion. As his squadron’s civic action officer,

in western Washington alone, the new tax regime promised

he had taken the lead in building a high school in Bien Hoa,

a more equitable tax treatment for Port Blakely Mill Co. as it

“scrounging lumber, teaching pupils, working with the South

continued its transformation into tree farming.

Vietnamese, working through a Dollars for Scholars program,”

There were now seven tree farms within the company’s

the newspaper reported. The principal of the Quoc Tuan School

forestlands—Kitsap Tree Farm, Blakely Pine Tree Farm,

stated in the article that he planned to hang an oil panting of

Novelty Hill Tree Farm, Olney Creek Tree Farm, and three

Gary in the library, with the legend, “In memory of our good

named for family members John W. Eddy, James G. Eddy, and

friend named Eddy.”

Robert B. Eddy. In this evolution to tree farming, Garrett was

In the aftermath of his son’s premature passing, Garrett

widely acknowledged as an industry pioneer. “I remember

invested more of his energies in running Port Blakely Mill Co.

sitting in the office of George Weyerhaeuser [chairman of

He was always the last person to leave the office, shutting off

Weyerhaeuser Company] in the early 1970s, when he told

the lights on his way out.

Garrett, ‘We’d love to own your company because your forestry

The early 1970s were not all doom and gloom. After a decades-long battle, the state of Washington in 1971 finally

practices are so far ahead of our own,’” recalls Tantsie Eddy. “We were doing things that no other companies were doing.”

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145

Moving into the Modern Era Port Blakely Mill Co. also had evolved into more of a modern organization. Garrett had recruited professional

the lumber business for many years; Elizabeth Almirall, the

business people to join Eddy family members on the board of

daughter of Robert B. Eddy; and George Nickum, second

directors, a rare gesture for a private company at the time. The

husband of M. A. Eddy. Nickum was a prominent designer and

outside directors provided invaluable business discernment

engineer in the shipbuilding industry who had designed several

and inspired insightful discussions at board meetings. They

ferries for Washington state and British Columbia.

included Thomas Gleed, president of Simpson Timber

146

son-in-law of James G., who had served as an executive in

The board directors oversaw the affairs of three

Company; Louis K. Bye, an executive with United Airlines;

organizations: Port Blakely Mill Co., H. O. Siler Logging (no

Peter Garrett, president of Merrill & Ring; Jim Scroggs, an

longer operating but still an existing legal entity), and Eddy

executive with Sears; and Larry Wells, the company’s chief

Investment Company. Managing the latter were Larry Wells

accountant and later the head of Winmar, the real estate arm

and James “Paddy” Ouillette, the husband of Bucky Elmore’s

of Safeco Insurance. Filling out the seats were Bucky Elmore,

daughter Mary Ann, or “Garby,” as the family called her.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

A surprising challenge came before the board in 1973, when Franklin Eddy decided to sell the shares he owned in Port Blakely Mill Co. The company bought the 2,884 shares from Franklin at a price of $360 per share. Five years later Franklin passed away, and the great house on Boylston was sold. The sale of Franklin’s shares brought up the discomfiting scenario of other family members also seeking to sell their stock, possibly to outsiders. The objective of ongoing control of the family business would endure increasing stress and strain in future years. Disagreements would arise between individual family owners of the company and family members in management positions over the owners’ difficulties raising funds for estate planning and other financial needs in years when company dividends were low. The company faced other challenges as well. As Garrett had long warned, harsher environmental regulations were indeed in store for the timber industry. In 1973 Congress passed the Endangered Species Act, predicated on protecting imperiled species from extinction, and preserving the ecosystems upon which these species depended. The culprits in the near-extinction of creatures as diverse as the whooping crane and the buffalo were rampant economic growth and development, the law’s sponsors declared. The die was cast, and literally dozens of other environmental laws followed—a “black cloud,” said Garrett, “that is continually worsening.” The rush to impose stricter rules often failed to consider the industry’s vastly improved and responsible forestry practices. At the company’s annual spring meeting, Garrett urged shareholders to counter the “extravagant claims of the extremists” with the many truths about the industry’s positive

(Top) Some of the attendees at a 1970s annual meeting. (Center) Photo at a meeting of Port Blakely directors and their spouses. (Left to Right, Back Row) Randy Almirall, Garby Ouillette, John Eddy II, Peter Garrett, George Nickum, Louie Bye, Garrett Eddy, Mark Jensen, and Tom Gleed. (Front Row) Libby Almirall, Tantsie Eddy, Pandora Garrett, M.A. Nickum, Mary Ford Eddy, Eva Jensen, and Mrs. Tom Gleed. (Bottom) The Ouillette family (left to right): Ann, Therese, Kathy, Garby (Mary Ann Elmore), Paddy (James E. Ouillette), Rita, and Chris.

Port Blakely Tree Farms —A Modern Organization

147

impact. Companies like Port Blakely Mill Co. practiced “constructive conservation,” driven by the “realities of the natural environment plus full consideration of the economic effects [that forestry] produces,” he explained. Very few shareholders, however, regularly attended the annual meetings, which were held at the Rainier Club or at 6100 Arcade Square. The sparse attendance was partly a consequence of hardly any Eddy family members living in the area, other than those actually working at the company. An exception was James G. Eddy’s daughter Mary Ann Warjone and her eldest son, Jim, who had been coming to the meetings since he was nineteen years old. “He’d stop by my office and ask these very sophisticated questions for such a young person,” Barry Sheppard recalls. Jim had not worked at the family business during his summer years off from school like his brother Onny had. He preferred to remain in Southern California, where he and a pal had started up a small enterprise painting docks. He and Onny were reared in the shadow of their father’s orange groves and lived the typical life of Southern California teenagers, surfing whenever the waves were in. Jim graduated from the prestigious Claremont Men’s College east of Los Angeles, and subsequently moved to Seattle, where he took a job at Simpson Timber. An imaginative problem-solver, he crafted an innovative plan to reduce that company’s operating expenses. He then left Simpson to become the assistant to the president of Interface Mechanisms (Intermec today), which was in the thick of developing the first bar code labels. Jim’s inventiveness

This canopy shot shows how a thinning can open up one side of a tree’s crown to stimulate growth in that tree.

148

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Forestry School

After the Washington Forest Protection Association (WFPA) launched

branches, then are shown the various products that derive from trees,

an educational initiative to teach children about the importance of trees,

followed by showing them pictures of the forests, from the forest subfloor

habitat, water quality, and wildlife, it sought involvement by its member

up to the canopy, and then the last station is where we introduce the

private timber owners. In 1991 Port Blakely Tree Farms took up the

animals that live in the forests,” Kelly says. “We have castings of animal

challenge and launched its Environmental Education Program. Through

footprints, and they get to make clay imprints.”

classroom study and field trips, the program has since taught more than

forty-six thousand students and parent assistants about responsible land

a two-and-a-half-hour tour. The company has designated three sites for

stewardship and the importance of managing the forests.

the tours south of Olympia, Washington. The fourth-graders are provided

clipboards and notebooks to write down their experiences as they traverse

Onny Warjone, the head of the company’s forestry division at the

After the classroom study, the children are escorted into the forest for

time, was responsible for

the forest, tracking the streams

getting the unique educational

and the wildlife they see. “Their

program going. At the time,

biggest regret is that they don’t

Onny was a director of the

get to see big animals like

WFPA (he would later serve

bears,” Kelly laughs. “But they

as president), and his goal was

often get to see their tracks or

to have every fourth-grader

scat. They just love talking about

in Washington state visit

scat!” En route, the tour guides

the company’s forestlands. To run the program Onny

will halt the expedition to talk

reached out to Kelly Stanley,

about clear-cuts, thinning,

a forester who had worked

plantings, and seedlings. “We’ll

for the U.S. Forest Service.

show them wetlands and snags

Coincidentally, Kelly’s

that are left for birds, explain

husband, Court Stanley, was

what a forester does, and we’ll

a company forester and today

let them use an increment bore

is president of the forestry

to tell the age of a tree, as well

division.

as the old standby of counting the whorls,” adds Stanley, the company’s

Since taking on the task of leading the Environmental Education

environmental education coordinator. “We give lectures on sustainable

Program, Kelly and her fellow tour guides have hosted more than sixteen

forestry practices so they understand that cutting down a tree is a good

hundred trips into the forests by the fourth-graders and their teachers.

thing because of the products produced from the tree. We’ll then show

The tours are conducted following an intensive classroom experience

them a clear-cut that has been recently replanted, and then take them to an

for the children. “We set up four learning centers where the kids start

area that was replanted several years before so they can see firsthand the

out by identifying different types of trees based on their leaves, bark, and

forest it already is becoming.” u

Port Blakely Tree Farms —A Modern Organization

149

was put to use creating both accounting and program

pulp, paper, and plywood.” The situation was reminiscent of

management systems for the firm on an IBM 1130 computer.

the 1930s and 1940s, when James G. Eddy would send one

The project’s successful implementation caught the attention of IBM, which recruited him as a systems engineer

All eyes were on the future, fingers crossed. Preparing for

writing code for the new IBM 360 computer. In 1972 Jim left

the eventual revival of the markets was the top priority. In

IBM and with a partner acquired Truckweld, a maker of trailers

1975 more than fifteen hundred acres were seeded or planted,

to haul special-purpose equipment. The company subsequently

over forty-five hundred acres were thinned, and another

was awarded five different patents by the U.S. Patent Office,

one thousand acres were acquired. New logging roads were

thanks in no small part to Jim’s out-of-the-box ideas. One

constructed, and old railroad grades were converted to truck

patent, for instance, recognized a splintlike tool he had

roads.

invented to reinforce rotting telephone poles. Jim’s regular attendance at the annual meetings and the

At a meeting of the board in 1977 Jim Warjone’s persistent inquiries about the prudence in retaining Eddy Investment

broad business expertise he had accumulated since college

Company and the company’s configuration as a C corporation

did not escape Garrett’s notice. In 1976 Jim was asked—and

reached a crescendo. He was also concerned about procedures

he agreed—to serve as a board director. He was eager to

for valuing and redeeming shares. “I explained that we needed

learn all he could about the company, persistently peppering

a more equitable way for shareholders to redeem their shares

management and the board with questions. One query had to

in times of need, and a fairer method for valuing these shares,”

do with the efficacy of retaining Eddy Investment Company.

Jim says. “I felt that we could do that by having a third party

Another concerned the company’s configuration as a

appraisal and a system for redemption.”

C corporation, an operating structure that resulted in double

With regard to Eddy Investment Company, Jim voiced his

taxation—first as a corporation at a 40 percent tax rate, and

opinion that the small size of the investment company did

then a second time when the excess cash was distributed to

not merit having company employees putting their time and

shareholders as dividends. Added up, roughly 65 percent of

effort into managing it. The female Eddy family members

the company’s income went to Uncle Sam. Much discussion of

disproportionately owned stock in the lower-risk, steady-

these matters would simmer over the next few years.

income trust, while the male members of the family owned

In the meantime, Port Blakely Mill Co. suffered from the

150

discouraging letter after another to his brother Jack.

shares primarily in the higher-risk company, which paid little

reduced demand for forest products. “Conifer markets during

or no dividends. “I was concerned about family members with

1975 were poor,” stated the annual forestry report. At the

liquidity issues who had not attended to their impending estate

spring 1976 annual meeting at the company’s new headquarters

taxes putting themselves in a position where they would trigger

in the Logan Building on Union Street, Garrett decried “low

a run on the cash from both Port Blakely Mill Co and Eddy

worldwide demand for forest products, including lumber,

Investment Company,” Jim explains.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

As it turned out, family members holding the lion’s share of the investment company’s were confronted by the biggest estate challenges. “I had discussions with the senior female members of the family about liquidating Eddy Investment Company, but since other family members were involved in running it, this was a very sensitive matter,” Jim notes. Although liquidating the investment company and converting to a limited partnership were complex, challenging undertakings, the suggestions nonetheless resonated with the board. Each subject would require more time and study before either saw the light of day. With Garrett now in his sixties and the board directors thinking increasingly about succession management, Jim’s ideas made an indelible impact. A few months after his presentation, the board formed an Officer Selection Committee of outside directors to ferret out possible CEO candidates. More than a dozen people were identified and interviewed, among them Jim, who at the time was still running Truckweld and had little intention of switching jobs. When his partner indicated an interest in buying Jim’s share of the company, and the selection committee recommended him as Garrett’s successor, the stars

James E. Warjone

These corporate seals through the years were used by Port Blakely, Siler Logging, Skinner & Eddy, and other related concerns to stamp legal documents, incorporation papers, and other official business.

were aligned for him to accept the offer.

A Warjone Comes Onboard In June 1978 Jim joined the family business as executive vice president of the three Eddy enterprises. He would be in a learning period, absorbing the nuances of company operations and both the timber and real estate development businesses. Not surprisingly, he was an especially quick study. “Jim Warjone is doing an excellent job as a new officer,”

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151

Garrett informed shareholders. “During the ten months of his

Jim immediately planned the construction of new buildings,

employment, he has shown an outstanding ability to learn the

including a high-rise office building called One Renton Place,

timber business and is becoming a great asset to the company.”

with approximately 132,000 square feet of space for rent upon

One of the new hire’s first tasks was leveraging his code-

its completion in 1980. Two additional office towers also were

writing expertise for IBM into computerizing the forest inventory for the forestry department, now under chief forester

Aquilo Properties also took over ownership of the Sheraton-

George Thomson. Years before, Garrett had hoped to produce

Renton Inn. The tenant management company had fallen

a comprehensive inventory, but the company was constantly

behind in its rent payments, resulting in foreclosure. To manage

acquiring and selling land, making this objective ever more

the hotel, Aquilo brought in a seasoned hotel executive from

elusive.

the Sheraton organization, Christine Anderson, as general

That task completed, the future president then turned his

manager. Christine quickly identified several problems. “I had

attention to Eddy Investment Company. He had long believed

inherited a huge staff of people that weren’t warranted, and

that the investment company had outlived its usefulness, did

downsized from about two dozen department heads to ten,”

not fit the profile of a modern timber company, and absorbed

she recalls. “We also needed a new controller, someone who

undue company resources and time. It also made little sense

understood what a financial statement was supposed to look

for an investment company to oversee real estate development,

like. We gradually turned things around.”

a burgeoning part of the company’s business. Although

At the end of 1979 Barry Sheppard reported that profits

liquidating the investment company would have the effect of

from Renton Village were up 34 percent. Over the next several

terminating Paddy Ouillette’s employment as its president, a

years, Aquilo Properties would provide a steady flow of

subject that caused more than a little distress among several

income to Port Blakely Mill Co. So did the timber business. Log

family branches, senior management and the board approved

markets in 1979 were reported as “very good,” and in 1980 the

the plan. The funds from the investment company’s liquidation

forestry department commented that “forestry operations had

were provided to its shareholders, a process that would take

a record year,” harvesting 40 million board feet and doubling

several years.

the after-tax income earned the previous year. Exports markets,

A new real estate subsidiary was formed to operate

especially Japan, accounted for a good portion of the sales

and manage the Renton Village project. In creating Aquilo

revenue, as did continuing high demand for paper and pulp

Properties, named for the late Jack Eddy’s yacht, a key

products.

goal was realized—isolating the risk of holding developing

152

on the drawing board.

All in all, it was the ideal time for Garrett Eddy to pass the

properties that were heavily leveraged. Eddy Investment

baton to new leadership. He had adroitly guided Port Blakely

Company sold its 51 percent interest in Renton Village to Aquilo

Mill Co. into the modern era as a tree-farming enterprise,

Properties, which had Jim Warjone as its de facto president.

personally crafting many of the thinning techniques used

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

In this tree planting operation, workers remove seedlings from insulated tree bags. The insulated bags prevent the seedling's bare roots from drying out and dying before the tree is planted.

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153

widely in the industry. He also had set in motion the company’s

both after-tax cash flow for reinvestment by the successor

successful diversification into real estate development. Garrett

organization and distribution to the owners. At the time,

would not be exiting entirely, as he retained his positions

Internal Revenue Code section 333 permitted a corporation

as chairman of the board and CEO. As planned, in 1980 Jim

with no inventory or financial assets like cash or bonds to

Warjone became the third president of Port Blakely Mill Co.

convert to a limited partnership. Upon the liquidation of the

Just as Garrett’s style of leadership was a departure from

corporation the company would recognize no gain or loss. As

his predecessors, Jim’s direction was different than Garrett’s.

Judson explains, “Only the shareholders would recognize gain

Whereas Garrett was hierarchical, Jim was collaborative. Each

at the time of liquidation, which would be ordinary income to

man was representative of the traditional leader of their times.

the extent of cumulated earnings and profits, and capital gains

Nevertheless, despite their different demeanors they worked

to the extent of the value of the rest of the company.”

together smoothly, conferring on all decisions as Jack and

Were Port Blakely Mill Co. to avail itself of this IRS code

James G. Eddy did decades before. “At first Garrett continued

section, it would transition from a corporation that was double

to call all the shots and Jim would sit there taking minutes,

taxed to a limited partnership in which the owners paid a single

but that soon gave way,” Sheppard recalls. “Jim was always

tax at a preferred capital gains rate. “While the tax costs of the

considerate of Garrett during and after the transition, and

conversion were estimated at several million dollars for the

Garrett—not someone easily accustomed to sharing power—

shareholders, the money that would be saved over time on an

appreciated this.”

annual basis would far outweigh these initial expenses,” Judson

Tantsie Eddy has her own view: “People expected friction between them since the company was Garrett’s baby, but he surprised us all by easily stepping into the role of mentor.

says. “The company could cover the tax cost to the shareholders by making a special distribution in a sufficient amount.” Then in 1983 the window of opportunity to convert to a

I’m not saying it was all sweetness and light—nothing ever

limited partnership started to close. “The IRS announced it

is in business—but there was a lot of graciousness in their

would ask Congress to do away with the code section at the

relationship.”

end of 1986,” Judson explains. “I told Jim and Garrett that if the company was going to convert, now was the time.”

Managing Tax Issues Several of Jim’s strategic objectives now picked up

154

Presented with the plan to transform into a master limited partnership, the board ultimately concurred, with one

steam, chief among them the planned conversion to a master

stipulation—that Jim and Judson get a private ruling from the

limited partnership. For several years, Jim had been working

IRS on the validity of their plans. The two men traveled to

with attorney C. James Judson from the law firm of Davis

Washington, D.C., to meet with officials of the Internal Revenue

Wright Tremaine to fashion the structure of the complex

Service. Not all went smoothly at first. “Previously, we had been

transformation, which was predicated on maximizing

told that to convert into a partnership, we would have to give

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The red blocks are thick ends of hard plastic wedges that were driven into the saw-cut to bias the direction of fall and to keep the chain saw bar from getting pinched in the process. The wedges, and the heavy hatchet with which he drove the wedges, can be seen in the fallerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s belt.

Port Blakely Tree Farms â&#x20AC;&#x201D;A Modern Organization

155

at least 20 percent of the company to a non-family entity as the general partner,” Jim recalls. “This didn’t fit with our goal

When these various initiatives finally reached fruition in

to have each shareholder exchange his or her stock straight

1986, a new company was born—Port Blakely Tree Farms,

across into the new limited partnership on a one-for-one basis.”

which simultaneously acquired Aquilo Properties. At the time

When apprised of the company’s objectives, the IRS demanded that the partnership have someone with significant personal assets at risk as the managing general partner. Pressed

of the conversion, the company owned nearly 103,000 acres of forestlands, nearly three times the 36,390 acres recorded in 1949. Jim also ran herd on the drafting of a corporate mission

to define “significant,” the IRS officials agreed to 1 percent.

statement. It reads, “To remain primarily a timberland and real

They also stated that they would allow two general partners

estate development company emphasizing continued growth in

to fill this role. Jim picks up the thread of the negotiations:

the quantity and quality of its assets through timely investments

“We suggested that since I owned more than one percent of

in those related parts of the business that are healthy and

the company’s shares at the time, I could become the general

growing.”

partner. We further suggested that we could have a second

Early in his tenure as president, Jim helped negotiate a

general partner who could house our officers and board, and

remarkable deal to export logs to China, an emerging economy

that I would also be the CEO of that corporation, which we

at the time. The country lacked an exchange-rated foreign

would call the Port Blakely Company.”

currency; consequently, it had yet to make a significant timber

The IRS approved both suggestions. “This sealed the deal so that the other 99 percent could exchange a share of the

transaction with a Western concern. Port Blakely Tree Farms was no stranger to exports, of

corporation for a unit of the partnership of equal value, and a

course. The company had been an exporter since the days of

voting share of the controlling corporate general partner,” Jim

Captain Renton, and a sizable 75 percent of its volume, much

notes.

of it larger-diameter logs, found its way to ports in Japan in

What Jim does not mention is that as the general partner

the early eighties. Every timber company in America sought

he was personally on the hook financially for the liabilities of

ways to penetrate China, the world’s fastest-growing market.

the company, a risk he was willing to shoulder. “I had complete

Jim’s novel approach began with a bit of luck. “I was assisting

faith in the future of the company,” he says.

the Port of Grays Harbor on a siltation problem they had,” he

Port Blakely Mill Co. converted to a master limited

recalls. “The river kept silting up at the docks, which required

partnership before the window of opportunity slammed shut.

constant dredging. We figured out a solution that involved

It was the last corporation to make the conversion under the

vacuuming the silt using giant fans that deposited it into the

old rules of the tax code, prior to Congress changing the law

oceangoing current as the tide was going out. We then learned

to make it prohibitively more expensive. Just prior to the

that the docks in Shanghai had a similar problem.”

conversion, another of the new president’s longtime goals—

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liquidating the investment company—also was realized.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Working with the Chinese At Jim’s behest, officials at the Port of Grays Harbor reached out to China’s ministry of the interior in Beijing to solicit its interest in solving the siltation problems. Jim subsequently was invited to join a delegation traveling to the country. He met with ministry officials and helped to outline their innovative silt vacuuming strategy, then he deftly segued into the primary reason he had made the trip. “I inquired if they would be interested in buying logs from us, and they responded ‘yes,’” he says. “They told me that the forests in the country had been harvested primarily for firewood, which is why very little lumber was being used in building construction. The demand was there.” Now the challenge was figuring out how the company would be paid once a deal was struck, given the foreign currency issues. Jim drummed up a possible solution—bartering. China was a major global producer of high-grade coal and gasoline, and Jim reasoned that the country would buy logs in exchange for the fossil fuels, which Port Blakely Tree Farms would subsequently sell domestically. A rail line stretched from the Port of Grays Harbor to Centralia, south of Olympia, site of a

A crown closure shades the road, limiting roadside vegetation and maximizing the available area for growth. The foliage essentially mitigates the loss of productive land to the road.

coal-burning power plant, which at the time the Environmental Protection Agency was threatening with closure unless the power plant lowered its emissions. “I called the plant manager and asked if he would be interested in mixing cleaner coal from China with its own lower-grade coal to bring the emissions in line with regulations,” Jim says. “He liked the idea.” Ultimately Jim was able to ink a contract to export company logs to the country. “We wrote it all up and shook hands on the deal at dinner; then the next morning as we escorted them to

At the time of the conversion, the company owned nearly

103,000 acres of forestlands, nearly three times the 36,390 acres recorded in 1949.

the airport they started negotiating again, as if we didn’t have a

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Chinese delegation with their interpreters learn about sustainable forestry.

deal,” Jim sighs. “It was very frustrating. I subsequently talked

understood the currency limitations and found ways around

with our banker at Seafirst, and he explained that there was no

them. The executive’s advice was to insert the agreed-upon

such thing as contract law in China.”

contract language in a letter of credit drawn from the Bank of

The banker, Bob Ingram, further mentioned that he knew a very savvy Chinese American executive at Seafirst Bank who

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China. “We did just that, they honored the agreement, and that’s how we were paid,” says Jim.

