Local Resident LLyn De Danaan’s Book Chronicles Salish Woman’s Life on Oyster Bay
Click to purchase the book.
Long time resident of Oyster Bay, author and anthropologist LLyn De Danaan, has a new book available on October 1. The title is Katie Gale: A Coast Salish Woman’s Life on Oyster Bay. It is a comprehensive history of Oyster Bay, with many references to Mud Bay, from about 1870 to 1900.
A gravestone, a mention in local archives, stories still handed down around Oyster Bay: the outline of a woman begins to emerge and with her the world she inhabited, so rich in tradition, so shaken by violent change. Katie Kettle Gale was born into a Salish community in Puget Sound in the 1850s, just as settlers were migrating into what would become Washington State. With her people forced out of their accustomed hunting and fishing grounds into ill-provisioned island camps and reservations, Katie Gale sought her fortune in Oyster Bay. In that early outpost of multiculturalism – where Native Americans and immigrants from the eastern United States, Europe, and Asia vied for economic, social, political, and legal power – a woman like Gale could make her way.
Llyn De Danaan’s new book, Katie Gale: a Coast Salish Woman’s Life on Oyster Bay, is a must read for anyone interested in local history, the shellfish industry, and our local Native American heritage. The book tells the story of Katie Kettle, a Native American woman, who married Joseph Gale, a white settler, in the late 1800s and lived on Oyster Bay. The Gales were major personalities in the oyster growing business.
This memoir is suitable for general audiences. Follow De Danaan’s intellectual and spiritual journey discovering the historically significant Katie Gale.
Author LLyn De Danaan
As LLyn De Danaan mines the historical record, we begin to see Gale, a strong-willed Native woman who co-founded a successful oyster business, then wrested it away from her Euro-American husband, a man with whom she raised children and who ultimately made her life unbearable. Steeped in sadness – with a lost home and a broken marriage, children dying in their teens, and tuberculosis claiming her at forty-three – Katie Gale’s story is also one of remarkable pluck, a tale of hard work and ingenuity, gritty initiative and bad luck that is, ultimately, essentially American.
LLyn De Danaan is a writer and an anthropologist. She contributed to the book Vashon Island Archaeology: A View from Burton Acres Shell Midden, and her articles have appeared in Women’s Studies Quarterly, Columbia: The Magazine of Northwest History, and Oregon Historical Quarterly.
“Katie Gale’s story is unique in its scale; few accounts of the nineteenth-century Northwest focus on the life of a single Native woman and her family. LLyn De Danaan’s writing is big history made deeply human, offering insights not just into Native American history but also into the arrival of industrial capitalism on Puget Sound, the politics of statehood and race in Washington, and the profound transformation of local landscapes.”
— Coll Thrush, author of Native Seattle: Histories from the Crossing-Over Place“I have followed LLyn De Danaan’s writing path for years now. She is talented and bold, and this new book puts her firmly where she belongs – at the heart of the American voice. Good stuff, highly recommended.”
— Luis Alberto Urrea, author of The Devil’s Highway and Into the Beautiful North
Fall Book Sale October 19 to Benefit Steamboat Little Free Library
The Steamboat Little Free Library will soon be installed near the front door of the Griffin Fire Department Headquarters. This library was purchased with generous contibutions from the community and the Friends of the Olympia Library. Click here to read our prior articles about the Steamboat Little Free Library. You are invited to the Fall Book Sale on Saturday, October 19 at the Griffin Fire Department. Proceeds from the sale will benefit the Steamboat Little Free Library. This is a fine opportunity to exchange some of the books in your home for ones you haven’t yet read and benefit our community’s new, book-sharing Little Free Library, at the same time.Fall Book Sale
Satuday, October 19
10 AM to 2 PM
Griffin Fire Department
Do you have books to donate to the book sale? Organizers of the Fall Book Sale will be accepting book donations at the Griffin Fire Department on Friday, October 18 from 6 PM to 8 PM.
Donate your used books on Friday, then join us for light refreshments, conversation among neighbors, and book browsing on Saturday.
The Fall Book Sale is a Griffin Neighborhood Association community event for the benefit of the Steamboat Little Free Library.
