Port Gamble

July, she will fly, and give no warning to her flight...

So goes the old nursery rhyme and the 1960's Simon and Garfunkel song.  The last busy weekend of July is over.  On Sunday morning I took the Seattle-Bainbridge ferry to visit my friend Candi in Poulsbo. 

We drove up to Port Gamble for lunch, a logging town with a colorful history and now a popular tourist destination on the Olympic Pennisula.

 Pt. Gamble company housing, 1906

Port Gamble was an old-fashioned company town, built by industrialists Josiah Keller, William Talbot and Andrew Pope.  It was known as "Little Boston" for the style of the architecture and because many of the early employees came from Massachusetts. (Of course there were inhabitants in the area long before a town was established by logger barons, but that's another story.) For 142 years, it was a sawmill and shipping community until the mill finally closed in 1995.

 The work day at the company town went like this: Every morning at 6:20 a.m., the men woke to the mill whistle. At 6:40 the whistle called them to breakfast consisting of "boiled corn beef, potatoes, baked beans, hash, hot griddle cakes, biscuits, and coffee." The men had 20 minutes to eat and report for a 11½-hour day. A good worker earned $30 a month and was paid daily in coins if he chose.

Pt. Gamble Company Store, 1918

I can't remember the last time I was in Pt. Gamble, but it might have been in the early 1980's. Back then it felt more like a real, run-down old town, rather than a Disney attraction. Not that there's anything wrong with Disneyland, but Pt. Gamble was designated as a National Historic Site and a Rural Historic Town, which allowed tourist development in the picturesque location while retaining the character of the buildings.

We've all been to "historic" places like this. The service station is now an artists' co-op and the meat and produce market became an antiques store. And so on. The general store, which has been in continuous operation, still has merchandise and a restaurant.

 Pt. Gamble Company Store today

Instead of a grimy mill town, it's all very clean, pretty and nice with folks lined up on the weekends for $20 breakfasts and salads.

We had a great visit and a fun browsing around the shops without buying a thing.  I'm looking forward to doing it again, but maybe in February. Speaking of lines!  When I headed home to Seattle at 2 pm, the ferry waiting line on the highway shoulder seemed to stretch half-way across Bainbridge Island.  I don't know why the traffic congestion and number of people in the Northwest can still take me by surprise.  Some part of me must be stuck back in the 1980's.