Port Blakely Tree Farms was the first American timber company in the modern era to ship logs to China. After the deal went through, the news shot through the industry. “We had successfully demonstrated that it could be done,” Jim says. At the Renton Village development in the middle of the decade, change again was afoot. At that point, all three new office towers were built, and the area hummed with activity. Then in 1985 the company’s joint

China and other Pacific Rim markets would play a huge role in Port Blakely’s business over the years. In fact, it was Port Blakely that opened up the new market, becoming the first American timber company in decades to ship logs to China. In this photo, Port Blakely representatives tour a Chinese mill.

venture partner, Puget Sound Power and Light, revealed it was interested in selling its 49 percent interest to acquire a coal-powered plant in Montana. Rather than buy the utility’s share, a deal was reached with CITIC (China International Trust and Investment Company) to purchase the three new office buildings—One, Two, and Three Renton Place—in Renton Village. The retail stores, the original Evergreen Office Building, and the hotel were sold to a local developer. A significant portion of the money from the sale went toward paying the taxes incurred by the limited partners from the conversion to a master limited partnership. Garrett Eddy’s bold diversification into Renton

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Dunhua Nursery, China, 1982, with one-year-old spruce.

Mike Mosman takes vital measurements on one of Port Blakelyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s tree farms.

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Village had proved a wise decision and an outstanding success.

together a partnership with a well-known real estate developer

In 1990, a rare real estate opportunity beckoned. Glacier

from Florida and California, Kenneth E. Behring. Behring had

Park Company, the real estate arm of Burlington Northern

recently developed a luxury unincorporated master-planned

Railroad, was actively seeking to auction several dozen

community near San Francisco called Blackhawk. The partners

parcels of land near the city of Issaquah, seventeen miles east

sat down with Glacier Park officials and negotiated a deal to

of Seattle. Before the auction was scheduled, Jim had put

buy five thousand acres of primarily residential land. Then they

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

brought in a silent partner, Renown Enterprises, an investment

Warjone, and new hires Mike Mosman and Court Stanley, to

company based in Japan, which acquired one-third of the

cruise and appraise the approximately 100,000 acres which

venture. The three partners named the future development

included the Clackamas tract. “They decided to pursue the

Blackhawk Port Blakely Communities.

southern Clackamas tract and had estimated the land held 50 million board feet, but we believed the volume actually was

Redmond

more,” says Mosman, in charge of the fieldwork. “The trees also

Some of the capital from the sale of Renton Village also

fit our age-class criteria, and the soil was very good.”

was directed into forestland acquisitions, and not just small

Publishers Paper put their Northwest Oregon properties,

family-owned parcels. In 1987 a company called Publishers

including the approximately twenty-seven thousand acres in

Paper made it known that it was interested in selling land

Clackamas County, Oregon, on the block. In addition to using

in northwest Oregon. This company, owned by several

the capital from Renton Village, the company intended to sell

newspapers, was led by Otis Chandler, president of Times

forestlands in eastern Oregon and near McCleary to fund the acquisition of the Clackamas tract. In selling these properties, it planned to make use of the tax deferrals available through Internal Revenue Code 1031 tax exchanges, which permits property owners to defer the capital gains from sales when there is a like-kind exchange of property (such as timberlands). In this case the McCleary and eastern Oregon properties were being exchanged for the Clackamas tract. Everything was set to negotiate the deal when Publishers Paper started stalling. At that time, paper manufacturer Boise Cascade was planning to sell forestlands in Washington’s Cascade Mountains. “I said to Times Mirror, ‘We’re seriously considering bidding on the Boise property, so we may have to

The Chinese mills may have been primitive compared to American operations, but there was no denying the importance of them to Port Blakely’s bottom line.

Mirror Co. and the publisher of the Los Angeles Times. The

pass on Clackamas,’” he recalls. “That got their heart rates up a bit.” Quickening the pulse further was a negotiating ploy

forestland had been acquired to assure a steady supply of logs

dreamed up by board director Stewart Rogers Jr., a chemical

for newsprint paper.

industry executive who had attended Stanford University with

John Colley, who had become chief forester upon George Thomson’s retirement, led a team of foresters including Onny

Otis Chandler. “We gave Otis’s representatives the date of the Boise auction, and said that Port Blakely Tree Farms would

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Forester Mike Mosman cruises fifty-year-old timber for Port BlakleyTree Farms, taking measures and collecting other data.

wire its final bid for the Clackamas property at noon the day before,” Rogers recalls. “They didn’t know that we’d planned all along not to send the wire. Sure enough, later that day we got an agitated phone call wondering why they hadn’t received the wire. We then wired over our final price, and they accepted.” The eastern Oregon and McCleary properties were divested as planned. With regard to the latter sale, the agreement permitted Port Blakely Tree Farms to manage the McCleary property postharvest, absorbing the new owner’s slash disposal and replanting costs, in return for having the property deeded back to it. Thus, these high-quality forestlands, which Garrett Eddy had thinned and replanted in the 1950s, did not leave company ownership. The Clackamas acquisition increased the company’s forestland footprint by 20 percent and helped further diversify its landholdings and regulatory risks. In succeeding years, additional contiguous acreage along the Clackamas Tract would be purchased. Today, the property is known as the John F. Eddy Tree Farm. Other land acquisitions during this period include the like-kind exchange of eastern Washington acreage and other landholdings in northern Idaho around Sandpoint for wellstocked forestlands in Sparrow Point and Coos Bay, Oregon, a region in the southwestern part of that state offering excellent soil conditions and a much faster tree-growth rate. As Onny Warjone put it, “Trees grew too slow in Idaho, and we could triple the growth rate on the Oregon coast.” In 1988 Port Blakely Tree Farms announced the appointment of a new chief forester, Onny Warjone. The teenager who had become entranced by the forests of the Pacific Northwest on his summer outings had become an expert forester, learning the

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The companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Mollala Tree Farm in Northwest Oregon in the 1980s.

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ropes from Jack Winn, George Thomson, and John Colley, who retired that year. Onny had become an adept forester under his predecessorsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; tutelage. He also possessed common sense, excellent communications skills, and a buoyant personality that made people want to be in his company. His team of foresters coalesced around him as a tight, highly professional unit. Onny also was a well-known presence in the industry, widely respected as a conciliator. He assisted in drafting Forest and Fish Agreements in Washington state that promoted collaboration rather than litigation to solve contentious issues between regulators, Indian tribes, and timber owners. In succeeding years, as the environmental

(Top) Future chief forester John â&#x20AC;&#x153;Onnyâ&#x20AC;? Warjone poses in front of a giant Douglas-fir tree ready for harvesting. (Center) Longtime company forester Mike Mosman in the foreground of a stand of alder trees at Coos Head, Oregon, in 1991. The company had recently acquired the forestlands, noted for a fast tree growth rate. (Bottom) The Port Blakely Companies team, Oregon, 1989.

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

movement reached fever pitch and the spotted owl became a symbol of the distance between the industry and its regulators, Onny’s singular spirit of openness and his progressive way of dealing with people would make a mark. Once again, two brothers were at the top of the company. One called the shots, but his younger sibling—the self-proclaimed former “wild child”—clearly was king of the forests. u

The landmark Timber/Fish/ Wildlife Agreement marks an inflection point in the relations between the forestry industry and its regulators.

The spotted owl (right) controversy pitted hard-working logging families against wildlife preservationists. In succeeding years, the company would establish collegial relations with regulators and environmentalists helping to balance these opposing views.

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Chapter

A Second Working Circle For many years, Port Blakely Tree Farms scoured the planet for a region to diversify its forestland holdings, finally finding this opportunity in New Zealand. Pictured is a stand of thinned radiata pine.

Beginning in the late 1980s Port Blakely Tree Farms could fairly be described as two companies: one engaged in the Eddy family’s traditional timber business, and the other pursuing real estate development through Blackhawk Port Blakely Communities. Real estate development was a diversification strategy, balancing the company’s reliance on forestry, which was subject to constantly shifting regulations affecting revenue and profit potential. Moreover, timberlands near spreading population centers were being taxed at higher real estate rates, regardless of whether they were being managed as timberlands. Garrett Eddy had led the company into real estate development with Renton Village, but now multiple projects were under way simultaneously in Washington: Montreaux on Cougar Mountain, Grand Ridge in Issaquah, Blakely Harbor on Bainbridge Island, Blakely Ridge in Redmond, and several smaller developments. Each project is a story unto itself. Long contemplated for development were the company’s forestlands in Redmond. The burgeoning city was now home to Microsoft, the fast-growing developer of the personal computer operating system. Redmond’s population was surging, prompting Blackhawk Port Blakely Communities to develop a master planned community in the Novelty Hill area northeast of the city. Roughly three-quarters of the company’s timber on its property in Redmond were logged to make room for the thirtyfive hundred homes planned for Blakely Ridge, the houses

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artfully arranged among the remaining trees. More than 140,000

Northern / Glacier Park Company property on Cougar

square feet of retail and commercial space also was on the

Mountain. Positioned as a high-end residential community,

drawing board, as was an eighteen-hole public golf course.

Montreaux borrowed heavily from Behring’s Blackhawk

Then, as often happens in the unpredictable real estate environment, the best-laid plans go awry. When the county

clustered around open space. The community comprised

reneged on its written intention to invest several million dollars

approximately two hundred houses and a one-hundred-unit

to widen a road connecting the development to a major arterial

multifamily complex of affordable housing. The company

road that linked to SR520, which accessed Renton, Bellevue,

also arranged for the Nature Conservancy and King County

and Seattle, the project was scaled down to about twenty-

to purchase a nearby square-mile tract of land as permanent

one hundred homes, ranging from one thousand to eighteen

parkland and plowed the capital back into the project.

hundred square feet. Partner Ken Behring then suggested

Blakely Ridge and Montreaux were mere warm-ups. While

altering the project to target an active-adult community—

each real estate project incurred the customary regulatory,

individuals fifty-five years of age and older. Research

political, and public challenges, these were minor compared to

indicated this demographic drove one-third less than working

the difficulties endured attempting to develop Blakely Harbor.

commuters, and would be less affected by the restricted connection to the arterial road. Rising from the ground at the same time as Blakely Ridge

For decades, the partnership had mulled what to do with the eleven-hundred-acre property on Bainbridge Island that Captain Renton had logged to build the world’s largest

was an adjacent development called Redmond Ridge that

sawmill. In the 1930s Jack and James G. Eddy tried to develop

Weyerhaeuser’s real estate operation, Quadrant Corporation,

a residential community called Blakely Beach, designed by the

had undertaken. As time flew by—real estate projects absorb

eminent architect Carl Gould. Gould laid out plans for a resort

many years from planning stages to completion—Blackhawk

hotel, yacht moorage, and large estates along the shore. With

Port Blakely Communities decided to sell Blakely Ridge to

the Great Depression in full tilt, however, only a few lots sold.

Weyerhaeuser. “We just realized that it made more sense for

Since then, the land’s development was obstructed by other

one developer to coordinate both projects,” explains Judd

impediments, chief among them the availability of freshwater.

Kirk, a Seattle real estate attorney whom Jim Warjone hired in

This hurdle was surmounted in the late 1980s when an

1989 to oversee the Grand Ridge development. Weyerhaeuser

underground aquifer was discovered eight hundred feet below

subsequently sold Blakely Ridge to Shea Homes, which brought

sea level. Company leaders now revived plans to develop the

the project to fruition under a new name, Trilogy.

property—this time along the lines of an urban village.

The company did see through to completion its first

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community in California, with large homes on smaller lots

The multiuse development would encompass a mix of

residential real estate development, Montreaux. The

homes appealing to people of different wealth strata and

project gradually surfaced from the former Burlington

incomes. Large estates were envisioned along the shoreline,

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Issaquah Highlands is nestled among trees against a backdrop of skyline and mountains in this Spring 2011 photo. The large-scale development has won many design and environmental awards.

with smaller houses, condominiums, and rental units more inland. A range of retail stores also was planned. This way, homeowners need not hop in the car to go to the grocery or the coffee shop; they could walk, as in the small-town America of yore. This concept of walkable neighborhoods, called New Urbanism, had just emerged in the United States, making the planned Blakely Harbor a pioneering development. “Our present hope is to create one of the most desirable and beautiful residential areas in the Northwest,” chairman Garrett Eddy informed the board of directors in 1989.

On the Other Side of the Buzz Saw Over the decades the company had nurtured good relations with Bainbridge Island residents—or so it thought. The company had long provided water free of charge from the old sawmill’s system to homeowners around Port Blakely harbor. When a

The old city of Winslow ferry dock in Eagle Harbor just north of Port Blakely harbor. Present-day Bainbridge Island, Washington, is still an inviting haven where residents can escape to after a day at work in Seattle. But there are hardly any traces of the days from when it was home to the world’s largest sawmill.

dam needed to maintain this water supply started leaking, it was repaired at no expense to users, as was the installation of a new chlorination house and equipment. When it was no longer legal to dump sewage into the sound, the company often let homeowners install septic drain fields on company lands if there were no suitable site on their own property. The company planned to connect these homeowners to the aquifer it had discovered on the northern end of the company’s property. Island residents also had used the company’s waterfront property and timberlands extensively as a park for more than one hundred years without charge. Thus, it fully expected that residents would warmly embrace the planned development. They did not. As the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported, Port Blakely Tree Farms encountered a “buzz saw of public opposition.”

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This concept of walkable neighborhoods, called New Urbanism, had just emerged in the United States, making the planned Blakely Harbor a pioneering development.

In many respects, it was the company’s own fault—a

company’s attorney, Tom Goeltz. “Jim and Charles laid out their

lesson it took to heart. Upon learning that the company was

grand vision for a unique neighborhood—a pedestrian-friendly,

drilling wells to determine the existence of water, residents

environmentally sensitive, and comparatively affordable village

became suspicious of the intent and subsequently banded

that would be the opposite of suburban sprawl,” Goeltz recalls.

together to thwart the project. They complained that the high-

Company officials described plans for a ferry to Seattle, the

density development would drain the water supply, crowd

building of four athletic fields, the setting aside of hundreds

area schools, tax overburdened fire and police services, and

of acres of open space, and the construction of an advanced

fundamentally alter the rural nature of the island. Rather than

sewage treatment facility. On top of these amenities, the

sit down with residents prior to making any plans, the company

company further offered to establish and financially support

had gone forward without consulting them. “This was the way

a rowing club, build a school site, and create horse, bicycle,

developments had always been done in the past—you drilled a

and hiking trails. According to Goeltz, “It didn’t make much of

well to determine how much water there was, platted out the

a dent.”

land, and then went to the county for approval,” says Kirk. “The

Garrett later told the board, “Our hand has suddenly been

times were changing, however. The mistake was not going to

forced by threats to downzone our property, incorporate the

residents first to engage them in the process.”

island, and many various efforts to . . . restrict what we feel is the

To get the project back on track, Jim brought in Charles Wilson of the California-based Irvine Company, a major

best eventual treatment of this desirable area of Puget Sound.” Residents soon did what they had threatened; they

developer of master planned communities in that state. Wilson

incorporated Bainbridge Island as a city in part to stop the

mounted a California-style public relations crusade that did

project. The feverish pitch of the antigrowth activism had

not sit well with the laid-back islanders. “Charles was very

reached a deafening crescendo, compelling the company to

experienced, bright, and knowledgeable, but he was also a bit

abandon its plans. The land subsequently was sold in small

aggressive,” Kirk explains. “California and Bainbridge Island

parcels to local real estate developers who built the kinds

are two very different cultures.”

of projects the island was used to, but without any of the

Local media took the side of residents, penning articles

amenities that Port Blakely Communities offered. The silver

that attacked the project and the company itself. Islanders

lining was the purchase of a 250-acre tract by publishing

started calling themselves “citizen activists.” Their intent was

software pioneer Paul Brainerd and his wife Debbi. The

to prevent county approval of the higher-density rezoning of

Brainerds converted the property into IslandWood, a unique

the property, from single-family homes to multifamily homes

outdoor learning center designed to inspire environmental and

and commercial buildings. At a hearing in a local gymnasium to

community stewardship.

discuss the development, hundreds of angry residents were in

Residents in opposition to the project effectively got

attendance. Jim was in the crosshairs as were Wilson and the

what they had wanted, and yet the company did not suffer

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Boulders in the foreground are a minor mirror to Mt. Ranier in the background at Issaquah Highlands. The community was planned with quality of life in mind, which meant walking trails and benches from which residents could stop to take in the view.

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financially. The real estate market was in high gear, and the parcels were sold at top market prices. Nevertheless, it was a sad epitaph to a real estate development that many island residents today believe would have been in the island’s best interests. “We learned the importance of being wide open with the public from the beginning, to incorporate their thoughts in a project as it is being developed and not to act like we know what is best for them,” Jim says. He learned from Judd Kirk—who had successfully led the development of the Skinner family’s Lake Washington shipyard into a hotel, condo, office, retail, and marina complex—that “You start with a deliberately blurry vision and then let residents help you fill in the picture. We made sure we wouldn’t make the same mistake at Grand Ridge.” Like Blakely Harbor, Grand Ridge was designed as a New Urbanism–type of master planned community. The difference in the two projects was that the company put its ideas before the public first, soliciting input from Issaquah residents in a series of focus groups. The message that came back was that locals wanted a community where they would get to know their neighbors. This dovetailed nicely with the company’s plans for an urban village. “We promised that we would develop the most environmentally friendly, large-scale project ever built in the Northwest, a place where people could live, shop, work, and play without really leaving the neighborhood,” Kirk says. “What we wouldn’t build was a hastily slapped together sprawl of homes on five-acre lots with no infrastructure or amenities nearby.” The concept resonated with residents. As time progressed, the company published Commitments: Grand Ridge, a twenty-

(Top) Children find Issaquah Highlands a fun, safe place to do what children do best—play. (Bottom) This cat in the sunshine at Issaquah Highlands couldn’t be more content.

three-page pledge. Among its commitments were as follows: “We will encourage urban mixed-use commercial buildings

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Issaquah Highlands with Seattle and Olympic mountains in the background.

rather than sterile suburban parks.” “We will build 30 percent of the residential units to meet the definition of ‘affordable housing.’” “We will build an active town center as a pedestrian-oriented public open space, surrounded by

PBC-0186

a mix of uses.” “We will build substantial employment and local shopping facilities on site.” “We will encourage and make possible mixed-use neighborhood hubs and gathering places in the residential neighborhoods, provide community amenities, and provide land and financial support for public open space, including parks, tot lots, pea patches, recycling and composting areas, soccer fields, baseball fields, tennis courts, trails, and picnic areas.”