Sheriff Department Releases a Community Alert – Burglaries near Delphi and Summit Lake
Neighborhood/ Area: ‘A’ district –(West Side of Thurston County)
Nature of alert: BURGLARIES
Details: The Thurston County Sheriff’s Office is warning residents to be on alert because of a high incident of burglaries in the west areas of Thurston County. Please take precautions when leaving your home unattended. As you may see in the below listed cases, the burglars have found unlocked access into homes. Please leave all doors and windows secured and work together in a neighborhood to watch for suspicious activity. If such activity is noticed, please call either 911 if it is an emergent situation, or call our non emergency dispatch number at (360) 740-2740. Let’s all work together and be safe!!!
Listed below are 4 A District burglaries that have occurred between August 14th and August 22nd. The entry method, items taken and time of crime are all similar. There is a possibility that a suspect / suspects are targeting this area, warranting additional attention. Burglaries include:
On 08/22/2013 between 0800 and 1700, a residence in the 8900 block of Delphi Road SWwas burglarized. Entry was gained through an unlocked window with an AC unit in it. Items taken were a pillow case, assorted jewelry, and electronics. TCSO case #13-456
On 08/21/2013 between 0730 and 1700, a residence in the 4400 block of Delphi Road SW was burglarized. Entry was gained through an unlocked sliding glass door. Assorted jewelry was taken.. TCSO Case # 13-4550
On 08/14/2013 between 1000 and 1130, a residence in the 3700 block of Delphi Road SW was burglarized. Entry was gained through an unlocked front door. An elderly disabled male on oxygen was inside the residence at the time of the burglary. Items taken included; jewelry, cash, and a man’s wallet. TCSO Case # 13-4414
On 08/22/2913 between 0500 and 1730, a residence in the 12300 block of Summit Lake Road NW was burglarized. Entry was gained through an unlocked window with an AC unit in it. Items taken included jewelry, which was placed in a pillow case. TCSO Case # 13-4572
To receive future Community Alerts and/ or to subscribe to the Thurston County Sheriff’s Office Quarterly Newsletter, log on to: www.co.thurston.wa.us/sheriff or www.thurstonsheriff.org
UPDATE: August 28
The Thurston County Sheriff’s Department has today released photos and additional information in an effort to identify suspects in some of these burglaries. Click here to download the document from the Sheriff’s Department web site.
Annual Blueberry Bash is This Sunday, August 25th
This Sunday, St. Christopher’s Community Church will host their popular annual Blueberry Bash. This is the 36th year of food, music, games and good neighbors. The weather forecast looks great and there’s a 100% chance of blueberries and fun!
St. Christopher’s Community Church
7902 Steamboat Island Rd. NW
Sunday, August 25
12 noon to 4 PM
This year’s live entertainment is provided by the Oly Mountain Boys. Based in Olympia, this bluegrass band will be performing from 12:30 to 3:30 PM.
 |
| The Oly Mountain Boys |
Bring the kids! There’ll be a kids’ activity station, a bubble station, bounce house, and face painting.
Don’t miss out on their famous homemade blueberry pies (other fruit pies, too), either whole or by-the-slice. There’ll be 100% beef polish sausages, vegetarian burgers, hot dogs, corn-on-the-cob, chips, popcorn, sno-cones and much more to eat.
Bingo Garden: 12:30 to 3:45 PM.
Free, old-fashioned games such as an egg toss, 3-legged race, and balloon toss beginning at 1 PM.
The Griffin Fire Department will be on-hand to demonstrate CPR techniques.
We hope to see all of you at the Blueberry Bash!
Community Picnic, Farmers and Local Business Fair a Success!
Cool and overcast weather didn’t dampen spirits as an estimated 300 or more area residents came together this last Sunday to enjoy a community picnic and farmers and local business fair. The event was hosted by Prosperity Grange, Restoration Hope Community Outreach, and the Griffin Neighborhood Association. Proceeds for the event were for the benefit of the Prosperity Grange. The grange is currently reviewing bids to upgrade their building’s electrical system.
If you missed this year’s picnic, there’s a photo album growing on our Facebook page. Click here to see that album.
This was the first effort on the part of the hosts to hold an event intended to meet so many simultaneous objectives. Funds were being raised for the benefit of the Prosperity Grange, organizers sought to highlight the many local businesses and farms operating in our area, and (lest we not forget) this is the community picnic held every year around this time. At the close of the day, everyone agreed the event was a terrific success.
Not only was attendance higher than we’ve seen in recent years, we also saw many more families with children. Thanks to the Steamboat Island Cooperative Preschool, Cedars on the Sound, Lighthouse Alpaca Ranch, and others for giving the kids something to do, following the afternoon meal.
A number of local farms and businesses made donations either directly to the Prosperity Grange or in the form of gifts for a silent auction and a golf driving game that was held during the picnic.
