On the fourth Wednesday of the month, I usually write a post with a historical theme—an event or place that features in one of my historical novels, for example. Today, I am detouring slightly to write about a place I recently went to that brought historical events to mind.
One of my favorite things about the retirement community where we live is Saturday morning park walks. The community’s bus takes a group of residents to a local park, then we have an hour or so to walk before boarding the bus to return in time for lunch. Some parks are more scenic than others, some require longer travel on the bumpy bus, but I am glad of someone else planning and executing the trip—all I have to do is show up with my coat, hat, and gloves, and sometimes an umbrella.
Last Saturday, we went to Carkeek Park, which is a ten-minute drive from our community. My husband and I had been there previously, but I hadn’t ventured down to the beach before. So the beach was my destination on Saturday. To get to the beach, I had to cross a pedestrian overpass over railroad tracks. But the tracks were the only part of the beach that seemed modern. Once I was on the beach, it felt like I had entered the 19th century when the first pioneers arrived in Seattle.
Perhaps I had that reaction because I’ve been reading about Arthur Denny and his family, the first settlers on Elliot Bay in early 1852. They arrived on Alki Point in what is now West Seattle in November 1851, but decided not to settle there permanently. After wintering on Alki Point, they moved to Elliot Bay at the mouth of the Duwamish River in February 1852, where they filed homestead claims in what is now the heart of downtown Seattle. Denny Way and Boren Avenue are two Seattle streets named after these pioneers.
Last Saturday was a cloudy, damp winter day, much like Arthur Denny’s descriptions in his memoir of Alki Point and Elliot Bay when he arrived at those locations. As I stood on the beach at Carkeek Park, I knew there were modern buildings up and down the shore and across Puget Sound, but I couldn’t see them. The only sign of civilization I could see was the tracks just above the beach. And unless a train was passing (which it did before we left the park), the tracks were not noticeable.
The tide was in, and the strip of beach was narrow. My husband and I and the birds (gulls and ducks and a couple of kingfishers) were the only creatures walking the shoreline. Piper Creek flowed into the Sound through the beach, and the park employees have kept the creek’s mouth in its natural state for salmon to climb in the fall to spawn. It didn’t look like much had changed in the 173 years since the Dennys arrived at Elliot Bay some ten miles south of Carkeek.
From the beach, my husband and I returned to the inland side of the railroad tracks and walked a wetland trail where we saw several beaver dams. The beavers, too, would have been there when the Dennys arrived on Puget Sound, probably in even greater numbers than those present today. I asked a park employee if she saw the beavers regularly. To my surprise, she said she had never seen a beaver. The evidence of their occupation was all around—several dams and chewed stumps and downed trees. But the beavers themselves stayed out of sight.
As I read more about the Dennys’ early days on Puget Sound, I will remember my morning at Carkeek Park. The weather and the flora and fauna of that era can still be found.
When have you visited a place that evoked historical events to you?
It looks like Owen Beach, which I visit with Owen and family in Tacoma. The special beauty of Owen Beach is the dense, tall trees that come down close to the shore. It’s also next to the zoo and beautiful botanic gardens. It is a favorite visit each time I come to WA. It is such a beautiful and varied state with a fascinating history.
Washington is a beautiful and varied state. My dad always called it “God’s country.”
Carkeek is my favorite place on earth. The beach at low tide is amazing for finding teeny crabs, anemones, and barnacles. And the orchard – have you explored the orchard? Such a fascinating story, and as someone who works in the grocery industry I find the heirloom apple varieties (no longer grown for commerce) so interesting. You are lucky to live so close!
Julie, I will have to make my way to the orchard soon.
Thanks for reading. Theresa
[…] mentioned the park walks that our retirement community sponsors every Saturday morning. These walks let me explore […]
Theresa – You’d be surprised to know that Piper’s Creek has been highly altered over the past almost two centuries (and longer by Native peoples). If you look at the outlet of Piper’s carefully, you can see it is anything but natural. It runs through a large box culvert under the railway after running over and through several installed log weirs, but the impacts of humans began long ago.
Once white settlers arrived, the surrounding area was logged early and the creek was used to drive logs down into the sound. By the late 1800s, logging left very little in terms of a natural ecosystem, and the focus shifted from land to water. A large fish trap was set at the outlet of Piper’s Creek to trap Salmon and other fish. The trap was operational for a while until it saw no return for several years, after which it was decommissioned. In more recent history, a wastewater system was installed near the base of the ravine that directs treated waters into the creek. This system has failed at least once and released absurd amounts of untreated waters into the creek and Sound.
Until recently (~2022/23) Beavers were thought of as a pest in this area and were removed or euthanized, however research has shown them to be beneficial ecosystem engineers, and thankfully WDFW, Ecology, and WA Parks is listening.
A pair of Beavers moved into Piper’s Creek (potentially from Golden Gardens, close by where they were known to be established) and quickly began altering the watercourse to inhabit. They quickly produced a small family, and have been continually altering the landscape of the park since their arrival.
Due to the highly constrained nature of the Creek within the developed Park, the wetland trail and parking lot began to flood. To protect these resources Parks consulted Beavers NW to help alleviate some of the flooding issues while allowing the Beavers to remain. Notch Exclusion Fences were installed along the largest beaver dam in 2024 to control the water level of the largest pond.
It is incredible what these animals do, and it is important to ask – do our management decisions help or hurt in the long run?
In this case, beavers are providing critical water quality functions that benefit us which we deprived ourselves of for so long due to poor management decisions.
Reality seems to be behind science by about 50 years. It’s important to support decision makers that make the right choice for our future – listen to the scientists and enact policy that takes science into account without compromise.