A Vision for the Future It was a stunning document, a promise in writing from the developer. Commitments: Grand Ridge vowed that the development would be a collaborative endeavor. Blackhawk Port Blakely Communities would not venture forward without residents’ contributions, and it set aside six years for a public planning process, from 1990 to 1996, to jointly determine desired uses for the land. “We realize that the only way you will be happy and we will be successful is if Grand Ridge reflects the values that you hold dear,” the company stated. “We are in the process of creating a vision for the future.” This open, transparent partnering process was a bona fide success. King County approved rezoning the property from one house per five acres to a high-density urban village of 3,950 residences, 425,000 square feet of retail space, and 2.95 million square feet of commercial/office space. As a gesture of solidarity the company pledged $6.7 million of its own capital toward construction of an interchange

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on Interstate 5, which would provide easier access from the freeway to the envisioned community. In its dealings with King County officials, the same collaborative approach was taken. “Jim and Judd were straightforward, very creative, and really involved in problem solving,” says Gene Duvernoy, a council staff member in the late 1980s, and now president of Cascade Land Conservancy, a conservation and stewardship organization. “They knew what they needed in terms of the bottom line, and were sensitive to what the county needed in terms of resource preservation. Port Blakely’s agreement with the county raised the bar in dealings with government.” In the meantime, other smaller real estate developments

Ellis Drive was named to honor Mr. James Ellis, the founder of the successful Mountain to Sound Greenway project that has preserved much of the viewshed from Issaquah to Snoqualmie Summit on Interstate 90.

on company forestlands moved forward, albeit with varied success. One was Kitsap Lake, adjacent to the city

property borders a county park, and there was interest in

of Bremerton, a mixed-use project that endured multiple

retaining it as open space,” Kirk explains.

alterations before its sale to another developer. Treemont

The transaction was the first in the state. King County had

Lake, located on 232 acres about five miles east of Grand

created the program and the company was the initial forestry

Ridge, also went through the usual regulatory fits and starts

concern to successfully negotiate the transfer of development

before its sale—not to another developer but to Cascade Land

rights. It represented a significant departure from the

Conservancy as permanent open space. “The property fell

traditional approach of downzoning rural areas and upzoning

under the 1990 Growth Management Act, which made it more

urban areas, which resulted in a transfer of value from rural

difficult for Port Blakely to develop,” recalls Gene Duvernoy.

landowners to urban landowners. A TDR was a counterbalance,

“They were constantly in front of the county trying to get the

in that the urban landowners paid the rural landowners for the

entitlements and permits and could have fought it out longer,

development rights. “Again, we demonstrated that we were

but decided enough was enough. Instead, we worked out a very

a business that was willing to engage with regulators, to sit

creative arrangement that was beneficial to both parties.”

down at a very high level and negotiate creative and mutually

Ames Lake was the name of a smaller planned project on forestlands north of Issaquah. The company negotiated a deal to sell the development rights to King County in return for retaining the land to continue its forestry operations. “The

satisfying solutions,” Kirk says. “Our reputation for fair and balanced dealings grew far and wide.” One aspect of Port Blakely Communities’ reputation that did not experience the same positive reception had to do with

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partner Ken Behring. In 1988 Behring acquired the Seattle Seahawks NFL team. Shortly thereafter he announced his plans to move the team to Anaheim, California—because of allegedly unsafe conditions at the Kingdome stadium where the Seahawks played—and he encountered a hornet’s nest of trouble. Local newspapers lambasted the developer in an outpouring of negative articles that often mentioned Behring’s ties to Port Blakely Tree Farms—not the best publicity for an organization in the heat of developing local real estate projects. Realizing he had become a political liability, Behring approached Jim about buying out his share in the tripartite venture, which the company obliged. Behring moved on, and the Seahawks stayed put. In 1996 the team was sold to Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen, who tore down the Kingdome in 2000 and replaced it with the new Qwest Field, paid for with taxpayer money. With Behring no longer a partner, the name of Grand Ridge changed to Issaquah Highlands. Renown Corporation’s interest which Ken Behring originally brought into the partnership was subsequently purchased, leaving Port Blakely as the sole owner of Issaquah Highlands. Real estate development was not the only diversification strategy in play at Port Blakely Tree Farms in the 1980s. In 1987 the company incorporated Siler Pole and Piling as a wholly owned subsidiary to take advantage of the growing market for high-quality power transmission utility poles. The price—at twelve hundred dollars per thousand board feet for poles that ran from 90 to 130 feet in length—was another factor in the decision. But the overriding reason for creating the subsidiary was diversification. Millworker unions were pressuring the federal government at the time to levy restrictions on private timberland owners exporting raw logs. Were this to occur,

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Friends take a baby for a stroll along Issaquah Highlands’s tree-lined avenues. Unlike many new communities, where developers skipped sidewalks in order to save money, Port Blakely ensured Issaquah would be laced with them.

it would direly affect the company’s income stream. Such restrictions would not apply to utility poles, which were manufactured within Washington state. A plant was built along a rail line in McCleary. Douglas-fir timber was cut into pole dimensions and sold to treating plants, utilities, and export markets. Port Blakely Tree Farms was back in the milling business—though not for long. The anticipated federal export curbs never materialized; moreover, since only the highest-quality trees—tall and straight—were cut to manufacture poles, it had required harvesting of stands at times unsuitable to market conditions. The business was shut down in 1990. At the company’s primary business, a new forestland acquisition strategy was under way. For decades, the practice was to limit the purchase of adjoining properties to reduce the possibility of fire losses, as well as climatological and infestation risks. Consequently the company owned numerous smaller parcels at a distance from one another in eastern and western Washington and eastern and western Oregon. While these holdings enjoyed well-distributed age classes, there were impediments to retaining such noncontiguous timberlands. “It’s very expensive to manage multiple small parcels since you need to have work crews spread here and there, which affects productivity,” explains Onny Warjone, the company’s chief forester at the time. “By consolidating the landholdings, you also can put more log volume into the

A scaler meansuring logs on the rollout at Pacific Lumber & Shipping’s Longview yard.

markets, which gives you a bigger market presence and more leverage on the price.” Port Blakely Tree Farms opted for a “simpler strategy,” Onny notes. “We decided to consolidate our forestland base between Olympia, Washington, and Salem, Oregon, trading up to ever-higher quality lands with faster-growing trees.”

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Managing forestlands requires people with expertise in wide-ranging fields. Here Casey Black (at left), an area forester, confers with Chris Lunde, harvest and systems manager, and Gareth Waugh, a forest analyst.

Southwest Washington and northwest Oregon thus became what the company refers to as a “working circle.” However, a

the company’s tree farms, a process that began in earnest in

large financial exposure remained by consolidating the forest

1989 (today, each tree farm is re-cruised every five years). The

resources in two states—the greater possibility of restrictive

data was further enhanced through the use of a Geographic

regulations. This risk also would be offset a few years later.

Information System (GIS), which provided more spatially

Under Onny in the 1980s the forestry department had

accurate computerized mapping of tree volumes per acre.

improved its ability to scout out land meeting the company’s

The new Timber Inventory Management System helped the

tree age-class criteria. Assisting this objective was a new

company improve its evaluation of forestlands for prospective

inventory information system developed by forester Mike

transactions. Since its unveiling, TIMS has been upgraded

Mosman. While the current system was sound from a

several times.

technological standpoint, the problem was the unreliability of

178

The solution, in part, called for more thorough cruising of

Mosman also tapped technology developed for the Bureau

the forest inventory data that went into it. “We could have the

of Land Management to improve the forestry department’s

best system in the world, but if the data wasn’t believable, the

determinations of tree age-class gaps. Called TRIMPlus, this

results wouldn’t be believable either,” Mosman says.

modeling software similarly evolved as the years advanced. “In

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

the old days, because of the poor data quality, we would apply heavy discounts to our volume estimates and harvest levels,” Mosman says. “As our confidence in the data grew because of the new tools, we gradually reduced the discounts and eventually eliminated them. We were ahead of the curve then, and are still pushing the envelope of what technology can do to help us with our forest estate models and forecasts.”

A Breaking of Rank A different sort of back-to-the-future scenario was occurring within the family-owned Port Blakely Tree Farms. Nearly fifteen years after the late Franklin Eddy sold his shares to the company in 1973, a frustrated younger shareholder sought to do the same. Unfortunately, this time the experience was divisive and protracted. Since the 1973 passage of a resolution by the board of directors establishing a clear process for valuing and redeeming shares, the company had become a master limited

A roto saw that can cut up to twenty-four-inch diameter trees. Port Blakely for years has invested in, and experimented with, new technologies for use in the forests.

partnership. Ownership was now divided into units, rather than shares. This was not the issue in this case, however. The problem was the sale of units to someone outside the Eddy lineage. Complicating the issue was that the buyer was competitor Simpson Timber, and the price Simpson paid was significantly higher than the actual unit value. In response, Jim Warjone went to visit Simpson CEO Gary Reed Jr. He reminded Reed that his company sprang from Sol Simpson’s transactional relationship with the old Port Blakely Mill Co. Jim offered to buy back the units at the paid-for price, and Reed, in response to the sincerity of Jim’s plea and the fact that the Simpson and Eddy families had enjoyed positive

Under Onny in the 1980s the forestry department had improved its ability to scout out land meeting the company’s tree age-class criteria.

relations over many decades, politely obliged. This did not end

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the matter, however. Other family members soon made their intentions known about wanting to sell their units, based on

unrelenting attacks by pro-environment groups. Countering the

their contentions over low dividend payments and what they

call for more regulations was the Washington Forest Protection

considered inferior valuations of the units they held. One family

Association, which launched a major public relations campaign

member was so disturbed over these issues that he expressed

to better educate the public about forest industry practices.

to other unitholders that he had conferred with Weyerhaeuser

The divide between these opposing forces was wide—loggers

about acquiring Port Blakely Tree Farms.

increasingly worried about continuing employment versus

Jim had long felt that unitholders deserved an equitable process for liquidating their ownership shares, as long as the

environmentalists concerned about saving the nation’s wetlands. Eventually, legislation passed enabling trees on both public

units were properly appraised and discounted (a discount

and private lands to be preserved as habitats for the diverse

is part of the actual appraisal process to determine market

species living among them. The law mandated the creation of

value for minority units). The problem was that certain family

buffer zones—strips of land alongside wetlands—within which

members believed the appraised value was below the actual

no trees could be harvested. Tapping the company’s GIS-

worth of their units. Wanting a higher fair value for their

guided inventory information system, Onny estimated that as

units, some family members hired an attorney who did his

much as 12 percent of the company’s merchantable forestlands

own mathematical calculations of unit values. The company

could no longer be logged. “When you consider we had about

subsequently retained securities firm Dean Witter Reynolds to

150,000 acres at the time, that’s a lot to lose,” he laments.

provide an independent economic valuation.

“And we still had to pay taxes on this land, which really got

Once again the tricky complications inherent in family ownership of a private company were resolved, though not

my goat.” The chief forester vented his resentments to the board

without some lingering discord. The original resolution

of directors. At the meeting, Jim Warjone expressed that

calling for unitholders to restrict the sale of shares to other

the company was losing land faster than it could earn the

unitholders or the company itself covered only the voting

money to replace it. “We needed a two-pronged approach—

shares of the general partner. It did not cover the units of the

simultaneously look for another place to grow trees with less

partnership which owned the assets of the partnership.

regulatory risk, and also become more directly involved in

To improve the unit valuation exercise, Mike Mosman

the making of laws and regulations,” he says. The latter would

developed a long-term discounted cash flow estimate of land

require “treating elected and appointed officials collegially and

values, which was turned over to an independent appraiser to

not as the opposition,” Jim adds.

guide the board in establishing redemption values. For the time

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Family discord was one thing, but equally disruptive were the

A hunt for quality timberlands reminiscent of Garrett Eddy’s

being, the disruptive issue was put on the back burner. Several

exploratory trips to Fiji, Liberia, and other foreign countries in

years would pass before it heated up yet again.

the 1950s and 1960s commenced. Company foresters evaluated

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

(Left to Right) Onny Warjone, Mike Buchanan, and Jim Warjone in front of one of the company’s North Island, New Zealand, radiata pine plantations. In the background are fruits of the company’s efforts.

thirty-three separate forests worldwide, from the Southeastern United States to faraway Russia, Chile, and New Zealand. The latter especially caught their attention.

Off to the Down Under An island country twelve hundred miles southeast of Australia across the Tasman Sea, New Zealand actually comprises two landmasses: North Island and South Island. Numerous smaller islands in an archipelago, such as Stewart Island, the Chatham Islands, and Matakana Island, surround the larger islands. The indigenous Polynesian inhabitants of New Zealand, the Maori, called the country Aotearoa, which means “land of the long white cloud.” When the contingent from Port Blakely Tree Farms visited New Zealand in September 1993 the country was in the thick of a remarkable transformation—from a socialized economy with many government-owned and -subsidized industries to an industrialized, free-market economy competing on the global stage. In precolonial days, New Zealand’s North Island was dense with slow-growing kauri trees in its northernmost half. Persistent logging depleted these forests, and some areas that were owned by the government were sold or given to returning veterans and converted into sheep farms. Much of the cutover land that remained was largely owned by the government, which aggressively planted them with various species after WWII. In the 1990s the government sold most of their forests to settle Maori claims that had been involved in protracted litigation. Also for sale were numerous sheep farms that were no longer subsidized by the government. New Zealand had dismantled its system of agricultural price supports and other

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Pentland Hills Tree Farm, New Zealand, planted with Douglas-fir with much of the seed procured in the Pacific Northwest.

forms of economic protection for farmers in 1984. This was

the byways. The former forestlands were destined to return,

one of the parliament’s responses to pending government

albeit not the same indigenous species but rather stands of

insolvency as a result of decades of overspending and

radiata pine and Douglas-fir.

borrowing internationally to cover the lack of tax revenues. Tax rates and other restrictions on foreign investment in New

earlier and passed on buying land there, the fourteen-day tour

Zealand were stifling their economy and the World Bank was

by Onny, finance chief Barry Sheppard, and foresters Mike

threatening to cease lending to the country if strict reforms

Mosman and Mike Buchanan changed everyone’s perceptions—

were not installed, a condition not unlike that faced by Ireland,

including Garrett’s eventually. Upon their arrival, the party met

Spain, and Portugal in 2009—2011.

with forest consultant Dennis Nielsen, who led them on a tour

Three years later the New Zealand stock market collapsed.

182

Although Garrett had visited New Zealand two decades

of timberlands on North Island and South Island. Visiting South

Share values plunged 60 percent from their mid-year peak,

Island was a case of déjà vu, given its startling similarity to the

spawning five years of economic depression. Sheep farmers

topography, climate, and plant life of the Pacific Northwest.

suffered from the one-two punch of lost government subsidies

Nielsen was an adept guide, and the contingent was constantly

and economic malaise—hence the “For Sale” signs decorating

on the move. As Onny remembers, “We flew on twelve different

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Gold in Them Thar Hills

airlines, drove over ten thousand miles, and never slept in the same bed twice.â&#x20AC;? The group met with numerous public officials, industry representatives, and farmers seeking to sell their lands. The companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s culture of open, mutually respectful, and

W When Blakely Pacific

acquired two sheep farms in the early 1990s on South Island, New Zealand,

planting the land to become

transparent dealings made an impact, and they, in turn, were

what is today Shag River

impressed by the opportunities presented. â&#x20AC;&#x153;There was a market

Tree Farm, forestry was on its mind and not gold. Still, the fact that smack dab next to the farms was the famed Macraes Gold Mine made the acquisition all the sweeter.

No one knows for

sure whether a rich vein

The New Zealand Venison is a cross between the Pacific Northwest Elk and the European Red Deer.

of gold lies under the Douglas-fir that has been planted on the farms. In any event, the potential for gold riches was nil as the government owns the mineral rights under the Shag property and leases them to other parties. Macraes was settled by farmers in the 1850s, and ten years later gold was discovered. Alluvial mining by prospectors commenced immediately, followed by commercial underground mining in 1889. More than 15,000 ounces of gold had been mined before the four mines were shuttered in the mid-1950s. More gold remained, but the techniques for mining the gold cost more than the market value of the gold after its mining. Then, in 1990, when gold mining became less expensive and the value of gold soared, more mines were opened in the area. Today there are half a dozen mines operating, both underground and open-pit mines, producing between 162,000 and 185,000 ounces of gold per year, and the Macraes mine is the largest active gold mine in the country. Initially, it was expected to produce gold for another ten years, but now the mines are anticipated to stay in production for another thirty-five years. u John Warjone is standing next to a eucalyptus tree in a stand of young radiata pine trees on Matakana Island. These trees grow fast in New Zealand and are often used for flooring and verneers.

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183

to buy timber domestically, in addition to a strong export market,” Mosman explains. “Unlike Australia, which had restrictive laws with regard to exporting logs, New Zealand had no such bans or tariffs on pine and fir. Its universities had forestry departments, and there was a world-renowned forest research center in Rotorua. From a long-term investment standpoint, we liked what we saw.” The barrier island of Matakana was especially captivating. Located on the western Bay of Plenty in New Zealand’s North Island, Matakana boasted long, sandy beaches and crystalclear waters that Hawaii would envy. More important, the island supported more than ten thousand acres of forestcovered coastal land exposed to the Pacific Ocean. Trees were primarily radiata pine, which grew in a sandy type of soil. Interestingly, radiata pine was the first tree planted at the

PBC-0381

Eddy Tree Breeding Station, and its successful introduction to New Zealand was due, in part, to the genetic breakthroughs that James G. Eddy funded. The fast-growing, tall, genetically enhanced trees defied their young age. The entire contingent did not tour the Matakana island initially—only Mosman, escorted by Nielsen. The company had previously expressed to the timber consultant that they were not much interested in forestland on an island because of the related transportation issues. So Nielsen decided to take just one person along. “Barry, Mike, and Onny went fishing,” Mosman recalls. The island was the subject of much controversy at the time. Although populated by an indigenous Maori people called the Ngai Te Rangi, a Malaysian company owned Matakana’s forests and had sold the harvesting rights to a paper and pulp manufacturer in the United States. The Malaysian concern

184

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

(Top) PBC directors on a visit to New Zealand (Bottom) These radiata pine logs were cut in New Zealand. The three triangles represent the logo of the company to which Port Blakely was selling the logs.

The tree in the foreground has been carefully selected for its form and recently pruned at about five inches in diameter to promote the growth of knot-free clear wood in the outer layers in an effort to be able to sell the trees pruned to the specialty furniture, molding, or plywood markets when it is finally harvested.

now sought to sell its holdings to a shell corporation. To stop the sale, the Ngai

Onny. “That alone says a lot.” After the contingent returned home,

Te Rangi and other Maori tribes banded

they received a phone call from Nielsen

together as the TKC Corp. and filed a

encouraging them to give the island a

lawsuit. Simultaneously, TKC searched

second look. Nielsen further proposed

for funding to purchase the forestland, a

that Port Blakely Tree Farms give TKC

quest that so far had been unsuccessful

the money to buy the land, in return for

because of the underlying native land rights disputes. “The

keeping the trees to harvest. After a second visit to the island

word Matakana means ‘distrust’ in the Maori language,” says

by the same contingent—plus Jim Warjone, who was intrigued

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185

by the bonus possibility of developing a resort community

commented that what sealed the deal was the honesty and

someday along the sandy beaches—a counterproposal was

forthrightness of company foresters and officials. When Maori

presented. “We offered to buy the whole forestry portion of the

leaders expressed their interest in employment opportunities

island [approximately 10,000 acres] with its remaining timber

for their tribal members, Blakely Pacific Limited—the

and give the land only in the southern half of the island to the

company’s named legal entity in New Zealand—promised to

Maori interests in return for their support and agreement to

recruit and train their people first for jobs as planters and

hold us harmless from the ongoing lawsuit. We also agreed to

loggers. Maori ritual traditions also were permitted to continue,

pay them land rent for those acres that still had growing timber

such as the annual hunt for wild pigs. The company agreed to

until we eventually harvested the crop,” Jim says. “Although

protect Maori sacred sites on its half of the property, and even

there was some give-and-take, it was a fair offer, and they took

built and staffed a firehouse to serve the needs of islanders and

it.”

forest preservation. “We stuck by our values of trust, respect, The transaction was finalized in February 1994 and closed

two months later. Port Blakely Tree Farms now had a second “working circle,” one outside the United States and thus not

and integrity, treating people the way you’d want to be treated,” says Onny. “You do that, and it opens doors of opportunity.” In succeeding years Blakely Pacific systematically enlarged

subject to its regulatory risks—at least not for the foreseeable

its forestland footprint in New Zealand. Mike Buchanan, who

future. Several Maori involved in the negotiations later

managed the subsidiary, toured North Island and South Island in search of suitable properties for sale. Several acquisitions were sheep farms with rich soil that had been fertilized to grow grass. Lots ranged in size from forty to eight hundred acres on North Island, at a cost of about one thousand dollars an acre. Much larger parcels were acquired on South Island, where land was selling for as little as seventy-five dollars an acre due, in part, to slower tree-growing conditions. On the sheep farms Blakely Pacific initially planted 1 million seedlings a year, soon upping the number to 4 million. The survival rate of the infant trees was 97 percent, an extraordinary accomplishment given the pest control issues— many areas were overrun with rabbits, wallabies, and deer—

Acre by acre, the vast tracts of empty land were hand planted with seedlings in New Zealand.

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

and the need to purge the land of the dread gorse bush, a spiny, dense evergreen shrub that can grow ten feet tall. To diversify the company’s asset base, Douglas-fir was planted on South Island, despite warnings that such trees would not grow well. Blakely Pacific proved them wrong. “These places looked like golf courses when we bought them; just sixteen years later, they look like forests—out of nowhere,” says Onny. Before the decade ended, Blakely Pacific was in negotiations with the Ngai Tahu, another South Island Maori group that had heard about the company’s respectful, fair, and trustworthy dealings with the Ngai Te Rangi. The doors of opportunity had opened, as Onny surmised. The Ngai Tahu and other Maori tribes had won substantial forestland concessions from the New Zealand government via the Treaty of Waitangi of 1840, which recognized Maori ownership of their lands and other properties. The Ngai Tahu wanted the historic sites, such as thousand-year-old cave paintings on this land, protected. They further sought a means of sustained capital for tribal members’ education and employment. On the negotiating table were three timberlands planted by the government in the early 1960s, called the Geraldine, Herbert, and Waimate forests. Together, they comprised more than thirty-three thousand acres. Most of the trees on these forestlands were radiata pine, with a few stands of Douglas-fir.

(Top) PBC director Mark Jensen from San Francisco in New Zealand. (Center) Pine being peeled for laminations below. (Bottom) Laminated and hydraulically formed radiata pine office chairs.

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Through 2003 each forest in succession was sold to Blakely Pacific. The company provided the capital needed to create a sustained source of funds for the Ngai Tahu people, and vowed to protect the historic sites on the land. Even though Blakely Pacific wasn’t contractually obligated, the company also promised to preserve the 250-acre Raincliff Forest, residing within the Geraldine Forest. Planted in 1888 with Lawson cypress, larch, spruce, Austrian pine, and other species, this “bewitching conglomerate of trees,” a local newspaper reported, was a grand “place of peace, a place to clear the senses.” Buchanan delivered the good news: the forest was safe from loggers’ saws, and its preservation would be vested in perpetuity in a trust formed by the company. In all, Blakely Pacific would close seventeen separate acquisitions of almost seventy thousand acres of land in New Zealand between 1994 and 2004. Sixty percent of these holdings were established forests, with the remainder sheep or cattle farms. More than twenty thousand acres have been planted with Douglasfir, offering a remarkable diversification of the company’s asset base in the country. Sites vitally important to the Maori people have been preserved. Endangered species, from exquisitely tiny orchids to short-billed dotterels and terns, have been protected, as has the revered Raincliff Forest. Port Blakely Tree Farms again demonstrated that straightforward negotiations in which there is respect for the other party’s viewpoints serve everyone’s best interests.

Conquering the Highlands Back home, these same principles were abundantly evident in Port Blakely Communities’ dealings at Issaquah Highlands. Throughout the public planning and development process, a unique

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Andrew Cocking, Blakely Pacific South Island regional manager, leads a group of curious children at Raincliff Forest, a protected area.

Preserving the Raincliff Forest

The spirit of engagement that Port Blakely Tree Farms brings to all its dealings with other parties achieved a pinnacle of sorts in Blakely Pacific’s vow to preserve a treasure of New Zealand: the beautiful Raincliff Forest. This majestic forest preserve in the Middle Valley between Fairlie and Pleasant Pointe lies within the company’s forestlands in the Geraldine and Herbert forests. The panoply of diverse tree species planted by Henry Hoare in the 1880s is one reason that the forest was preserved. The other is the adjacent properties within the Raincliff that other local landowners similarly donated, such as Pioneer Park and Burke’s Homestead, which feature several nineteenth-century buildings made from limestone, in addition to rock art created from charcoal and red ocher by indigenous Maori more than six hundred years ago.

The company even funded the establishment of a penguin preserve with

a delightful viewing stand. Visitors can view the penguins emerging from the ocean at dusk and being greeted by their mates in their multiple caves and burrow homes.

Once before, in the 1940s, the South Canterbury rural community in the

shadow of Raincliff fretted that the trees would be harvested and the land converted into farmland. They had hoped that the forest would be retained in perpetuity for the general enjoyment of everyone. Fortunately, plans were abandoned to harvest the land, but no guarantee of its future preservation was provided—until Blakely Pacific gave its word.

Through the years since first acquiring land Down Under, the company

has forged strong relationships with the people of New Zealand, perhaps most of all with various Maori tribes like the Ngai Te Rangi and the Ngai Tahu. Blakely Pacific has preserved sites that are vital to these people and permitted their established rituals and traditions to continue. In return, they have earned the tribes’ trust and respect. At a celebration in Christchurch following the company’s purchase of forestlands in the Waimate Forest, a member of the Ngai Tahu, Mark Solomon, said of the tribe’s dealings with Blakely Pacific, “It is a friendship and business relationship that has grown in value and stature over the past years.”

Jim Warjone echoed the sentiment: “We have always borne in mind that

relationships are forever and need to be nurtured and respected.” u

A lot of handwork went into maintaining the New Zealand radiata pine forests, including pruning the bottoms of the trees by hand.

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The M.V. Skookum, Tauranga, launched November 21, 2005, New Zealand. It was designed to ferry logs from Matakana Island to the Port of Tauranga twenty minutes away.

public/private partnership was forged to mutually share in

were recruited to design high-quality houses that defied monotony

the creation of the first true urban village developed in the

and yet seemed related, giving the visual impression that they were

northwestern United States.

all part of a whole. The neighborhood was designed to encourage

From the remains of old mining pits on the former railroad

190

interaction among residentsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;their stated desire during the focus

property, a residential neighborhood of large and smaller

groupsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;with sidewalks aplenty and garages tucked out back.

homes, townhomes, and multifamily apartment buildings

Many houses featured distinctive entry porches and balconies,

slowly sprouted in 1996. Thirteen prominent homebuilders

high-pitched roofs and gables, and other classic details. Pedestrian-

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

friendly, tree-lined streets and walkways connected these

only seven hundred residences and 10,000 square feet of retail

residences to each other and to natural wetlands, village

space. As attorney Tom Goeltz puts it, “We wouldn’t get the

greens, recreation centers, and an assortment of trails and

genie out of the bottle until that interchange was done.”

parks. Ground soon was broken on a Montessori school and an

Government funding of the interchange was suddenly in jeopardy, however. To break the impasse, someone with the

elementary school, and plans were drawn up for a town center

problem-solving skills of a Solomon was needed. Fortunately,

with various stores, offices, hotels, restaurants, and other

Port Blakely Tree Farms had just such a person in its employ. u

services. Even a state-of-the-art hospital was envisioned for the area. “We wanted to create a vibrant town with choices for everyone,” says Judd Kirk. More than 1,500 acres were set aside as permanent open space to provide habitat for wildlife, and over 120 acres of wetlands were shielded from construction sediments to preserve waterfowl and aquatic species. Port Blakely Communities and the city of Issaquah joined together in creating the Evergreen Building Guide, the first green building standard in the Pacific Northwest and the forerunner of the Built Green program of the Master Builders Association of King and Snohomish Counties. This, in turn, inspired the development of the Built Green Idea Home, an energy-efficient house created with materials that are safe for people and the environment. In 1997 the company received good news: the signing of an option by Microsoft to buy more than 150 acres adjacent to Issaquah Highlands as the location of a 2.95-million-squarefoot office campus. The tech giant would provide work for area homeowners, and these employees would shop at local retail establishments, many still to be built. It was an incredible

Pruned radiata pine logs for verneer. These logs are from trees that are less than thirty years old, testament to the fast growth capabilities in New Zealand.

win-win situation. All eyes now were on the planned Sunset Interchange connecting the development to the I-90 freeway. Until its completion, the company had committed to building

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Chapter

Expertise and Excellence

192

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of the Port Blakely Companies

Logs are readied for transport to the Port of Longview in Washington state, one of the primary transportation venues for exports to the Pacific Rim.

For more than 160 years the Eddy family had contributed to the nation’s prosperity and public welfare through the provision of logs and lumber. In the early 1990s, at the brink of its risk tolerance due to increasingly restrictive regulations, Port Blakely Tree Farms seriously contemplated ending its long involvement in the business. Driving this profound consideration was the listing of the northern spotted owl and marbled murrelet as threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. The birds made their habitats in Pacific Northwest forestlands, including lands held by the company and other private timberland owners. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service considered also listing the Puget Sound Chinook salmon as “threatened.” The species was dwindling due to warm water temperatures and fishing skirmishes with Canada over international quotas, prompting the government to contemplate three-hundred-foot-wide buffers on either side of streams to promote more shade. Other onerous restrictions followed—requirements for watershed analyses, limits on the size of clearcuts, and the possible ban of chemicals long used and deemed critical to the reforesting process, to name a few. Many rules were hastily conceived simply because a problem was perceived, despite scant research and empirical testing. There seemed to be no end to the restrictive measures, hence the company’s deep questioning: Should it liquidate, sell, or trade its forestland volume now and thereby eliminate the possibility of never being able to harvest the trees? Expertise and Excellence

193

Port Blakely Tree Farms seized instead a creative alternative:

environmental regulations through confrontation and the legal

rather than fight government regulations like the rest of the

system, but Onny frankly said that Port Blakely wanted to

industry, it would join in their development. The company vowed

take a different tack,” Wilkins says. “He asked, ‘What if we did

to learn everything possible about the diverse species living

our own research on managing the land and other resources

within its forestlands; this way it could be proactive in managing

like water, wildlife and fish, learned more about these things

the forests to protect the creatures. “We decided to become the

than anyone else, and then sat down with state and federal

expert in both forestry practices and wildlife preservation,” Jim

regulating agencies to collaboratively produce agreements?’

Warjone explains.

“I thought this was

To accumulate this

a prudent, responsible

expertise, Port Blakely Tree

approach for a timber

Farms hired the first of

company to take,”

several wildlife biologists

Wilkins continues,

on a full-time basis. Neal

“since it protected the

Wilkins was finishing up

species and also took

his PhD at the University of

uncertainty out of the

Florida when Onny Warjone,

regulatory process.”

president of the forestry

Wilkins was hired

division, called and asked

by Port Blakely in 1992.

for his input in helping

“Neal just jumped in

the company address its

with both feet,” recalls

threatened species problems

forester Court Stanley,

at the Robert B. Eddy Tree Farm near Brooklyn, Washington, a logging

who joined Wilkins The New Zealand coast line features wildlife protected areas, a movement that dovetailed nicely with Port Blakely’s own sentiments about protecting plants and animals alike.

community and home of the

new forestry office in Centralia at the time.

historic Brooklyn Tavern. The forestlands were mostly second-

“Another timber company, Murray Pacific, had just completed

growth stands of Douglas-fir and western hemlock, which were

the Habitat Conservation Plan [HCP], and we were determined

habitat to both the marbled murrelet (a seabird common to the

to undertake a much larger version, with Neal driving it. It

Pacific Northwest) and northern spotted owl.

would include not one or two species but literally all the fish

The wildlife biologist was impressed by Onny’s no-nonsense approach. “Most everyone else in the industry was fighting

194

at the company’s

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

and upland species within the tree farm, making it the first true multispecies HCP.”

An HCP is a legally binding plan, agreed to by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, to protect a specified area as habitat for a threatened or endangered species. Wilkins remembers the reaction he received from the board of directors when he introduced the subject. “Garrett Eddy was the chairman, and he challenged every assumption I made,” Wilkins says. “He interrogated me in a room for three hours, while he smoked nonstop—in a ‘no smoking’ building, no less. He made me prove everything I said. He understood that the company’s quarterly profits would be reduced, but he ultimately convinced the board that it was the right thing to do, since it addressed

The wildlife biologist was impressed by Onny’s no-nonsense approach. “Most everyone else in

the more important issue of future strategic risks. I loved him

the industry was fighting

for that.”

environmental regulations

Buoyed by Garrett’s and the board’s blessing, Wilkins embarked on an intensive study of the Brooklyn-area

through confrontation

forestlands, nearly seventy-five hundred acres in all. The

and the legal system, but

company selected this relatively small and well-blocked-up parcel as the test site for the HCP, with the understanding that it could be expanded in the future, but if it failed the damage would be contained to the site. He leveraged the GIS-guided forest inventory system to analyze the terrestrial, aquatic, and

Onny frankly said that Port Blakely wanted to take a different tack.”

riparian (riverbank) habitat conditions, and documented the extraordinary range of species living within these ecosystems. “We assembled a huge list, not just endangered species,” Wilkins notes. “There were multiple species of salmon, bats, salamanders, frogs, and other critters that many people have never seen or even knew about.” With the help of Court Stanley, other foresters, and attorney Jeff Van Duzer, who would join the board of directors in 2010, Wilkins drafted an all-encompassing plan to ensure that the company’s forest management activities would not impair the

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survival of the various species through the next fifty years. In

of vertebrate wildlife are identified as likely to use the forest

return, regulators would not impose additional restrictions on

habitat, of which only two, the northern spotted owl and

its forestry practices at the tree farm during this period of time.

marbled murrelet, were threatened. Creatures as diverse as the

â&#x20AC;&#x153;We held out the olive branch, and regulators took it,â&#x20AC;? says

Pacific treefrog, northern alligator lizard, rough-skinned newt,

Wilkins.

rubber boa, long-tailed weasel, marsh shrew, ruffed grouse, and hooded merganser are documented alongside the betterknown bald eagles, muskrats, beavers, and garter snakes. Literally every living thing on the tree farm is listed. It was an unprecedented document, and no regulator, timber company executive, or anyone else had ever seen anything like it. On July 19, 1996, Port Blakely Tree Farms finalized the fifty-year HCP, covering 7,486 acres under its ownership in Pacific and Grays Harbor counties. The company pledged to undertake four specific habitat conservation measures over the next half-century: it would adjust its harvest schedules to allow for variable rotations, as opposed to large-scale clear-cutting; PBC0056. jpg

it would protect streams and riparian habitats from mass wasting, slope failure, surface erosion, and other risks; it would align its silvicultural (forest management) procedures with habitat preservation; and it would stringently manage specific sites to protect the nesting and denning areas of threatened and

endangered species.

Port Blakely Companies was one of the first tree farms in the state to write a multispecies Habitat Conservation Plan. The plan took four years to write and forever branded the company for its commitment to sustainability and protection of wildlife.

With the HCP, Port Blakely Tree Farms had gathered and introduced to its forestry practices long-range scientific concepts comprising wildlife, fishery, and forestry sciences. Every square inch of forest would be managed to balance the

196

The inch-thick HCP is arguably one of the most important

needs of trees with the survival of the creatures living among

documents in the long history of Port Blakely Tree Farms.

them. It was the first time in the industry that such a broad

Every tree species at the Robert B. Eddy Tree Farm is listed

forest management strategy had been unveiled and approved

within it, not to mention each type of shrub and forb (an

by the federal and state governments, as well as endorsed

herbaceous flowering plant). One hundred fifty-eight species

by the Native American tribes and the bulk of the local and

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

A leader on a tree is visible in the foreground of this photograph of the company’s forestlands in Coos Bay, Oregon. The leaders are an immediate indicator of how fast a tree is growing.

national environmental organizations. At last, the financial

confrontation, litigation, or buying its way out with an “incidental

uncertainty that had fostered its probing questions about

take permit”—a permit legally protecting companies from

remaining in the business was resolved. “We were the initial

accidentally harming or killing an endangered or threatened

beneficiary of the government’s new ‘no surprises’ policy, which

species—Port Blakely Tree Farms proved that collaborative,

established that a ‘deal was a deal’ with regard to an HCP,”

balanced solutions were possible. “All of this became a deep

says Onny. “We achieved certainty that the federal government

source of satisfaction within the organization,” says Jim.

could ask no more of us during the fifty years in which the HCP was in effect.” In the industry, the fact that the company had successfully

This pride in achievement was apparent the day the landmark HCP was signed in the middle of the woods at the Robert B. Eddy Tree Farm. Company executives, board

engaged with regulators in forging the all-species HCP

directors, and foresters were in attendance, joining senior

changed the course of future government dealings. Instead of

officials from the U.S. Department of the Interior, including

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197

A contracted worker operating tree thinning equipment is seen inside the glass-enclosed cab. One of the logging companies contracted by Port Blakely Tree Farms has been working with the company for multiple generations, adopting new technology along the way to remain competitive.

Secretary Bruce Babbitt. The nearest airport was more than

through 9.3 million acres of state and private forestlands.

a two-hour drive away, but all the parties wanted to be in the

Representatives from the federal, state, and county

very place where the HCP would take effect.

governments had developed the law in collaboration with

In succeeding years the landmark HCP would inspire other timber companies and federal and state fish and wildlife

leaders. More than 140 people were involved in drafting the

agencies to pursue cooperative engagement. In 2006, for

statewide HCP, a group that included scientists, policymakers,

instance, the federal government endorsed a statewide HCP

environmentalists, and regulators.

supporting the seven-year-old Forests and Fish Law, protecting sixty thousand miles of salmon-bearing streams running

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private timberland owners and Native American tribal

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

While the threat of restrictive regulations had not gone away, truly great strides had been made in limiting their impact

since the day Garrett Eddy first warned the board about the mushrooming “black cloud” of environmental laws. Thanks to the efforts of Port Blakely Tree Farms in developing one of the first multispecies HCPs, a silver lining had appeared, offering hope for the future.

Emergency on Sunset Interchange At Issaquah Highlands, government problems of a different sort were causing headaches. Funding for the planned $176 million Sunset Interchange connecting Interstate 90 to the community, deemed vital to the real estate development and Microsoft’s plans to build an adjacent office complex, was threatened. Several parties had committed to paying for the interchange: Port Blakely Tree Farms, the city of Issaquah, King County, Washington state, and the Metropolitan Area Transit Authority or Metro. Each had pledged a certain amount toward its construction—in the company’s case, $6.7 million. The economic value of the interchange had compelled

After the trees are felled and stripped of their branches on site, they are loaded onto trucks for the saw mill. What used to take hours to ready one tree for the truck can now be done in minutes.

the state legislature to designate it the top highway priority in Washington. Armed with this commitment and a stack of favorable media articles, Jim boarded a plane to the nation’s capital to solicit matching funds from the Federal Highway Administration and the U.S. Congress. “It’s a game of matching money,” Jim says. “Once you get state and local funding commitments, and if the amount is 40 percent or more of what is required for the first phase, you can jump the prioritization

Jim won the federal funding commitment, and then the floor fell out from under him.

queue at the federal level.” Jim won the federal funding commitment, and then the floor fell out from under him. A tax activist in Washington state named Tim Eyman successfully campaigned to repeal the motor vehicle excise tax, which had been based on the

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Issaquah Highlands offers quality of life amenities such as this pond, as well as walking paths, bike lanes, and other features.

value of the car at the time of registration and was in addition

carrying a high debt load. Jim realized a speedy solution was

to regular licensing fees. The resulting loss of tax revenue hit

essential, and he burned up frequent-flyer miles between Seattle

state and local coffers hard. “Eyman’s initiative essentially

and Washington, D.C., in a bicoastal damage-control effort.

killed the taxing source that would pay for the bonds to

With help from several important state and local legislators—as

build the state’s share of the interchange,” explains attorney

well as coaching from the Seattle-based public relations firm

Tom Goeltz. “Strapped for cash, the state had to reorder the

Gogerty & Stark, and the Washington, D.C., government relations

queue of budgeted projects, putting the interchange on hold.

consulting firm Denny Miller and Associates—Jim made his

And without the state money, federal matching funding was

arguments to the government. He pointed out that Metro, the

jeopardized.”

transit authority in King County, believed the interchange was

Financial challenges suddenly reared for Port Blakely

200

crucial, and had committed $10 million to the project, as well as

Communities, which had committed to building only seven

another $10 million to build a thousand-car Park and Ride. “I also

hundred homes until the junction was constructed. The flow

explained that we would provide the land for this parking facility

of revenue was stalled—not the best situation for a company

free of charge,” Jim says.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Jim did more than that in his visits with federal agencies,

Then a more literal mountain thwarted the junction’s

recalls Judd Kirk, then-president of Port Blakely Communities.

completion. Granite boulders the size of small automobiles and

“He had the documentation ready, from the construction

evidence of a preexisting landslide were discovered during test

timetables to the environmental studies,” Kirk says. “He also

drilling for the future overpass foundations. Overcoming these

worked very closely with Rep. Jennifer Dunn of the House of

obstacles required the use of imported, expensive oscillating

Representatives, whose district the interchange was in, and with

drill rigs. Another challenge involved the delivery of two

other state officials like Gary Locke, the county executive at

massive 116-ton, 132-foot-long steel girders from Vancouver,

the time and later the state’s governor and future United States

British Columbia. The girders, which have the distinction of

secretary of commerce, to tell the truth about the need for the

being the longest and heaviest structures ever hauled on a

interchange.” Other public officials who assisted the cause of the

Washington state highway, would serve as parts of a bridge.

junction were U.S. Senators Slade Gordon and Patty Murray, and

A special tractor-trailer spanning more than 280 feet and

future Washington governor Christine Gregoire.

rolling on 86 tires had to be custom-built to make the trek, at

Jim’s tenacity paid off; more federal dollars were committed

a maximum speed of thirty miles per hour. Months slipped by.

to the interchange, filling the void in state funding. “Some people

The need to minimize construction impact on the wetlands

didn’t think he could get it done,” says Kirk, “but he loves getting

around the East Fork Issaquah Creek, a Chinook salmon

under the hood and fixing things. He’s just very innovative, and

spawning ground, also slowed down construction timetables.

he figured out how to get in front of the line of federal funds.” Sharing this opinion is Bob Ingram, formerly with Seafirst

These various impediments and the time absorbed in locking up the funding sources ultimately added two and one-

Bank, the lead banker involved in financing the Issaquah

half years to the completion schedule. In the interim, Microsoft

Highlands project. “Jim had to work with so many different

reviewed and then canceled its plans to erect a new office

federal, state, and county agencies to get things back on track,

campus. “They said they couldn’t count on the interchange

and it is not easy to manage such a large group of funding

opening,” Kirk remembers. “They wanted more certainty

partners,” says Ingram, senior vice president at US Bank today.

and predictability. So they decided to lease office space in

“It was a big accomplishment.”

Redmond, rather than build it in Issaquah.”

Characteristically, Jim chalks up the success to the

The loss of the planned campus was a significant blow,

company’s reputation for fairness and integrity. “We had

given the thousands of workers who were expected to

decided to engage legislators and regulators in the development

buy homes in Issaquah Highlands and shop at its retail

of forestry rules and regulations, and word had spread,”

establishments. Board director Steve Miller doesn’t pull any

he explains. “Thanks to the HCP, we’d become known as a

punches. “We took a bet on Microsoft, and they wimped out,”

company that could be trusted, and it persuaded many local

says Miller, chairman of private equity firm Mid-Ocean Partners.

officials to back us. Their help moved mountains.”

Another departure also was in the offing. In 2001 silent

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partner Renown Enterprises, under pressure from Japan’s protracted financial crisis, approached the company about buying its half share (after Ken Behring left the venture, the two remaining partners had engineered a 50-50 ownership split). Jim worked out a favorable deal that involved very little money down and a note at 2 percent interest. Port Blakely Communities now owned the entire project, a risky

PBC0629

undertaking. It sought another partner to absorb some of the financial exposure, but none was forthcoming. Fortunately the economy was shipshape, and interest in the development percolated after it was named Puget Sound’s 2001 Community of the Year by the Master Builders Association of King and Snohomish Counties. The Sunset Interchange finally dawned, opening in late 2003

Port Blakely’s Family Council made monumental leaps in organization at every level, and was recognized in 2003 with The Family Business Management Excellence Award from the Owner Managed Business Institute. It noted the company’s commitment to stewardship of the family business in governance and leadership.

unitholders to its annual meetings. “There were always more staff members than owners, and I asked Dan if he had faced

to great public acclaim. The junction spanned nearly twenty-

this same problem and had a cure,” Jim recalls. “Dan then

five acres, comprised more than two miles of new exit ramps,

asked me where and when we were holding the meetings.”

and boasted four bridge structures. Port Blakely Communities

“Seattle during the week in late winter,” was the response.

broke ground on the next phases of development—thousands

Dutton explained that Stimson also used to schedule its annual

of homes bursting from the ground in a whirl of construction

meetings in the city during the dreary weekdays of winter,

activity. The company also committed $34 million of its own

resulting in low attendance. When he relocated the meetings

money to build a road from the interchange to the Issaquah

to a warm, sunny place on the weekend, and paid for everyone

Highlands community. Says Kirk, “Jim Warjone deserves the

to come, they showed up in droves. When Jim returned to the

credit for getting that interchange back on track.”

office, his assistant Chris Floren sent out invitations to the 1999 Port Blakely Tree Farms annual meeting, to be held at a resort

The Family Council Is Born

in Napa Valley, California. Free airfare and lodging would be

Indeed, Jim had spent seemingly more time in the air than

provided. The attendance skyrocketed.

on the ground in his travels to Washington, D.C. On one flight,

202

Now Jim wrangled with a related issue. In the years since

the ever-affable Warjone struck up a conversation with the

the late Franklin Eddy had redeemed his ownership shares,

person seated next to him—Dan Dutton, CEO and chairman

Port Blakely Tree Farms struggled with the continuing risk of

of family-owned Stimson Timber in Oregon. Jim happened

other unitholders doing the same. Jim had long recognized the

to mention the company’s difficulties in attracting family

need for an equitable structure to redeem family units.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

He also sought to ensure that family members were accurately and transparently apprised of the company’s business dealings and prospects. There were obstacles to this quest, however. These included the family’s large size, the geographic distance separating them, and some lingering resentment over how previous share redemption issues were resolved. Over the years since the redemption program was instituted in 1986, different parts of the family had broken into factions, threatening the company’s future as a family business. The solution, as Jim and the board of directors saw it, involved more than imparting information about the company to the unitholders. They wanted to generate excitement and pride among the owners about Port Blakely Tree Farms, its grand legacy, and its promising future. This way they would be much less inclined to part with their ownership units in the future. Once again, an outsider stepped in to make a suggestion. At a watering hole in Boston, Jim encountered Bill Britt, vice president at agribusiness giant Cargill Inc. Founded in 1865 Cargill is the largest privately held company in the United States, in terms of revenue. Britt had just been tapped to manage family affairs at the company, no easy task given the more than 450 family owners at the time. When Jim learned the number of unitholders—three times the figure at Port Blakely Tree Farms—he wryly passed on his condolences. He then asked for some suggestions on managing multiple generations of company owners. Britt replied that one branch of the family that owned Cargill had recently retained a Harvard Business School professor and consultant— John A. Davis, PhD, coauthor of Generation to Generation: Life Cycles of the Family Business—to assist in organizing the family owners. Jim called Davis at his office

(Top) In the background of this 1980s photo is an Austrian-made portable logging tower that Port Blakely purchased to promote early age thinning in steep areas. Keeping a lookout is Michael Warjone, son of Onny, who would later become a Port Blakely forester. (Bottom) Ken Risenhoover, Tim Truax, and Court Stanley reviewing an ownership map overlaid on an aerial photograph—output from the GIS-based inventory system.

in Santa Barbara, California, and they met for lunch shortly

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(Left to Right) René Ancinas, Mike Warjone, Court Stanley, Lindsay Geyer, Duane Evans, Mike Mosman, Kim Hillyard.

thereafter in the coastal community. Davis was accompanied

a company by their wallets, they look upon their ownership

by a colleague, behavioral psychologist Cathy Quinn, PhD. Jim

shares as just another investment,” Davis says. “The inherent

then posed the seminal question: “What is the ‘magic sauce’ for

advantages of family ownership—the various talents that

a family business to make it from one generation to the next?”

members can contribute and the license a stable ownership

“I laughed when Jim said this, and asked him to elaborate on his problems,” Davis recalls. “Jim explained that the Eddy

connect the family by their hearts and brains to the business,

family owners no longer paid attention to the company, had

to view the company as their legacy, something they can feel

grown apart from the business, and were spread all over the

proud about. Then they’ll work hard to make it sustainable.”

U.S. and Canada. The family members didn’t talk to each other

much, other than in the sub-branches. As they lost touch with

a system of family business governance, Davis informed Jim at

the business, they tended to treat their ownership shares more

the luncheon. He then took a napkin, drew three intersecting

like an investment than a legacy.”

circles on it, and wrote a different word within each circle—

Davis explained the consequences of this geographic and psychological detachment. “When a family is connected to

204

base gives to management—fragment. You need a way to

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Uniting family members to the company they own requires

family, owners, and employees. He explained the meaning:

Senior management is the organizing mechanism and voice

Steve Jensen, Galen Sherlock, Jill Jensen; Robert B branch:

of the employees; the board of directors is the organizing

John Almirall, Sara Almirall.

mechanism and voice of the owners; and the family council is

Geyer also remembers the early days of the task force. “The

the organizing mechanism and voice of the family. Port Blakely

family recognized that it would be unhealthy for the company

Tree Farms had senior management and a board of directors.

to allow every family member to work wherever they wanted

What it lacked was a family council drafting policy for the family

without any expectations,” she opines. “Moreover, if you’re

in its discussions with senior management and the board. Davis

going to work for your family company the expectations should

advised forming such an organizing mechanism to balance the

be higher of you than of nonfamily employees. It is natural that

family’s wishes with the company’s well-being.

nonfamily employees look to family employees to set standards

Impressed by what he had heard, Jim invited Davis to the company’s second offsite annual meeting in sunny Monterey,

for the company, regardless of the positions they hold.” The task force endeavored to create an employment policy

California. There Davis talked to virtually the entire Eddy

that promoted a career path for family members compatible

clan, several meeting each other for the first time. As a step

with their respective skills. “This way we’d develop the pipeline

toward creating the family council, Davis suggested creating a

of leadership coming into the organization,” Geyer explains.

task force of family members to develop a family employment

“One young woman was interested in wildlife biology and took

policy, a recommendation that the board of directors approved.

an internship with the wildlife department. She’s now majoring

Eight people volunteered and five were chosen—John Eddy III,

in environmental sciences in college and may somedayhave

Bruce Lemire-Elmore, René Ancinas, Eddy Ancinas, and Thea

an opportunity to take on a leadership role in the wildlife

Jensen Engessor. In addition, Lindsay Geyer, vice president of

department.”

human resources at Port Blakely Tree Farms, and Jim Warjone

As planned, the Task Force for the Drafting of the Family

joined as staff to facilitate the process. “We recommended a

Employment Policy metamorphosed by 2001 into the Provisional

summer intern program where high school- and college-age

Family Council, under the guidance of Davis and Quinn. Three

family members could work for pay, but do brainier things than

additional family members from the fourth generation joined

I did working for the company as a teenager,” says Bruce.

their five relatives on the council. Each person was responsible

The following family members have served the Family

for communicating company plans and activities to a set group

Council since its inception. James G branch: René Ancinas,

of designated family constituents. These unitholders, their

Eddy Ancinas, Bruce Lemire-Elmore, April Ancinas, Carmen

spouses, and children fifteen years of age and older are all

Ancinas-Gee, Kate Eddy, Noel Elmore, Lydia Elmore, Ann

members of the Family Assembly, which has a powerful written

Fitzmaurice, Charlotte Lamp, Don Lamp, Kathy Madden,

mission: “To promote and strengthen relationships among

Amanda Starr, James Starr, Mike Warjone, Suzy Warjone;

all branches and generations of the family and to encourage

John W branch: Thea Engesser, Julie Appling, John Eddy III,

responsible stewardship of the family business.” The goal of

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205

the family council was that no

were effectively in charge, led by René Ancinas,who was

longer would any member of the

elected to be president by his peers. The son of Adaline Eddy

extended Eddy clan be in the dark

Starr Ancinas, a granddaughter of James G. Eddy, René coined

about the business.

a clever work hard / play hard motto for the group which has

At the second annual meeting in Monterey, another prominent nonfamily member

René Ancinas, selected first president of Family Council in 2002. A classically trained clarinetist, René had been intimately involved with the Family Council for years, but had never worked in the industry when he was asked to consider taking the job as CEO. For several years, he worked alongside Jim Warjone until he was formally voted in by his peers to helm the company into the future.

Eating since 2000.” One additional person joined the council in 2003, bringing

was in attendance. Jim

the total number of members to nine (plus Jim Warjone

had invited Patrick Moore,

and Lindsay Geyer). Each year, three members retire from

cofounder of Greenpeace, to

the council and three new members are voted in. In its first

speak at the gathering. The famed

six years of existence, sixteen family members served the

conservationist was not an enemy

organization—ten from the line of James G. Eddy and five from

of the forestry industry. Much

the line of John W. Eddy. The first member from the line of

to his fellow environmentalists’

Robert B. Eddy served in 2006.

chagrin, he forcefully promotes the

Within the Family Council have resided several committees,

sustainability of forests and their

such as the Education Committee and others assembled to

utilization as a renewable resource.

develop the Eddy Family Vision and Core Values, a Family

Moore blames deforestation on population growth, sprawl,

Director Policy, and the Eddy Family Constitution. Dr. Charlotte

and agriculture—not on the industry’s forestry operations.

Lamp, a teacher for four decades and the granddaughter of

He bluntly disagrees with other environmentalists in their

James G. Eddy, became chair of the Education Committee in

campaign to reduce wood consumption. In fact, Moore believes

2003 when she was elected to the Family Council. “It bothered

people should use more wood and substitute wood products

me at the annual meetings that the little kids were left with

for nonrenewable resources like fossil fuels, since forests are

sitters while the adults went off to meetings,” says Charlotte.

sustainable and coal and oil are not. His was a remarkable

“They weren’t getting educated about the business.”

presentation, one that went a long way to resolve any concerns

Charlotte, who earned her master’s degree in administration,

among younger family members about the company’s forestry

curriculum, and instruction, wrote the committee’s mission

practices and their impact on the environment.

statement. Her doctoral dissertation, The Positive Influence of

By the third offsite annual meeting in San Diego, the actual

206

stuck to this day—“The Eddy Family Council: Meeting and

Family Governance on the Family Business System, which

Family Council had completed enough of the constitution to

included an overview of the Eddy Family Council, and her history

hold the first formal election of its members. While Davis and

of the council published in Family Business Magazine, are

Quinn were still in attendance, the members of the council

indications of her deep involvement in the Family Council and

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Education Committee. She further created a new educational institution, the Eddy Academy, which is predicated on educating the youngest members of the Eddy family about the company and its businesses. “Within the total family, we have a rotating curriculum, so one year we teach about forestry, then real estate, and finally finance and wealth management,” Charlotte explains. “The kids in Eddy Academy follow this cycle, too.” With forestry education, for example, the children are taken on a tour of the forests and shown how trees are planted and harvested. “We’ll point out the different ages of the trees, and then go visit the seed nurseries,” Charlotte says. “One year, the kids were given a seedling to take home and plant. Sometimes the whole family joins in these excursions.” The two earlier serendipitous encounters with Dan Dutton of Stimson Timber and Bill Britt of Cargill Inc. lead ultimately to the founding of the Family Council which set the path toward better family governance and a forum for resolving future family conflicts. But in the late 2000s, a number of years after the founding of the Family Council, the family was shocked when a small number of dissident unitholders retained two law firms to dispute the value of their units for redemption purposes. These

An access road snakes into one of Port Blakely’s tree farms while the mountains hover in the background. Seedlings in the foreground will be ready to thin to a final spacing prior to their final harvest in thirty years.

family members threatened to sell their remaining units to an outsider or force a liquidation of the company if the board of

this type of behavior in future—they increased two-way

directors did not agree to their demands to be paid an inflated

communications with family owners and established firm

price for their small interest. Shortly thereafter, they sued

policies to give the company and the family the first right to

the company to compel a forced buyback of their units at the

purchase any units offered to third parties to better insure that

inflated price. The suit was eventually settled with the dissidents

the family company would stay in the family.

and their units were completely bought out by the company.

Today, the company's operations and plans are transparent to the family members, whose opinions via the Family Council

Offended by the dissident unitholders’ actions, remaining company owners took two positive steps to hopefully prevent

are openly received by senior management and the board. Most important, individual family members are now fully cognizant

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207

and appreciative of the extraordinary legacy of the great family business they are apart of and, in many ways, serve.

A Giant in the Forest Is Felled During the course of these familial events, Garrett Eddy passed away. A lifelong smoker, he had fought a valiant battle against lung cancer before the end came in 2001. After passing the chairman’s title to Jim Warjone in 1996, Garrett had come to the office virtually every day in his new position as chairman emeritus. The Seattle Times extolled him in a headline as both a “timberman” and a “conservationist,” calling him that “rare combination of both.” His pioneering efforts in forest sustainability, his groundbreaking research into thinning practices, and his institution of long tree-rotation patterns were cited as major contributions to the industry. The latter—growing Douglas-fir for eighty years as opposed to the customary forty years—offered both higher-quality wood and improved habitat for wildlife, especially birds, Garrett’s “great love,” the Times wrote, adding that his donation of more than $2 million to the University of Washington’s Burke Museum “transformed its bird-research center into one of the most prestigious in the world.” Jay Green, chairman and CEO of The Joshua Green Corporation, and grandson of Jack Eddy’s lifelong friend Joshua Green, was a board director at Port Blakely Tree Farms when Garrett died. “He was the true leader in sustained yield practices in the industry, was studious always and tough, and some would say a bit of a curmudgeon,” says Green, whose father had been friends with Garrett as a boy. “Most of all he was farsighted, which helped to position the Eddy family beautifully.” Indeed, Garrett had led Port Blakely Tree Farms into

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

A national tree farming legend, Garrett Eddy died in 2001. While he had been “retired” since 1996, he still made his way to the office every day before falling to lung cancer.

real estate development, and he lived long enough to see the budding of its greatest project. When the Sunset Interchange opened two years after his passing, the pent-up demand for housing in Issaquah Highlands exploded. Scores of people visited the community, enticed by positive media touting its Living Green principles, unique urban village concept, and more than fifteen hundred acres of shared open space—more acreage than all the parklands in Seattle combined. In 2004 ground was broken on the building of the town center, called the High Streets. The same year Microsoft returned 88 acres of the 151 acres it had optioned from the company to build the now-abandoned office campus. The town center plans were subsequently altered to accommodate a lifestyle-center mall, which combines the traditional retail functions of a shopping mall with leisure amenities oriented to more upscale consumers. The project, which entailed 280,000 square feet of retail space and 100,000 square feet of office space, would be undertaken in a joint venture led by real estate developer Opus Northwest. The forestry division that Garrett had created also was in high gear at the time, planting a record nine hundred thousand trees in 2003. Many more trees were headed the company’s way. At a meeting of the Washington Forest Protection Association that year, the Campbell Group, representing Harvard University Trust, approached Onny, then-president of the WFPA, founded by his grandfather James G. Eddy and others in 1906. The timber investment advisory group wanted to feel out the company’s interest in acquiring the Morton Tree Farm property owned by the trust. Located in southwestern Washington, at the foothills of the majestic Cascade Mountains near the town of Morton in Lewis County, the forestland

(Top) The Morton Tree Farm property in Lewis County—at 42,000 acres—was the largest acquisition PBTF had ever undertaken. The cables slicing across the photo are connected to towers that enable the loggers to hoist felled trees up steep inclines. (Bottom) Duane Evans had formerly been a logger until a horrific accident with a chain saw nearly sliced him in two. A dedicated Ironman competitor, doctors credited his superb physical conditioning with keeping him alive until he made it to the hospital. Afterward, he began to work his way up the Port Blakely Tree Farm ladder, going to college at night in Tacoma (paid for by the company) to get his business degree. He is now vice president of U.S. Forestry Operations.

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perfectly suited the company’s “working circle” consolidation

“Everything we own is within forty-five minutes from this

objectives and would enable it to increase its market leverage

office,” Onny says. “Even better, if someone came to us

with domestic and export customers. It also was geographically

tomorrow and said ‘We need 4 million board feet of logs this

proximate to the primary transportation corridors for exports

quarter. Can you get it to us at the dock in Longview and we

to the Pacific Rim—the ports of Longview and Olympia—each

will pay you extra for it?’ we could do it.”

less than an hour away by truck. Onny’s eyes opened wide. The due diligence commenced. Onny and chief forester

but not of forestland. To increase its log exports, the company

Court Stanley toured the property and were impressed by the

sought greater marketing expertise but didn’t want to create

high quality of the trees and the responsible management of

its own marketing division from scratch. Instead, the company

the forestland. The company’s wildlife biologists followed in

found this know-how in a longtime customer, Pacific Lumber

their stead and provided equally commendatory observations.

& Shipping. PLS was a highly innovative and respected log

So did Duane Evans, operations forester, and Tim Truax, the

and lumber marketer to Asia-Pacific markets. Among its novel

forestry manager at the time, along with several other company

ideas was shipping logs in forty-foot-long containers to Asian

foresters, who analyzed the tree age classes and broke up

markets. The containers had arrived at the Longview port laden

the property into harvest units for appraisal purposes. Mike

with cargo and were typically sent back empty. By filling them

Mosman’s appraisal team then entered the data, tree stand

with logs, the associated freight costs were vastly reduced.

by tree stand, into the forest inventory system and projected

“PLS was seeking a buyer and, for defensive reasons, we did

the discounted cash flow over the next sixty years, in present-

not want a competitor to acquire it and lock out the smaller

day values. Once again, the news was excellent. At 42,000

producers,” Jim explains. “But the main factor in our interest

acres, Morton would be the largest acquisition in the history

in PLS was that the volume of competitive bids for our export

of the business. Not that the company blinked; the value

logs had fallen.” PLS offered hopes for an upsurge, given its

far outweighed the risks. “We engaged in some long, tough

marketing savvy and clout.

negotiations,” says Onny. In 2004 Morton Tree Farm joined Port Blakely Tree Farms.

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Another major acquisition closed on the heels of Morton,

Port Blakely Companies closed the acquisition in April 2005. Former PLS president Jerry Weed recalls, “We had

To acquire the property, the company sold or “exchanged”

been contacted by several big companies as potential buyers,

several separate forest parcels totaling 23,000 acres (or a

including Weyerhaeuser and Merrill & Ring, but my preference

quarter of the company’s estate) in northern and southern

and the preference of our chairman and the board was Port

Washington and in Coos Bay, Oregon. Following the strategic

Blakely. Like us, they were a family organization with a long

forest trades, the company’s sustainable annual cut increased

history. Their business philosophy, core values, and ethics

by more than 30 percent. Port Blakely Tree Farms now held

matched well with what we were used to. And they had a

nearly 140,000 acres of timberland in the United States.

substantial timber base that gave us confidence in the future.”

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Port Blakely Companies operates PLS as an independent

him that the company would provide and pay for the requisite

subsidiary, one that has grown significantly thanks to its parent’s

education and training. “It was a huge decision, and he gave

capital investments. For the most part, the company no longer

me time to talk it over with my family,” René says. “In the back

puts all of its export logs up for bid. Rather, the lion’s share is

of my head I was thinking ‘no,’ but my wife April, who knows

transferred to PLS, which markets the logs in Japan, China,

me really well, asked what my gut was saying. I wasn’t sure

Korea, and other export locales. Following the acquisition,

so I called John Davis, whom I had worked with on the family

Weed moved over to manage PLS until his retirement. Tom

governance structure.”

Leeds, who developed the innovative containerized logs

Davis recalls their conversation. “René told me that the

concept, heads up the division today. The company has more

company was willing to do whatever it took to flatten his

than doubled in size since its acquisition in 2005.

learning curve,” the consultant says. “When I heard that I said

In the thick of these back-to-back acquisitions, Port Blakely Companies made an announcement regarding new leadership

to him, ‘Really, how can you turn this down?’” One month later, the classically trained clarinetist—he had

at the company. René Ancinas, who had so capably headed the

studied at Oberlin Conservatory and had hoped someday to

first Eddy Family Council, was selected by the board to succeed

play first-chair clarinet in a major orchestra—gave his answer

Jim Warjone as president. In his presentations to the board as

to the board and senior management of Port Blakely Tree

president of the council, René had impressed several directors

Farms. In April 2005 René and April, who hails from Bay City,

and one in particular: Mike Hollern, CEO of Brooks Resources,

Michigan, of all places, started hunting for houses in Seattle. u

an Oregon-based land developer. “I was in New Zealand with Jim and we got to talking about succession management, when I turned to him and asked, ‘What about René?’” Hollern remembers. “Jim said, ‘Now why didn’t I think about that?’” René at the time was a project manager at kodakgallery.com, an online digital photo developing service owned by Eastman Kodak. “Jim called me and said he was coming down to Oakland and wanted to have lunch, and I asked why he was coming down,” René says. “When he replied, ‘No reason,’ I knew something was going on.” At the luncheon Jim came right to the point. Both he and the board believed that René would be a fitting successor.

At the luncheon Jim came right to the point. Both he and the board believed that

René would be a fitting successor.

When René confessed that he knew little about the company’s forestry and real estate development enterprises, Jim assured

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Chapter

212

Bright Futures

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Survival for any great company depends on its ability to weather economic storms without compromising its principles. When an acute global financial crisis reared in 2007 and fostered a prolonged economic recession, it deeply affected the forestry and real estate development divisions of Port Blakely Companies. The company had tolerated worse calamities, from the series of economic panics bridging the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and the Great Depression of the 1930s to the mushrooming threats posed by restrictive environmental regulations in the 1970s and 1980s. Those challenges were met with ingenuity, grit, and the rectitude that comes from an ingrained adherence to ethical values. This newest shock, brought about by reckless bank lending practices and the risky (Top) Chris Lunde of Port Blakely Tree Farms uses an instrument called a relaskop to take a tree height measurement. These trees, in an area called Goat Creek, are forty-five to fifty years old. (Bottom) A meeting underway at Port Blakelyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s downtown Seattle headquarters. (Left) Wildlife biologist Claudine Reynolds using a multi-parameter water quality meter, as part of the companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s long-term water quality monitoring program, established in 1999. The data indicates if management practices are affecting stream water quality.

securitization of subprime real estate mortgages, would be tackled the same way. The Great Recession, as it came to be known, brought down lumber prices to the near-breakeven point, at a level that had not been seen in thirty years. Fortunately the companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s emphasis on long-term tree rotation, which produced older trees of higher-quality wood, absorbed some of the sting. Foreign markets in Japan, Korea, and China had a keen appetite for quality wood products, and domestic demand continued for tall logs for use as power transmission and distribution poles. The company had deliberately saved its

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Tom Goeltz. “When the real estate market revives, it will be the first to come back.” He adds, “We’ve got all the zoning in place, and all the environmental work has been done; consequently, we can get building permits very quickly. Someday it will turn around, and someday it may turn a profit.” Despite the setbacks, there was still much to cheer about the project. To date, for instance, Issaquah Highlands has received more than twenty environmental stewardship awards A Ben & Jerry’s store in Issaquah Highlands provides a cool respite for residents, offering—as their sign says—peace, love and, of course, ice cream.

for its Living Green and sustainability standards. Blakely Hall—a seven-thousand-square-foot community center built by Port Blakely Companies and donated to residents—alone

higher-quality trees for just such times, as part of its strategy

earned two top environmental awards, a Green Globe given by

for selling low-quality logs in periods of high pricing and high-

the Green Building Initiative and a LEED (Leadership in Energy

quality logs in periods of low pricing.

and Environmental Design) Silver certification awarded by

Where the economic troubles caused the most distress

the U.S. Green Building Council. Blakely Hall wasn’t the first

was at Issaquah Highlands, the pioneering urban village east

building in Issaquah Highlands to earn the Silver designation; in

of Seattle. Plans to develop a lifestyle center mall with joint

2003 the community’s Fire Station 73 received the prestigious

venture partner Opus Northwest were abandoned. Although Opus, which led the project, had commitments from several companies to lease retail space, as the recession took hold and credit availability subsequently contracted, most of the prospective tenants reneged. A key anchor tenant cancelled its letter of intent, followed by the mutual termination of a signed lease by a large-format supermarket. Several unitholders expressed concerns to management regarding the financial impact of these developments, creating more than a little consternation. As of mid-2011 a positive financial return on investment had yet to be realized, not surprising given the protracted real estate market crisis at the time. “Issaquah Highlands is still a work in progress,” says external counsel

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The fire station at Issaquah Highlands is ready for emergencies but also open when families stop by. In 2003. the station received a prestigious LEED silver designation from the U.S. Green Building Council.

Residents relax with coffee and other refreshments in an Issaquah Highlands restaurant.

certification. “We wanted Blakely Hall to embody the same

Although the lifestyle mall was put on hold, other plans

values that formed the foundation of the project, such as

moved forward, including the development of additional office

smart growth and sustainable development,” Judd Kirk says.

buildings, one of which earned LEED’s Gold certification.

“It’s a remarkable building, and it felt great to present it to the

Swedish Hospital broke ground on a major medical complex,

community as a legacy from Port Blakely Communities.”

comprising a medical office building / outpatient center and

Kirk himself made a mark on Issaquah Highlands. He had

a hospital to serve the health-care needs of the fast-growing

come to know many residents by name, and was always open

community and outlying areas. The office building / outpatient

to their questions. In return they named one of several parks

center is scheduled to open in 2011, and the hospital the

within the community Kirk Park, a token of appreciation that

following year.

Judd certainly deserved, given his passionate commitment to

Across the street is a large structure housing Proliance

the project. A nearby plaque acclaims Kirk for making Issaquah

Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine. The YWCA is constructing

Highlands “a richer place to live for generations to come.”

an affordable housing project in the area, while Habitat for

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Man’s best friend stands sentry among one of Port Blakely’s many seedling plots. In time, these trees will be relocated to a clear cut piece of land to reseed a future forest.

Humanity is putting the finishing touches to ten homes. A

and get to know each other better. More than six thousand

new community in the development’s farthest reaches, West

people from all walks of life live in Issaquah Highlands, which

Highland Park, soon will have a trolley connecting it to the

has emerged as a vibrant multicultural community. “Even though

town center. Then, there is zHome, the first multifamily, zero-

this has yet to work out financially for the company, we’ve done

energy, and carbon-neutral community in the country. zHome

something here that we are all proud of,” says René Ancinas.

consists of ten attached townhomes that use zero net energy and 60 percent less water than customary homes. It further

Onny’s Legacy

offers clean indoor air, as the townhouses are constructed

René had accepted the position of vice president of Port

entirely with low-toxicity materials. The amenities in Issaquah Highlands are neighborhood-

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Blakely Tree Farms LP in 2005, as part of his transition to becoming president. The following year, Onny Warjone, who

focused, including a Bark Park where family dogs can roam

had worked at the family business since 1961, retired as head

off-leash, and the Block Party Wagon, which stops at various

of the forestry division, and Court Stanley succeeded Onny as

neighborhoods with food and beverages for residents to enjoy

the division’s new president.

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Onny had changed the ways in which the company dealt

While an HCP involves land with endangered or threatened

with regulators and legislators, inspiring his colleagues, and

species nesting within the habitat, an SHA concerns property

much of the industry as well, to pursue the same open-minded,

that contains no listed species at present, but may attract them

collaborative process of engagement. “Onny brought passion

in future. “Our commercial thinning practices and longer tree

for sustainable forestry to the company and the industry,” says

rotation schedules had increased the possibility of creating

Mike Mosman, senior vice president for lands and resources.

owl habitat down the line, which put us in the uncomfortable

“Under his leadership we became one of the best practitioners

position of the property becoming off-limits for harvesting in

of sustainable forestry in the Pacific Northwest, and the

future years,” explains Dr. Blake

forestry staff became a coordinated team of

Murden, director of the company’s

specialists able to address the technical,

wildlife and fisheries program. “We

environmental, and social challenges of

didn’t want to have to harvest the

the business today.”

trees early to avoid the potential

Onny had hired the company’s first

restrictions, and were at a

wildlife biologist, its first GIS manager,

crossroads. The SHA was a fair

and its first forest engineer. “He always

and balanced solution for all

said that our biggest challenge was to know

parties.”

more about our forestlands than anyone else, including the best ways to manage them sustainably,” Mosman says. “It became part of our culture.” The standard of excellence established by Onny continued in

The agreement was signed with U.S. Fish and Wildlife, Washington Department of Natural Resources, and Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, marking the first time an SHA was reached both

his absence. In 2009 the company signed a landmark Safe Harbor

with state and federal regulating agencies. As described in

Agreement (SHA) with federal and state agencies, leveraging

the agreement, Port Blakely Tree Farms pledges to carry out

the engagement that was Onny’s hallmark. The agreement,

habitat management measures likely to benefit the northern

which addresses roughly forty-five thousand acres at the Morton

spotted owl and marbled murrelet. The birds travel through

Tree Farm in Lewis County, was the culmination of two years

the Morton Tree Farm en route to adjacent nesting habitats,

of constructive and collaborative negotiations between the

and the company agreed to create thousands of acres of

company and regulators. Like a Habitat Conservation Plan, a

so-called dispersal habitat to protect them. In return, it

voluntary SHA is designed to benefit federally listed endangered

received assurances that no additional restrictions related to

and threatened species by rewarding landowners’ voluntary

the threatened species would burden its forestry practices

conservation actions with assurances that future restrictions will

over the next sixty years. “We’re protecting these species

not be imposed on the land.

at the same time we’re managing our forestlands free of

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217

further regulations,” says Duane Evans, the company’s vice president of U.S. operations, who worked alongside Murden in developing the forest management plan. “It’s a win for the public and a win for the company.” While other SHAs had been signed in the southern United States to protect the red-cockaded woodpecker, the forestland footprint in these agreements was hundreds of acres. “At fortyfive thousand acres ours is the largest SHA by far,” says Court Stanley. “We now have certainty that the trees we’re planting today we’ll be able to harvest tomorrow.” At a celebration following the signing of the landmark SHA, Washington Governor Christine Gregoire said, “I applaud Port Blakely and [the regulating agencies] for their vision and

Forester Andrew Cocking (left) and Phil Taylor, head of operations and managing director of Blakely Pacific.

dedicated teamwork. Together, they have created a long-range plan that will advance environmental goals while keeping Port Blakely and the surrounding community economically viable. This type of collaborative partnership is another example of the Eddy family’s commitment to sustainable forestry and environmental stewardship.” In 2010 Port Blakely Tree Farms was one of ten recipients of the prestigious Environmental Excellence Award bestowed each year by the Association of Washington Business, Washington’s oldest and largest statewide business association, representing more than seventy-one hundred companies with over 650,000 employees. In forging the SHA, the company had “demonstrated once again its long-held and firm belief in responsible forest stewardship,” the organization stated. The company’s sustainable forestry practices were not confined to the United States. In New Zealand the same principles are observed. “We manage the land here the same way they’re managed in the United States—responsibly,” says

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

The company’s sustainable forestry practices were not confined to the

United

States. In New Zealand the same principles are observed.

Andrew Cocking, Blakely Pacific South Island regional manager.

have to take positive actions,” asserts Phil Taylor, Blakely

“We’re a mirror image of the same values and culture. This was

Pacific managing director. “Carbon offsetting is part of the

Onny’s vision when he led Port Blakely here, and we take it

solution.”

seriously. It cannot be understated.” Forestland acquisitions continued apace in New Zealand through

Emission trading is best explained by example. Say Company A is in the power generation business and needs to

the new millennium. In 2004 more than 7,400 acres were acquired

buy emission credits to address the greenhouse gas emissions

in the Waimate Forest, and the following year another 5,000 acres

for which it is responsible. Company B, meanwhile, is in

in the Geraldine Forest were added to the land base. At present,

the forestry business and receives emission credits for land

Blakely Pacific owns approximately 72,000 acres of forestlands in New

Jim Warjone inspecting a Douglas-fir plantation in New Zealand.

Zealand, in addition to 142,000 acres in the Pacific Northwest. The New Zealand timberlands are providing a unique source of revenue beyond their harvesting. It’s called carbon offsetting, an emission trading scheme administered by the country’s Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry to reduce harmful greenhouse gas emissions polluting the atmosphere. Gases like carbon dioxide emitted by industries through combustion are absorbed and sequestered by living trees and forests. Through the process of photosynthesis, the carbon dioxide is converted into

it is planting as forests. It also cuts down some trees each

cellulose and oxygen, the latter gradually emitted as a “good gas”

year to sustain operations, for which it must surrender some

into the atmosphere, leaving the carbon locked up in the trees. The

emission credits. As forests mature, they store more carbon,

emission trading scheme (ETS) establishes a framework, process,

which creates additional credits for the company. Under

and most important, a market for trading carbon emissions for

the ETS, Company B sells its credits to Company A. In 2010

carbon sequestration. “Whether or not climate change is human-

Blakely Pacific did just that, selling three hundred thousand

induced, it is nonetheless occurring, and citizens of the globe

New Zealand credits, each credit representing a metric ton

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219

The view from Dog Mountain exemplifies the beauty of Washington state.

of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions, to a large oil and gas

limits trading to post-1989 forestlands. Blakely Pacific is the

producer for $3.7 million (carbon pricing is market-based and the

second-largest owner of these lands in the country.”

government agrees that carbon credits can be bought and sold within its jurisdiction). As usual, it was a

units to trade in the future. “This is an opportunity right now, and we can’t assume it will last forever,” says René Ancinas.

Pacific sold only the carbon

“We’re taking a very conservative approach, and then turning

sequestered in the roots and

around and buying more land.” Indeed, shortly after the trade

stumps of trees—not within

concluded, Blakely Pacific acquired another two thousand

the limbs and trunks,” says

acres in the Waimate Forest. Back in the United States, another forestry strategy

Elmore. “This way we don’t

abetting the environment was getting its legs. Jim Warjone

have to purchase back the

had long been intrigued by the concept of biomass power—

credits when the trees are

the conversion of postharvest tree debris into energy. Jim’s

eventually felled.”

curiosity was reminiscent of James G. Eddy’s research into

“It’s as if we’re selling air

220

additional forestland acquisitions, which in turn provides more

singular agreement. “Blakely

board director Bruce Lemire-

Derek Burrows of Blakely Pacific in New Zealand pauses in front of a deck of one-hundredyear-old Port Orford cedar logs. This operation was in the Raincliff forest on the South Island in the aftermath of a major windstorm.

The income from the sale of units was earmarked for

tree genetics; like his grandfather he had amassed a veritable

at no cost to us,” says Taylor.

library of scholarly articles on the topic. “There are three

“Long-term we cannot project

hundred chemicals in the limbs, tops, needles, and other

where this will lead, but for

woody parts we leave on the ground after a harvest,” Jim says.

at least the next two to three

“Some needs to stay there as nutrients for the next crop, but

years it is full speed ahead

other parts could be converted into oil or a gas that could then

with carbon trading. We’re

be used as a fuel source. Someday this could result in new

fortunate in that New Zealand

products and another revenue stream for the company.”

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Jim Warjone in Retirement— A Loosely Defined Concept Jim equates the business possibilities from woody biomass power to the company’s salt mining operations of yore. Sawdust, in great supply from sawmills like the one operated by Eddy, Avery & Company, became the ideal fuel for the salt conversion process. “Several major laboratories and university researchers are examining the opportunities of converting wood waste into energy, and I’ve been in contact with a few of them,” Jim adds. “It’s one of my pet projects now that René is in charge.” As planned, René Ancinas succeeded Jim Warjone as president and CEO of Port Blakely Companies in 2010, freeing Jim up to focus on woody biomass and other projects in the community that are dear to his heart. René had spent the years since joining the company in 2005 learning all he could about its constituent parts. He spearheaded several projects, successfully managing, for example, the restructuring of a challenging fiber optic network connecting every home in Issaquah Highlands to the Internet. He also earned an MBA from the University of Washington, taking classes at night. When the time came to take the reins of the company, René was ready. Jim remained chairman of the board and was an invaluable resource to his successor as both men worked together seamlessly, a consequence of their mutual respect. Additionally,

A tree seedling is planted in previously clearcut land, promising forests and lumber products for generations to come.

Jim chaired the Washington Business Roundtable in 2011 and was very active working with the governor and legislators in Olympia in the Roundtable’s effort to help the state government develop sustainable operating and capital budgets so that taxes do not need to be increased on businesses as they recovered from the recession.

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Entrusted as the steward of Port Blakely Companies, Jim Warjone earned high marks from his extended family.

(the couple tied the knot in 1991). Christine has this to say

Among his many achievements, family members singled out

about her husband: “To me his beautiful legacy is his method of

the conversion to a master limited partnership, the creation

interacting with others. He is truly a collaborative, open person,

of a high-functioning board, the establishment of Blakely

and it helped set the tone of engagement and reciprocity at the

Pacific, the ongoing land consolidation and diversification

company.” Jim, in turn, gives much of the credit to Christine,

strategies, and the development of the Family Council. “Were

who so ably supported and collaborated with him for most of

it not for Jim’s efforts in creating the Family Council, we might

his career at the company.

no longer have a family business,” René says. “Sustainable

René shares the great admiration of his predecessor. “Jim

family ownership is what sustains this company. While there

has sincere respect for individuals,” he says. “In the face of

have been severe tests in family ownership in the past, family

a problem, he will engage the other person and not confront

commitment to this company has never been stronger than it is

them. He has always insisted that this company do ‘the right

today, and this is a direct consequence of the Family Council.”

thing always,’ and all of us here hold this standard high.”

Under Jim’s guidance, the company’s net worth doubled,

Port Blakely Companies is the culmination of one family’s

its forestland acreage increased exponentially, and its many

resolve to make lasting use of its land to the betterment of

real estate projects blossomed. In Issaquah Highlands, despite

others. Generation after generation, the company’s leaders

ongoing financial pressures, Jim had helped define and create

have endeavored to improve the family business entrusted to

an extraordinary neighborhood community that will positively

their care, without ever compromising its reputation or ethical

influence other developments in the years ahead.

principles. “Reputation, reputation, reputation!” cries Cassio

Yet his colleagues and fellow unitholders reserve most of

in Shakespeare’s Othello. It is the “immortal part” of “oneself.”

their praise for his entrepreneurial zest, unflagging energy,

Within the Eddy family courses an inexorable river of profound

and scrupulous honesty. Many extolled his receptivity to their

integrity.

ideas and the ideas of others, his visionary thinking, his much-

Do not expect these ideals to waver in the years ahead.

lauded curiosity and inventiveness, and especially his unbiased

Across three centuries, the Eddy family’s lives have intertwined

rationality. “Under Jim, the company helped shape public

with America’s forests. They are proud of the industry and its

policy, creating agreements with regulators that were more

positive contributions today. The company they own and serve

caring of the environment while protecting the future of the

provides much more than much-needed timber; it manages

company,” says board director Steve Miller.

the needs and habitats of indigenous species, provides rural

Jim spends a good portion of his time these days sailing

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Sheraton Hotel in Renton Village back to health in the 1980s

employment, produces clean air and water, creates soil

Puget Sound with his wife Christine Anderson—yes, the

stability, and even sequesters carbon from the atmosphere. As

same Christine Anderson who nursed the company’s failing

Jim Warjone says, “If you could invent an industry providing

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

James Eddy Warjone Seed Orchard

Mike Warjone is the silviculture manager of Port Blakely Tree Farms. Not

incidental pollen in the air—not the optimal pollen cloud you want. Once

long ago, his father Onny Warjone retired as president of the company’s

the orchard pollinates, that’s where you get the hybrids.”

forestry division. His great-grandfather was James G. Eddy, whose intense

A few more years are left before the orchard reaches this point. Still,

interest in tree genetics guided the creation of

the promise of the initiative is high—

the Institute of Forest Genetics. So it is only

the continual development of stellar

fitting that Mike would be carrying on James

tree parents by breeding the elite

G.’s example.

seedlings; assessing and measuring

A strapping man with a quiet, easygoing

their progeny with assistance from

demeanor, Mike has that vein of scientific

educational institutions; selecting the

curiosity that seems to weave through the

hardiest, fastest-growing specimens;

fabric of so many Eddys, such as Garrett

cross-pollinating them; and so on.

Eddy or his Uncle Jim Warjone, whose

“By having this all in one complex

inventiveness earned a couple of American

where we produce a variety of

patents. Mike started working for the

seedlings best suited to the various

company as a teenager in the summertimes,

microclimates of our forest estate,

tagging along with his father through the

such as slope elevation, wind

forests. He earned a degree in business

resistance, different types of soil,

economics and then came back to the family

fertilizer and pesticides, and other

business working full-time. Now he runs the

factors like breeding rates, we can

James Eddy Warjone Seed Nursery, named

continually improve the trees through

in honor of Jim shortly after the chairman

genetics,” Mike says.

passed on the titles of president and CEO to

Sounds very much like the work

René Ancinas.

undertaken by his great-grandfather

nearly a century ago. “James G. was

The orchard is located on what the

company calls the Forbes property in western Washington. “We made the decision to launch

primarily concerned with disease and Mike Warjone, Port Blakely silviculture forester.

how to avoid mass destruction of

our own seed orchard five years ago,” Mike says. “We started clearing the

trees by bugs, although he also had interest in tree growth and straight

land and then began planting seedlings that we get from local nurseries.”

trees,” Mike acknowledges. “I guess we share the same curiosity in

promoting tree growth through genetics, a topic that would probably put

But these are not just any seedlings. “These are elite seedlings, about

twenty of them, and they’re the product of millions of dollars of research,”

other people to sleep. Funny, but several times I’ll be at a conference on

explains Mike. “The goal is to breed them. It takes about five years for a

genetics and his work will be brought up. Most people don’t realize the

tree to reach maturity to produce a cone and pollen. Until then, it’s just

familial connection.”

Bright Futures

223

clean water, clean air, habitat for wildlife, and housing for humans, it would be the forestry industry of today.” Ever since Jonathan Eddy formed a logging partnership in 1832 in Bangor, Maine, the Eddy family has distinguished itself in its contributions to the world in which we live. Bay City was built from the efforts of Jonathan’s son Frank Eddy and his fellow timbermen. Frank’s sons Jack and James G. managed the world’s largest sawmill, while their brother Robert managed the family’s investment company. When Jack joined Ned Skinner in building the great Skinner & Eddy shipyard, James G. put his skills to creating the distinguished Institute of Forest Genetics. Jack’s son Garrett adroitly guided the company into the modern era of forestry practices, inventing a few of them himself along the way. James G.’s grandson Jim Warjone created the Family Council and made the financially prudent decision to convert

The planned community of Issaquah Highlands includes more than 1,000 acres of green space.

to a master limited partnership, diversify into New Zealand, acquire PLS, and with his brother Onny inculcate a culture of engagement into the company. With stewardship, innovation, and integrity, the Eddy family is well positioned to succeed as a family company for generations to come. These achievements, of course, merely scratch the surface. Port Blakely Companies has another highly capable, passionate, and principled leader writing the next chapters of its history. “This family business has huge potential for true, meaningful impact,” CEO René Ancinas says. “We have proven that we can behave as stewards of the land we own, rather than purely trying to reap financial benefit. What this means is that we will take better care of this land than others might. This is meaningful, and it comes directly from the values of the family—values that have been passed down from one generation to the next. This is our true and lasting legacy.” u

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

“We have proven that we can behave as stewards of the land we own, rather than purely trying to reap financial benefit.”

A newly received truck load of logs are “rolled out” on “skids” and individually “scaled” (measured and graded) so they can be sorted and restacked according to export customers’ specifications. The logs are then loaded aboard oceangoing ships bound for Japan, China, and Korea.

Numbers in italics indicate images. ——— Abenaki Indians, 19 Akihito, Crown Prince, 135 Alaska Department of Fish and Game, 94 Alaska Pacific Salmon Corporation, 81 Alki Beach (WA), 52 Alki Point (WA), 54 Allen, Paul, 174 Almirall, Elizabeth, 144 Almirall, John, 203 Almirall, Libby, 145 Almirall, Randy, 137, 145 Almirall, Rob, 137 Almirall, Sara, 203 American Forestry Association, 102 American Forests, 91, 103, 129 American Merchant Marine Library Association, 84 American Shipbuilding Company, 75–76 American Tree Farming System (ATFS), 123 American Tree Farm System, 114 [ Ames Lake, 173 Anchor Salt Company, 45–46, 50 Ancinas, April, 203, 209 Ancinas, Eddy, 203 Ancinas, René, 8, 9, 202, 203 accepting VP position of Port Blakely Tree Farms, 214 on carbon offsetting, 218 on the Eddy family legacy, 222 elected president of the Family Council, 204 offered CEO position, 204 on Jim Warjone and the Family Council, 220 pride of, in Issaquah Highlands, 214 projects managed by, 219 succeeding Jim Warjone, 209, 219 Ancinas-Gee, Carmen, 203 Anderson, Christine, 139, 150, 220 Appling, Julie, 203 Aquilo, 86, 95, 110 Aquilo Properties, 150154

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Arndt, Leslie E., 31, 41, 45 Association of Washington Business, 216 Austin, Lloyd, 90, 91, 93, 102 Avery, John H., 41 Avery, Newell, 24, 26–28, 29, 41 Avery, Sewall, 24, 26, 41 Avery & Murphy, 29, 45 Babbitt, Bruce, 195–96 Bailey, Amos, 26 Bailey, Caroline. See Eddy, Caroline Bailey Bailey, Mark, 26 Bailey and Orton, 38 Bainbridge Hotel and Tavern (Port Blakely), 56–57, 61 Bainbridge Island (WA), 49, 166–71 Bancroft, Hubert Howe, 53 band saws, 63 Bangor (ME) Eddy family house in, 24 growth of, 23–24, 26 lumber industry in, 19–23 Universalist church in, 25, 26 upper class of, forming, 26 Bangor First National Bank, 26 Bangor Tigers, 22 Bank of California, 72–73 Bark Park (Issaquah Highlands), 214 barrels, manufacturing of, 34–35 Bassett Seed & Company, 39 Bay City (MI), 19, 222 baseball as pastime in, 31 building and expansion of, 30, 31–34 Eddy Block, 38–39 Eddy Rest Pavilion (Wenonah Park), 49 Edwin Eddy moving to, 28–29 electricity in, 35, 43 maps of (1800s), 30 Millionaire’s Row, 40, 41, 42 Phoenix Block, 44 sawmills closing in, 49 Universalist church in, 40, 43, 44 Wenonah Beach amusement park, 43

Westover Block, 32 Bay City Building Company, 44 Bay City Sugar Company, 45 Bay City (MI) Tribune, 46–47 Behring, Kenneth E., 158–59, 166, 174, 200 Berger, Jim, 14 biomass power, 218–19 Black, Casey, 176 Blackhawk Port Blakely Communities, 159, 165. See also Port Blakely Communities committed to collaboration with residents, 172 pledging money for construction of an interstate exchange, 172– 73 Blackman (F. H.) and Company, 36, 38 Blackman geared-steam locomotive, 19 Blakely, Johnston, 55 Blakely Beach, 166 Blakely Hall, 212–13 Blakely Harbor (real estate development), 165, 166–68 Blakely Harbor (WA), 57, 81 birthing slip built at, 63–64 opposition to, 168–71 U.S. Navy wintering barges at, 108 Blakely Line railroad, 61, 62 Blakely Pacific Limited, 181, 184–87, 217–18 Blakely Pine Tree Farm, 143 Blakely Ridge, 165–66 Block Party Wagon (Issaquah Highlands), 214 Boeing Co., 132 Boise Cascade, 159 boom logs, 22 booms, 22 Boren, Carson, 54 Brainerd, Debbi, 169 Brainerd, Paul, 169 Britt, Bill, 201, 205 Brooklyn (WA), forestlands near, 192, 193 Buchanan, Luella, 56 Buchanan, Mike, 179, 180, 184 buffer zones, 178, 191 Built Green Idea Home, 189 Built Green program (Master Builders Association of King and

Snohomish Counties), 189 Burbank, Luther, 90, 91, 93 Burke Museum (University of Washington), 206 Burke’s Homestead (NZ), 187 Burrows, Derek, 218 Burton (captain, Newell A. Eddy), 47 Bye, Louis K. (Louie), 144, 145 By These Waters (Arndt), 31, 41 cable yarder, 103 California, drawing Michiganders interested in lumbering, 51 Campbell, John, 55, 56, 62, 63–64 Campbell, William, 55, 56, 63–64 Campbell Group, 207 Campbell River Timber Company, 92, 138 cant hooks, 22 cants, 49 carbon offsetting, 217–18 Cargill Inc., 201 Carnegie Institute, 101 Cascade Land Conservancy, 173 Cato, Edgar, 115 caulks, 22 Chandler, Otis, 159 Chapin & Barber mill, 41 Charles A. Eddy, 47 Château St. Hilaire, 84 Chicago, reconstruction of, 35–36 Children’s Orthopedic Hospital (Seattle), 79 China doing business with, 154–59 exports to, 212 mills in, 159 Chippewa Indians, 30 Chronicles of the Builders of the Commonwealth (Bancroft), 53 circular saw, steam-powered, 30 CITIC (China International Trust and Investment Company), 157 Clackamas Tract, 159–60 Clemons (Charles L.) Tree Farm, 114 Cocking, Andrew, 186, 216–17 Colley, John, 130, 134, 159, 162 Commitments: Grand Ridge, 171–72

Index

227

constructive conservation, 146 Cooke (Jay) & Company, 36 Cooley, Edgar, 84 Cooley and Hewitt, 84 Coos Bay (OR), 195 Cornish, Nellie C., 104 corporate seals, 149 Cotchett, Lucretia, 114. See also Eddy, Jasmine Cotchett, Walter Victor, 84 Cotchett, Walter Victor, Jr., 84, 104 crackaloo, 61 crown closure, 155 crown spacing, 126 Cutler and Eddy, 29 Davis, John A., 201–3, 204, 209 Davis Wright Tremaine, 152 Dean Witter Reynolds, 178 deforestation, 204 Denny, Arthur, 54 Denny Miller and Associates, 198 Detroit (MI), 45 dispersal habitat, 215 Distinguished Service Award (USDA), 93 Dog Mountain, view from, 218 Dominion Mill Company, 81 Donner, George, 21 Donner Party, 21 Dorade, 115, 127 Douglas-fir, 49, 87, 102, 186, 217 five-year-old plantation of, 124–25 growth rate of, 126 prices for, 65, 92, 130 increased sales in, after World War II, 130 overcrowding of, 121 planting, in New Zealand, 185 Dunhua Nursery (China), 158 Dunn, Jennifer, 199 Dutton, Dan, 200, 205 Duvernoy, Gene, 173 East Saginaw Valley Company, 34

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Economic History of Kitsap County, An (Buchanan), 56 Eddington (ME), 23, 33 Eddy, Adaline Seymour, 84, 85 Eddy, Avery & Company, 29 location of, in Bay City, 31 reaction of, to Panic of 1873, 37 salt mining venture of, 34–35 tearing up mills and building new ones, 36 Eddy, Avery & Eddy, 41, 44–45, 49 Eddy, Avery and Eddy, 41 Eddy, Avery and Murphy, 28 Eddy, Barbara Ethel, 127, 132 Eddy, Caleb, 21 Eddy, Caroline, 36, 41, 49, 84 Eddy, Caroline Bailey, 24, 25, 26, 28 Eddy, Charles A., 41, 45 Eddy, Charles Freemont, 26, 41, 45 Eddy, Charles K., 21 Eddy, Charlotte Whittemore (Gar), 84, 113. See also Elmore, Charlotte Eddy Eddy, Cornelia, 43 Eddy, Darius, 24, 29 Eddy, Edwin (the elder), 21 Eddy, Edwin (the younger), 21, 24, 28–30, 41 Eddy, Edwin Milo, 71 Eddy, Eleazar, 21, 29 Eddy, Elizabeth (Libby), 82, 85, 92 Eddy, Eliza Holland, 24 Eddy, Ethel Elizabeth Randall, 82, 92 Eddy, Ethel Garrett, 84, 85, 86, 95, 98, 104, 115 Eddy, Ezra Butler, 21 Eddy, Frank (John Franklin), 24, 25, 35, 72, 222 as benevolent employer, 44 burial of, 49 death of, 46–47 developing a Bay City block, 38–39 as director and president of First National Bank (Bay City), 37, 38, 45 diversifying business holdings (late 1800s–early 1900s), 45 establishing Eddy Investment Company, 49 forming Michigan State Troops unit, 37–38 house of, 42

investing in his tenants’ companies, 39 joining Edwin at the mill, 31 joining groups in Bay City, 31–32 moving to Michigan, 29–31 nonbusiness pursuits of, 32, 34, 36, 43–44 owner of haberdasheries, 36, 38 salt mining ventures of, 34–35 Eddy, Franklin, 85, 98, 115, 143 appointed vice president of Port Blakely Mill Co., 127 assuming seat on First National Bank board, 109 colorful personality of, 115 learning from his father, 110–11 nonbusiness life of, 115 on Port Blakely Mill Co. board of directors, 121 selling company shares, 145 serving during World War II, 105, 109, 111, 112 working at People’s Bank (Seattle), 109, 115 Eddy, Garrett Edward, 83, 84, 85, 93, 97, 98, 108, 113, 132, 145, 222 advocating need for company to take activist role in taxation issues, 122 appointed president of Port Blakely Mill Co., 127 on building plans for Blakely Harbor, 168, 169 convinced of merits of tree-farming strategy, 130 crewing with Franklin on the Dorade, 115 dealing with depressed conditions in the housing market (1970), 141–42 death of, 206–7 education of, 109, 110 embracing accountability and accustomed to excellence, 129 exploratory trips of, to foreign markets, 137 firming plans for real estate development in Redmond and Bainbridge Island, 138 guiding Renton Village development, 139 hearing about son’s death in Vietnam, 142–43 as industry pioneer, 143 on initial thinning experiments, 119 interest of, in real estate development, 132, 139 interested in forest sustainability, 123 interrogating Wilkins on protecting specified areas, 193 on Jim Warjone’s early performance, 149–50 leading the tree-farming effort for Port Blakely Mill Co., 116–17,

123 learning from his father, 110–11 marriage of, 111, 112 on need to revise land taxes, 122 passing baton to new leadership, 150–52 as president of the Washington Fire Protection Association, 89 recommendations of, after Forest Industry Report, 124–25 recommending acquiring forestlands in Liberia, 130–32 reinvigorating land acquisition program, 129–30 serving during World War II, 105, 109, 111–13 thinning theories, affirmed correct, 125–26 urging restriction of land purchases pending information on age classes, 120 warning of increasing environmental regulation, 138, 145–46 working at People’s Bank (Seattle), 109 world-class ornithologist, 109–10 Eddy, Gary, 127, 137, 142–43 Eddy, Hannah, 21 Eddy, Ibrook, 23 Eddy, Jack (John W., John Whittemore), 36, 37, 41, 43, 49, 71, 98, 99, 109, 222 attending Harvard, 45 businessman’s perspective of, 95 commissioned by University of Washington to gather African biological specimens, 116 death of, 128 desiring more modern logging operation, 88 disagreeing with James G. on building a new sawmill, 105 enjoying automobile racing, 95 experimenting with real estate development, 132, 166 impressed with son’s scientific inquiry, 110 instituting new logging and land purchasing practices, 64 investing in Hobbs, Wall & Company and Federal Salt, 51 joining in on Campbell River Timber Company, 92 later years of, 127 launching Anchor Salt Company, 45–46 letter from, to John W. Eddy II at his birth, 127–28 lighter side of, 95 managing Port Blakely Mill Co., 64 managing shipbuilding process, 74, 76, 79 marriage of, 84 named vice president of Ferry-Baker Lumber Company, 68

Index

229

ownership of, in Skinner & Eddy Corporation, 72 perturbed by government’s price and labor actions during World War II, 108–9 political service of, 97–100, 101, 103–4 on Port Blakely Mill Co. board of directors, 121 proactive stance of, regarding workers’ benefits, 77–78 purchasing Port Blakely Mill Co. for Eddy Investment Company, 51–53, 64 reflecting on intelligence, 110 remaining optimistic during the Depression, 94 salt business of, 50 serious injury of, in auto accident, 107 setting up Florence Logging Company, 65 Skinner’s relationship with, 79 spending time with his children, 110–11 as sportsman and author, 86, 94–95, 110 stipulating removal of animals from Port Blakely Mill Co., 56 Eddy, James G. (James Garfield), 36, 37, 49, 71, 114, 128, 222 abandoning logging business, 107 agreeing on taxation laws supporting replanting, 97 in charge of Port Blakely Mill Co., 107 considering building another sawmill, 104–5 death of, 129 desiring more modern logging operation, 88 education of, 45 engagement and marriage of, 82–84 experimenting with real estate development, 132, 166 forming Forest Genetics Research Foundation, 129 at founding of the Washington Forest Fire Association, 89 helping with family enterprises during summers off from school, 50 home of, in Medina (WA), 106–7 on improving business at Port Blakely Mill Co., 65–66 industry acclaim for, 128–29 interest of, in tree genetics, 90–91, 221 joining in on Campbell River Timber Company, 92 joining Jack at Port Blakely Mill Co., 64 joining Ned in San Francisco office of Port Blakely Mill Co., 52 later years of, 127 limiting harvesting in late 1930s, 106 looking at timber business scientifically and economically, 88–90 managing Ferry-Baker mill, 73

230

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

named president of Ferry-Baker Lumber Company, 68 ownership of, in Skinner & Eddy Corporation, 72 perturbed by government’s actions on price and labor during World War II, 108–9 on Port Blakely Mill Co. board of directors, 121 raising horses, 86, 107 realizing the company’s future was in tree farms, 114 receiving news of two grandchildren in one week, 113 receiving USDA Distinguished Service Award, 93 reorganizing the Eddy Tree Breeding Station, 100–103 scientific curiosity of, 89–90, 93 serving during World War II, 105, 109, 113 setting up temporary offices in Berkeley, 67 Skinner’s relationship with, 79 taking greater control of company while Jack was a legislator, 104 writing during the Depression on the lumber industry’s forecast, 94 Eddy, James Garfield, Jr. (Jack), 41, 43, 84 Eddy, Janet, 84 Eddy, Jasmine Lucretia (Lu), 84, 85, 98, 104. Eddy, J. Franklin, 84 Eddy, John, 21, 29 (emigrant from England) Eddy, John (of Taunton), 29 Eddy, John, 137, 142 (son of Garrett) Eddy, John, III, 203 Eddy, John Whittemore, II, 95, 115, 127, 145 Eddy, (Col.) Jonathan, 23, 33 Eddy, Jonathan, 16, 21, 22, 23, 25, 222 Bangor home of, 26 beginning lumber operations, 23, 24–26 death of, 28 public service of, 26 reorganizing the lumber company, 28 Eddy, Kate, 203 Eddy, Laura, 24 Eddy, Libby. See also Eddy, Elizabeth Eddy, Lottie Whittemore (Charlotte), 35, 36, 41, 43, 46, 49 Eddy, Lucretia Glover (Lu), 36, 41, 49 [ Eddy, Mary Ann (MA), 84, 113 Eddy, Mary Baker, 21 Eddy, Mary Cooley, 106–7, 113, 114, 128, 129

Eddy, Mary Ford, 111, 143, 145 Eddy, Mary Horton, 82–84 Eddy, Mary Ware, 33 Eddy, Murphy and Company, 24, 26, 28–29 Eddy, Nancy Clapp, 24 Eddy, Nelson, 21 Eddy, Newell Avery, 26, 41, 86, 93 Eddy, Robert Bailey, 36, 37, 41, 49, 72, 84, 86, 222 assisting First National Bank (Bay City) through the 1929 stock market crash, 37 death of, 92 education of, 45 managing family enterprises in Bay City, 50 marriage of, 82 selling off family’s remaining landholdings in Michigan and Ontario, 86 Eddy, Samuel, 29 Eddy, Selwyn, 21, 41 diversifying business holdings, 45 home of, 19, 40, 43 president of Pacific Lumber Company, 51 Eddy, Stanley Lane, 71 Eddy, Tantsie (Constance Tarcea), 143, 145, 152 Eddy, Ware, 22, 23, 117 Eddy, William, 21 (survivor of Donner Party) Eddy, William, 33 (son of Colonel Jonathan Eddy) Eddy, William, 29 (vicar) Eddy, Zacharias, 29 Eddy Academy, 205 Eddy Brothers & Company, 41 advertisement for, 35 buying mill in Blind River (Ontario), 44–45 liquidation of, 49 Eddy and Company, 38 Eddy family abandoning logging, 107 ancestors and relatives of, 21, 29 breaking into factions, 201 contributions of, 222 dissidents from, threatening unit sales to outsiders or forced liquidation, 205 diversifying business holdings in the Midwest, 45

educating the younger members of, 204–5 Family Council, 200–206 financial planning sessions for, 137 first use of debt to finance a business, 72–73 ideals of, 15 investment portfolio of, hurt during the Depression, 94 land ownership of, 13 treating ownership shares as an investment, 202 purchasing Ferry-Baker Lumber Company, 68 resolve of, 220–21 scientific curiosity of, 221 selling stock, 145, 177–78 service of, during World War II, 109, 111–13 starting in the timber business, 23 turning attention to forestlands, 82 wanting out of the shipbuilding business, 81 Eddy Investment Company, 37, 49, 50, 144 forming real estate division within, 132 Hewitt assuming management of, 92 holdings in, 148–49 investing in Port Blakely Mill Co., 65 liquidating, 149, 150, 154 purchasing Port Blakely Mill Co., 51–53 retaining, efficacy of, 148 Eddy Investment Trust, investing in Port Blakely Mill Co., 129 Eddy Match Company, 21 Eddy Mill, fire at, and rebuilding of, 40–41 Eddy Rebellion, 23, 33 Eddy (C.K.) & Son, 21 Eddytown (ME), 23, 33 Eddy Transit Company, 44, 45, 47, 50 Eddy Transportation Company, 28, 44, 72 Eddy Tree Breeding Station, 90, 91, 93, 100–103, 182. See also Institute of Forest Genetics Edwin Eddy, 44 Elliott Bay (WA), 54 Ellis, James, 173 Ellis Drive, 173 Elmore, Bruce Lemire, 114, 117, 121, 133 (son of Bucky) Elmore, Bruce (Bucky), 109, 113, 130, 134, 144 Elmore, Charlotte, 113, 114, 133, 134 (daughter of Charlotte W. Eddy Elmore)

Index

231

Elmore, Charlotte W. Eddy, 134. See also Eddy, Charlotte Whittemore (Gar) Elmore, Lydia, 203 Elmore, Mary Ann (Garby), 134. See also Ouillette, Mary Ann (Garby) Elmore, Noel, 203 Elmore, Tom, 132, 134, 137 emission trading scheme (ETS), 217–18 Employees Relief Association of Skinner & Eddy, 78 Endangered Species Act, 145, 191 Engesser, Thea, 203 Engessor, Thea Jensen, 203 Entwistle, William, 89 Environmental Education Program, 147 Environmental Excellence Award (Association of Washington Business), 216 environmental movement, 138–39, 142, 192–97, 215–16 environmental regulation, 145, 178, 191 eucalyptus tree, 181 Evans, Duane, 202, 207, 208, 215–16 Evergreen Building Guide, 189 exports, 62–63, 68–69, 71, 118–19, 135–36, 150, 154, 212 Eyman, Tim, 197–98 Family Assembly, 203–4 Family Business Magazine, 205 Family Council, 200–206, 220, 222 family employment policy, 203 Family Gathering, 8 family-owned companies, 13 family units, redemption of, 200–201. See also Eddy family, selling stock farming, stewardship related to, 123 Farr, M. E., 75–76 Favorite, 72, 76 Federal Salt Company, 51 Ferry-Baker Lumber Company, 68, 86, 92 Fillmore, Millard, 21 Fire Station 73 (Issaquah Highlands), 212–13 First National Bank (Bay City), 32, 37, 38, 45 Fitzmaurice, Ann Ouillette, 203 Floren, Chris, 200

232

A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

Florence Logging Company, 65, 88 Forbes property, 221 forest conservation movement, beginnings of, 68 forest fires, 89, 121 Forest Genetics Research Foundation, 129 Forest Industry Report (Port Blakely Mill Co.), 122–25 forestland acquisition, strategy for, 137–38, 160, 175–76 taxation of, 97, 101, 103–4, 122 forestry genetics research, 16 forestry industry, productivity improvements in, 91 Fort Cumberland (Nova Scotia), 33 Franco-Prussian War, 37–38 Fraser House Company, 39, 45 Fraser House Hotel (Bay City), 29–30, 31, 32, 39 French and Indian War, 33 Garrett, Edward I. (Gunk), 92, 95, 98 Garrett, Pandora, 145 Garrett, Peter, 144, 145 Garrett Eddy Tree Farm, 117 Geographic Information System (GIS), 176 Geraldine Forest (NZ), 185–86, 187, 217 Geyer, Lindsay, 202, 203, 204 Glacier Park Company, 158–59 Gleed, Mrs. Tom, 145 Gleed, Thomas, 144, 145 Glove Navigation Company, 71 Goat Creek, 211 Goeltz, Tom, 189, 198, 212 Gogerty & Stark, 198 gold mining, in New Zealand, 181 Gordon, Slade, 199 Gould, Carl, 166 grainer, 34 Grand Rapids and Indiana railroad, 35 Grand Ridge, 171–73, 174. See also Issaquah Highlands Great Depression, 98–100 declining timber production in Washington during, 92 Eddy family’s portfolio hurt during, 94 effect of, on timber industry, 98 Jack Eddy’s optimism during, 94

Port Blakely Mill Co.’s struggles during, 105–6 Great Expulsion, the, 33 Great Mill, the, 61–62 Great Northern Railroad, 62 Great Recession, 211–12 Greeley, William B., 101–2, 108, 119, 128 Green, Jay, 206–7 Green, Joshua, 92, 95, 98, 109, 116, 128 greenhouse gases, 123 Gregoire, Christine, 199, 216 habitat conservation measures, 194 Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP), 192–97, 215 Habitat for Humanity, 213–14 Hall, Larry, 132 Hall Brothers Shipbuilding, 58, 59, 63 building West Coast’s first five-masted schooner, 60, 63, 64 relocating to Eagle Harbor, 64 relocating to Port Blakely, 59 Harriett Rockwell, 53 Harvard Business Review, 122 Harvard University Trust, 207 Hayes, Rutherford B., 57 hemlock, overcrowding of, 121 Herbert Forest (NZ), 185–86, 187 herbicides, 87, 122, 123 Hewitt, John C., 92 High Streets, 207 Hillyard, Kim, 202 Historic Michigan: Land of the Great Lakes, 41 History of Bainbridge Island, A (Warner), 59, 61 Hoare, Henry, 187 Hobbs, Wall & Company, 51 Hollern, Mike, 209 Holmdahl, Otto, 107 Holmes, Charles S., 55, 56, 57, 59, 62–63 Hoover, Herbert, 99 Hope, Bob, 105 horse-drawn logging sled, 18 Hotchkiss, W. J., 51 Howard, Daniel S., 55 Howard, E. A. (Bud), 137

Hunting the Alaska Brown Bear (Eddy), 86, 94 Hunting on Kenai Peninsula (Eddy), 86, 94 Hurley, Edward N., 79 IBM, recruiting Jim Warjone, 148 Inca, 63, 64 incidental take permit, 195 Ingram, Bob, 156, 199 Institute of Forest Genetics, 93, 128, 129, 222. See also Eddy Tree Breeding Station given as a gift to the United States, 102–3 incorporation of, 101–2 Web site of, 92 Interface Mechanisms (Internec), 146–48 International Timber Company, 92 inventory, 117 categories of trees used in, 122–24 information system for, 150, 176 replantings following, 120–21 using system of, to fill in tree age classes, 137 Irvine Company, 169 IslandWood, 169 Issaquah Highlands, 14, 15, 16, 167, 170, 171, 172, 174, 198, 212, 222 affected by the Great Recession, 212 amenities in, 214 development of, 186–89 developments within, 213–14 environmental stewardship awards for, 212–13 explosion of interest in, 207 named Community of the Year, 200 Port Blakely as sole owner of, 174 James Eddy Warjone Seed Orchard, 221 James G. Eddy Tree Farm, 143 James Seed & Company, 45 Japan exports to, 150, 212 trade with, 135–37, 141 Jensen, Eva, 145 Jensen, Jasmine Eddy (Jas), 137 Jensen, Jill, 203

Index

233

Jensen, Mark, 145, 185 Jensen, Stephen Fairchild, 104, 113, 203 John F. Eddy, 28, 44 John F. Eddy Tree Farm, 160 Johnson, Fred, 84 John W. Eddy Tree Farm, 143 Judson, C. James, 152–54 Kamilche Tract, 117 kauri trees, 179 Keep Washington Green, 121 Kennedy, John F., 133 King County (WA), 166, 172, 173 Kirk, Judd, 166, 169, 171, 172, 173, 189, 199, 200, 213 Kirkland, Burt P., 116 Kirk Park, 213 Kitsap Lake, 173 Kitsap Tract, 117 Kitsap Tree Farm, 143 Korea, exports to, 212 Lake Washington, 106 Lake Washington Cable Railway, 56 Lamont, C. B., 72 Lamp, Charlotte Elmore, 115, 203, 204 Lamp, Don, 203 landowners, taxation of, 97 Lawrence, Darius, 26 leader, 195 Lee, Gypsy Rose, 115, 127 Leeds, Tom, 209 Lemire-Elmore, Bruce, 203, 218 See also Elmore, Bruce Lenora, 55 Leroy, Kitty, 32 Liberia, forestlands in, 130–31 Liberian Timber Industries Company, 130–32 Living Green, 212 Locke, Gary, 199 logging becoming Eddy family’s means of revenue generation, 88 logjams, 22 log mark, 22

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A True and Lasting Legacy: History of Port Blakely Companies and the Family Behind It

log raft, 23, 50, 54, 61 modernized practices of, 126–27 rolling out logs, 223 slash, burning of, 138 Long, George, 89 Lowther, Martin, 137 lumbering concerns, complementary businesses of, 34–35 lumber mills, mid-1800s operation of, 31 Lunde, Chris, 176, 211 Lunnum, Kurt, 121–22 machinery, improvements, in, 126 Macraes Gold Mine, 181 Madden, Kathy, 203 (Kathy Ouillette Madden) Madsen, Jeff, 93 Maine, depletion of forests in, 26–27 Major, W. F., 79 marbled murrelet, 191, 215 Mary and Jane, 52–54 Mason County, 135 Master Builders Association of King and Snohomish Counties, 189, 200 master limited partnership, conversion to, 152–54 Matakana (NZ), 182, 183 McDonald, Malcolm, 61 Mercantile, the (Bangor bank), 26 Merrill & Ring, 89, 208 Mesabi (MN) iron range, 45 Metro (Metropolitan Area Transit Authority), 197, 198 Metropolitan Building Company, 81 Michigan scouting of, for timberlands, 26–28 timber industry in, 30, 45, 49 Michigan Central railroad, 35 Michigan State Troops, 37–38 Michiko, Crown Princess, 135 Microsoft, 165, 189, 199, 207 Millard, Robert, 21 Miller, Steve, 199, 220 mission statement, 154 Moe Brothers Transportation Co., 71 Mollala Tree Farm, 161

Montana Power, 139 Montreaux, 165, 166 Moore, Patrick, 204 Moran Brothers, 73 More Trees for Washington, 121–22 Morton, Joy, 50 Morton block, 70 Morton Salt Company, 50 Morton Tree Farm, 207–8, 215 Mosman, Mike, 159, 160, 162, 176–77, 178, 180, 181–82, 202, 215 Mountain to Sound Greenway, 173 multiparameter water quality meter, 210 Murden, Blake, 215, 216 Murphy, Simon J., 24, 28, 29, 45, 51 Murray, Patty, 199 Murray Pacific, 192 Murrow (Lacey V.) Memorial Bridge, 106, 107 M.V. Skookum, 188 National Lumber Manufacturers Association, 114 Nature Conservancy, 166 New Deal, 100 Newell A. Eddy, 47 New Sweden (WA), 62 New Urbanism, 168, 171 New York Alki. See Alki Point New Zealand, 136, 164–65, 222 coastline of, 192 Port Blakely Tree Farms purchasing and managing forestland in, 179–87 sustainable forestry practices in, 216–17 Venison of, 181 Ngai Tahu, 185, 186, 187 Ngai Te Rangi, 182–83, 187 Nickum, George, 144, 145 Nickum, M. A., 145 (see also Mary Anne Eddy Warjone) Nielsen, Dennis, 180, 182, 183 Niels Nielson, 74 North Eddy Mine, 45 Northern Pacific Railroad, 62 northern spotted owl, 163, 191, 215 North Island (NZ), 179, 184

Nova Scotia, independence for, from the Crown, 33 Novelty Hill Tree Farm, 143 Oakhill, 55 Ocean, 55 Oldfield, Barney, 95 Olmsted, John C., 56 Olney Creek Tract, 117 Olney Creek Tree Farm, 133, 143 One Renton Place, 150 Opus Northwest, 207, 212 Ouillette, Ann, 145 (see also Ann Fitzmaurice Ouillette, Chris, 145 Ouillette, Garby (Mary Ann Elmore), 145. See also Elmore, Mary Ann (Garby) Ouillette, James E. (Paddy), 144, 145, 150 Ouillette, Kathy, 145(see also Kathy Madden Ouillette, Rita, 145 Ouillette, Therese, 145(also Therese Ouillette Rehn) ownership shares, valuation of, 178. See also Eddy family, selling stock Paccar, 132 Pacific Lumber Company, 21 Pacific Lumber & Shipping (PLS), 10–11, 208–9, 222 Pacific Shipping Illustrated, 81 Padduck, Susanna, 29 PALCO (Pacific Lumber Company), 51 Panic of 1873, 36–37, 56 Panic of 1893, 62 peavey, 22 Peninsular Military Company, 38 Penobscot Basin, 23 Penobscot Mining Company, 45 Penobscot River, 19–20, 22–23 People’s Bank and Trust Co. (Seattle), 92, 109, 115, 138 Pere Marquette railroad, 35 Perkins, Sam, 95 Phinney, Guy, 56 Pierre, Joseph H., 127 pine. See also radiata pine peeling, 185

Index

235

pollination of, 100 Pioneer Park (NZ), 187 Placerville (CA), chosen for Eddy Tree Breeding Station, 91 pneumatic ram, 78 portable logging tower, 201 Port Blakely (WA), 51, 52 general store in, 49 growth of, 55–56, 60, 61, 62 Hall Brothers Shipbuilding relocating to, 59 nature reclaiming, 81–82 Renton purchasing land in, 55 as sailor’s paradise, 61 women of, 52, 56 Port Blakely Communities, 14. See also Blackhawk Port Blakely Communities developing Issaquah Highlands, 186–89 reputation of, 173–74 Port Blakely Companies, 162, 208–9 Port Blakely Company, 154, 165 Port Blakely Mill Co., 37, 63, 75, 80 altering the ownership of, 65 annual meetings of, few people attending, 146 becoming a tree farm, 88–90, 116–17 common stock of, valuation of, 130 converting to master limited partnership, 149, 152–54 defined contribution pension plan for employees, 137 early advocates for tree farming, 123 early profitable years under Eddy family ownership, 65 Eddy Investment Company’s purchase of, 51–53 evolving into a more modern organization (1970s), 144–45 export business of, 62–63, 135–36 failing to repay its initial investment, 86 fallen timber of, after Typhoon Frieda, 134–35 fire at, 61, 66–67 first financial losses at, 68 flourishing from the start, 56 Forest Industry Report, 122–25 forestlands of, used for military maneuvers, 108 forestry department of, first report from, 119–20 as founding company member of the Washington Forest Fire Association, 89 hiring first full-time forester, 117

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improvements at, in machinery and worker safety, 126–27 land acquisition strategy of, 120, 137–38 leading industry in inland timberland acquisition, 61 logs for export, 118–19 menagerie at, 56 naming tree farms for Eddy family members, 123 Norwegian foresters visiting, 125–26 obtaining timber from independent loggers (mid-1880s), 57–59 opening employment opportunities to all family members, 133 organized as C corporation, 148 organized and chartered in California, 57 origins of, 52 outside directors at, 144 process in, for redeeming shares, 148 promoting conservation and education, 121 purchasing Glove Navigation Company, 71 purchasing Moe Brothers Transportation Co., 71 put up for sale, 64 replantings following initial inventory, 120–21 road system of, 121, 135 seven tree farms of (early 1970s), 143 sold to Skinner and Jack Eddy, 56 struggling during the Depression, 105–6 suffering from reduced demand for forest products (mid-1970s), 148 taking inventory of its forestlands, 117 timber holdings of, 64 tree categories of, for inventory purposes, 122–24 tree farming strategy of, 121 at vanguard of timber industry’s renovation, 125 waiving dividends in 1933, 99 Port Blakely Mill, 81, 82 Port Blakely Training Class, 137 Port Blakely Tree Farms annual meeting (1999), 200 birth of, 154 considering leaving the timber business, 191 diversifying, 174–75 Environmental Education Program, 147 exports of, 154, 157 family employment policy, 203 first U.S. timber company to ship logs to China, 157

as guardian of its forestlands, 15–16 headquarters, 211 incorporating Siler Pole and Piling, 174–75 joining in development of government regulations, 192–97 leading industry in commercial thinning practices, 16 leading progress in the timber industry, 13–14 looking for quality timberlands outside the U.S., 178–79 new forestland acquisition strategy, 175–76 New Zealand activities of, 179–87 proximity of timberland holdings, 208 recipient of Environmental Excellence Award, 216 sales strategy of, 212 striving for sixty-year life of Douglas-firs, 103 Port of Grays Harbor, 154–55 Portland Hills Tree Farm (NZ), 180 Port Orchard (WA), 54–55 Port Orford cedar logs, 218 Positive Influence of Family Governance on the Family Business System, The (Lamp), 204–5 Proliance Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine, 213 Provisional Family Council, 203 Publishers Paper, 159 Puget Sound, Renton’s first excursion to, 53 Puget Sound Chinook salmon, 191 Puget Sound Power & Light (PSP&L), 132–33, 139, 157 Quadrant Corporation, 166 Quinn, Cathy, 202, 203, 204 radiata pine, 164–65, 182, 187, 189 railroads adding to and assisting expansion of the lumber business, 35 presenting problems for Port Blakely Mill Co., 62, 63–64, 65 Raincliff Forest (NZ), 186, 187, 218 Rainier Club (Seattle), 128 real estate development. See also individual development names as diversification strategy, 165 Garrett Eddy’s interest in, 132 Jack and James G. experimenting with, 132 in Redmond and Bainbridge Island, 138 Redmond (WA), target for development, 165–66 Redmond Ridge, 166

Reed, Gary, Jr., 177–78 reforestation, 88, 90–91, 97. See also sustainable forestry regulatory risk, 176 relaskop, 211 Renown Corporation, 174 Renown Enterprises, 159, 200 Renton, Holmes & Company, 57 Renton, Sarah Sylva, 53, 62 Renton, William, 49, 52–54, 82 branching out into other businesses, 59 death of, 62 directing building of the Great Mill, 61–62 eschewing investment in his own logging business, 57–59 establishing a country club in Port Blakely, 62 on fire at Port Blakely Mill, 67 home of, 59 keeping forests intact for future harvesting, 59 land acquisitions of, 55, 56–57, 60–61 relocating mill to Port Orchard, 54–55 Renton (WA), 62, 132–33 Renton Coal Company, 59 Renton Village, 132–33, 138, 139, 150, 157–58 Republican Party, founding of, 28 Reynolds, Claudine, 210 Righter, Francis I., 100 Risenhoover, Ken, 201 river hogs, 32 Robert B. Eddy Tree Farm, 138, 143, 192, 194, 195–96 Roblin, Stephen, 44, 47 Rodgers, David, 73, 74, 78–79, 80, 81 Rogers, Stewart, Jr., 159–60 Roosevelt, Franklin Delano, 98, 100, 106, 108 Roosevelt, Theodore, 68 roto saw, 177 Royal Botanical Garden (Edinburgh), 101 Safe Harbor Agreement (SHA), 215–16 Saginaw River, 30–31, 34, 41 Saginaw Timber Company, 137–38 Saginaw Tract, 138 Saginaw Valley (MI), 21, 26–28, 29, 31, 34, 44 salt business, 34–35, 41, 45–46, 50–51

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237

salvage operations, 120 San Francisco, earthquake in, 66 sawdust, used in the salt conversion process, 34, 41 scaler, 175 scarfing (skiving) machine, 78 schooners, 55, 60 Schwab, Charles, 73 Scroggs, Jim, 144 Seafirst Bank, 156 Seattle, fire in, 62, 67 Seattle Construction and Dry Dock Company, 73 Seattle Dry Dock Company, 77 Seattle Seahawks, moving of, 174 Seattle Times, 128, 206 Seattle and Walla Walla Railroad, 59 Selwyn Eddy, 44 Shag River Tree Farm, 181 shanty boys, 32 shantytowns, 99, 100 Shea Homes, 166 Sheppard, Barry, 130, 132–33, 137, 138, 143, 146, 150, 180 Sheraton-Renton Inn, 139, 150 Sherlock, Galen, 133, 203 Sherrard, William R., 53, 61, 71, 77, 78, 81, 101, 129 shipbuilding, 48, 58, 73–76. See also Skinner & Eddy Eddy family queried about resuscitating, during World War II, 107–8 modular construction methods for, 108 rivalries in, between Atlantic and Pacific coast yards, 80 ships. See also individual ship names four-masted, 14 loading lumber at Port Blakely Mill, 65 named for family members, 44, 47 Port Blakely Mill Co.’s ownership of, 71 ready for loading, 50 schooners, 4–5 shooks, 20 Siler, H. O., 64, 65, 88, 105, 107 Siler (H. O.) Logging, 88, 106, 144 Siler Pole and Piling, 174–75 Siler Tract, 117, 120–21 siltation, addressing, at Port of Grays Harbor, 154–55

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Simon J. Murphy, 45 Simpson, Sol G., 61, 63, 64, 67, 122 Simpson Resource Company, 89 Simpson Timber Company, 61, 146, 177–78 Skinner, David Edward (Ned), 45–46, 50–51, 222 assuming sales responsibilities for Port Blakeley Mill Co., 64 career of, after separating from the Eddy family, 79, 81 joining Jack Eddy at Skinner & Eddy, 73 managing modular shipbuilding process, 74 ownership of, in Skinner & Eddy Corporation, 72 partner in Port Blakely Mill Co., 51–53 proactive stance of, regarding workers’ benefits, 77–78 relationship of, with the Eddy brothers, 79 relocating to San Francisco, 50–51 setting up temporary offices in Berkeley, 67 wanting out of the lumber business, 81 Skinner, Jeanette, 79 Skinner and Allied Families (Skinner), 79 Skinner & Eddy, 48, 68, 69, 222 benefiting from access to its own lumber, 80 building ships for World War I, 75–77 countersuing the U.S. Shipping Board, 80 formed for shipbuilding, 72–73 holding company for Port Blakely Mill Co., 81 praised for wartime achievements, 80, 81 proactive stance of, regarding workers’ benefits, 77–78 receiving World War I’s largest shipbuilding order, 76–77 setting shipbuilding records, 72, 73–76, 79–80 shutting down and dismantling its shipyards, 81 as standard-bearer for U.S. shipbuilding, 78–79 timber for ships from, 88 wartime orders continuing after World War I, 80 Skinner family, 171 Smith, Samuel, 55 snubber, 22 soil erosion, 102 Solomon, Mark, 187 Sons of the Profits (Speidel), 54 South Eddy Mine, 45 South Island (NZ), 179, 180, 184 Speidel, William C., 54 spotted owl. See northern spotted owl

S.S. Edgefield, 69 S.S. West Elcasco, 68 Standard Research Consultants, 130 Stanley, Court, 147, 159, 192, 193, 201, 202, 208, 214, 216 Stanley, Kelly, 147 Starr, Amanda, 203 Starr, James, 203 Stedman, L. B., 72 Stephens, Olin, 115 Stinson Timber, 200 stock market crash (1929), 37, 92 stumpage, 44–45 Sunset Interchange, 172–73, 189, 197–200 sustainable forestry, family turning to, 86. See also reforestation Sustained-Yield Forest Management Act (Public Law 273), 114 Swedish Hospital (Issaquah Highlands), 213 swing dingles, 22 Sylva, Sarah. See Renton, Sarah Sylva Task Force for the Drafting of the Family Employment Policy, 203 taxation, 101, 103–4 inequitable, 122, 130 issue of, as part of Eddy’s political involvement, 97–100 Taylor, Phil, 216, 217, 218 TDR. See transfer of development rights 1031 exchanges, 159 Terry, Charles C., 54 thinning, 16, 84, 116–17, 119, 146, 196 commendation for, 126 commercial, 126 experimenting with, 125–26 obtaining release through, 125–26 precommercial, 126 two-step process for, 126 withstanding typhoon, 134 Thomson, George, 130, 131, 132, 137, 150, 159, 162 timber companies managing like farms, 88 slow return from, 86 Timber/Fish/Wildlife Agreement, 163 timber industry changing into legions of tree farms, 122

Depression’s effect on, 98 educating the public about, 121 thrust without preparation into forest management, 119 Timber Information Management System (TIMS), 176 Tittabawasee River, 34 Titus, Louis, 51 TKC Corp., 183 transfer of development rights, 173 Trautman, Ken, 137 Treaty of Waitangi, 185 tree farm. See also individual tree farm listings first, 114, 117, 123 management of, 116–17 tree farming, 88, 140, 141 certification system for, 123 defined, 123 future of, for the forest industry, 116 importance of, to human beings, 123 tree genetics, 90–92, 100, 102 Treemont Lake, 173 trees falling of, 153 managing, based on age classes, 120, 176–77 planting of, 151 pruning of, 183, 187 root competition, 126 seedling, 219 survival rate of, in New Zealand, 184–85 Tree Top Terrace, 107, 113, 128 trespassers, problem of, 121 Tribune Publishing Company, 45 Trilogy, 166 TRIMPlus, 176–77 Truax, Tim, 201, 208 Truckweld, 148 turkeys, 24 Turner, Levensaler and Eddy, 23 Typhoon Frieda, 134–35 Under the Oaks, 28 unit valuation, 178 United States, timber booms in, 19–20, 30

Index

239

University of California at Berkeley, 101 U.S. Army harvesting Port Blakely timber as a fuel source, 108 using company’s forestlands for maneuvers, 108 U.S. Department of Agriculture, 93 U.S. Department of the Interior, 102 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 193 U.S. Forest Service, 93, 102 U.S. Green Building Council, 212 U.S. Navy, wintering barges at Blakely Harbor, 108 U.S. Office of Price Administration, 108–9 U.S. Senate, Select Committee on Forestry, 90–91 U.S. Shipping Board Emergency Fleet Corporation, 76, 79, 80 USS Amber, 96–97, 108, 111 USS Boxwood, 111 USS Cornel, 111 USS Key, 111–12 USS Ulvert M. Moore, 112 utility poles, 174–75, 212 Vail, Charles, 38 Vail and Eddy, 38 Van Duzer, Jeff, 193 Waimate Forest (NZ), 185–86, 217, 218 Warjone, Hans, 113 Warjone, James Eddy (Jim), 8, 15, 113–14, 132, 134, 149, 179, 203, 204, 217, 222 asked to serve as board director, 148 on becoming experts in wildlife preservation, 192 becoming president of Port Blakely Mill Co., 152 buying back family shares sold to Simpson Timber, 177 computerizing forest inventory, 150 crediting Christine Anderson for support and collaboration, 220 criticized for Blakely Harbor plans, 169 de facto president of Aquilo Properties, 150 developing China business, 154–56 early career of, 146–48 on the forestry industry, 220–22 on importance of early collaboration during real estate development design, 171 on importance of relationships, 187

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interested in biomass power, 218–19 joining business as EVP of three Eddy enterprises, 149–50 legacy of, 220 meeting with the IRS, 152–54 on mistakes at Sheraton-Renton Inn, 139 promoting drafting of a mission statement, 154 on purchase of Pacific Lumber & Shipping, 208 retirement of, 219 soliciting matching federal funds for the Sunset Interchange, 197–99, 200 succession planning, 209 upbringing and education of, 146 working with King County on development, 173 Warjone, Mary Anne, 146 Warjone, Michael (Mike), 201, 202, 221 Warjone, Onny (John), 89, 113–14, 132, 159, 179, 181, 222 addressing threatened species problems, 192 appointed chief forester, 160–62 on buffer zones, 178 on consolidating land holdings, 175–76 on effects of the HCP, 195 enjoying the New Zealand landscape, 136 joining company in the forestry department, 134 on negotiations in New Zealand, 184 on plantings in New Zealand, 185 purchasing Morton Tree Farm, 208 respect for, in the industry, 162–63 responsible for beginning of Environmental Education Program, 147 retirement and legacy of, 214–15, 217 summer work of, 133 touring New Zealand, 180–81 on tree growth rate and acquisitions, 160 working summers for the company, 146 Warjone, Suzy, 203 Warner, Katy, 59, 61 War Production Board, 108 Washington, George, 23, 33 Washington (state of) blowdown of trees in (1934), 105 changing posture on taxing timber companies, 143 declining timber production of, during the Depression, 92

largest fire in, 89 legislature of, 98–99, 101, 103–4 motor vehicle excise tax in, 197–98 Puget Sound region, 51 statewide HCP, 196 Washington Business Roundtable, 219 Washington Fire Protection Association, 89 Washington Forest Fire Association, 89 Washington Forest Protection Association, 147, 178 Washington State Forestry Conference, 121 Waugh, Gareth, 176 Wausau Tract, 105 ways, 48 Weed, Jerry, 208–9 Wells, Larry, 130, 139, 144 West Alsek, 75 West Apaum, 75 West Cohas, 75 West Ekonk, 75 West Haven, 74–75 West Highland Park (Issaquah Highlands), 214 West Lianga, 75 West Mahomet, 75 Westover Opera House (Bay City), 32, 43–44 Weyerhaeuser, 88, 89, 114, 117, 122, 135, 138, 166, 208 Weyerhaeuser, George, 143 Weyerhaeuser Timber Company, 65, 123 When Timber Stood Tall (Pierre), 127

Whitson, Chris, 17, 93 Whittemore, Augusta, 36 Whittemore, Jeannette, 46 Whittemore, Lottie, 46 Whittemore, Nathaniel, 36 Wilkins, Neal, 192, 193–94 Wilson, Charles, 169 Wilson, Woodrow, 80 Winn, Jack, 117, 124–25, 130, 162 Winslow, John, 33 Winslow ferry dock, 168 Wood, J. M., 43–44 Woodland Park Zoo (Seattle), 56 Wood’s Opera House, 32, 44, 45 worker safety, improvements in, 126–27 working circles, 176, 184, 208 World War I effect on lumber business exports, 68–69, 71 effect on shipbuilding business, 75–77 end of, 80 World War II Eddy family service during, 105 effect of, on timber industry, 107–9 Yacolt Burn, 89 Yama (WA), 62 YWCA, 213

Index

241

Photo Credits Bangor Museum and History Center

University of Washington Newspaper Archives

Page 22

Pages 66, 134

Bainbridge Island Historical Museum

Alan Weiner Photography

Pages 14, 48, 49, 51-52, 54-55, 75, 80-82

Pages 1, 2, 6, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 70, 93, 123, 124, 167, 170-176, 190, 196, 198, 202, 204, 207, 210-214, 221, 223

Bay County Historical Society Pages 18-19, 21, 27-29, 32, 34-35, 38-39, 41

All other photos property of Port Blakely Companies or private family collections. We appreciate curators, librarians,

Gary Benson

archivists, historians, company employees, and family

Pages 146, 160, 197, 205

members who provided photography. Every attempt has been made to credit photos accurately. We apologize for

Museum of History and Industry, Seattle, Washington Page 69 (2009.56.69) Renton Historical Society Page 53 University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections, Seattle, Washington Page 52 UW 18560 Page 54 2002.48.391 Page 59 UW26575 Page 61 UW4993 Page 64 Hester 10454 Page 65 Hester 10153 Page 67 UW28207z, UW 1977.6486.63 Page 68 UW 1977.6486.63 Page 76 UW27871z Page 106 UW SEA0932

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omissions or errors.