A special thanks is made to the extraordinary contributions made by sponsors of the event. Xinh Dwelley, of Xinh’s Clam & Oyster House, prepared claims and curried mussels (seafood donated by Taylor Shellfish Farms). Steamboat Trading Post (formerly Steamboat Island Fuel, at the corner of Sexton and Old Steamboat Island Rd.) donated beverages and bags of chips. Steamboat Golf hosted a game to benefit Prosperity Grange and allowed most of the event (and the parking!) to take place on their property.
Here is a list of the farms and businesses present and some of the donations made during last Sunday’s picnic:
- 4 B’s Farm – a wood turning lathe demo and donation of a wood bowl to the silent auction
- Authority Martial Arts – a martial arts demonstration
- Black Diamond Roofing
- Blissful Wunders Chocolats
- Building Earth Farm
- Cameron Gardens – a large bouquet for the silent auction
- CC Christmas Tree Farm
- Cedars on the Sound – a bag toss game and prizes for the kids
- Chelsea Seafood Farms – donations of sweatshirts and hats to the Steamboat Golf driving game
- Chick Jewelry
- Dogwoods Canine Play and Stay – gift certificate for a 2-night stay at Dogwoods
- Feline Friends
- Griffin Fire Department
- Griffin Neighborhood Association/Steamboat Conservation Partnership
- Ken’s Automotive – donation of gift certificates for free oil changes
- Lemonade Stand (the son of one of the owners of Chick Jewelry)
- Lighthouse Alpaca Ranch – cash donation to the Prosperity Grange (and alpacas!)
- Madrona Grove Summer Fruit Stand – 5% of proceeds of sales to the Prosperity Grange and a $10 gift certificate
- Meyers Woodworks – donation of six cutting boards for the silent auction
- Oliver’s Landscaping
- Open Hands Food Bank Garden (St. Christopher’s Community Church)
- Pacific Coast Shellfish Growers Association
- Polar Bear Construction
- Prosperity Grange
- Art Ray Plumbing
- Restoration Hope Community Outreach
- Sound Stage Car Audio
- South Sound IT – free computer diagnosis and repair during the event
- Steamboat Animal Hospital – donation of a $50 gift certificate for veterinary services
- Steamboat Golf
- Steamboat Island Coffee Shop
- Steamboat Island Cooperative Preschool – face painting and kids’ activities
- Steamboat Island Grooming and Pet Supplies
- Steamboat Island Market
- Steamboat Junction Farm Stand
- Steamboat Muscular Therapy – free chair massages during the picnic, donation of gift certificates for two 30-minute massages
- Steamboat Trading Post – discount gas cards, donation of all the soda and chips for the event
- Sunrise Hair Design – donation of a gift basket for the silent auction
- Stickman Coffee Roaster
- Thurston County Explorer Search and Rescue
- Xihn’s Clam & Oyster House – free clams and curried mussels with rice!
Did we leave anyone out?
Many of these farms and businesses are listed in our online local business directory. Do you own or operate a local business, then click here for information about how you can be added to our directory.
Past and present members of the Board of the Griffin Neighborhood Association staffed a pair of grills and offered hamburgers, hot dogs and veggie burgers to everyone at the picnic. Even a surprise inspection by the Thurston County Health Department didn’t slow the pace of production.
At the information table for the Griffin Neighborhood Association there was on display the Little Free Library which will soon be placed near the front door of the Griffin Fire Department Headquarters. The library was donated thanks to generous contributions from local residents and the Friends of the Olympia Library. Contributions to cover the costs of the purchase and installation of the library are still being taken. Click here for more information about the Steamboat Little Free Library.
There was one tragic set of circumstances associated with this year’s picnic. Bliss, of Blissful Wunders Chocolats, made a sizeable donation of his truffles. But where was all this candy, on Sunday? Rumor has it that Bliss (who was selling his chocolates elsewhere this weekend) delivered his donation to the grange hall on Thursday. These were discovered in the refrigerator by the Steamboat Bluegrass Festival, held in the grange hall on Friday night. We understand the Bluegrass Festival was quite a success and we’d like to think that was, if only in a small part, because of the chocolates meant for our community picnic.
We hope to see you all at next year’s community picnic. But wait! Do not forget the Blueberry Bash, Sunday August 25th at St. Christopher’s Community Church! We’ll see you all there.
And, around 3:15, the sun did come out.
Did you attend the community picnic? What suggestions do you have, for next year’s picnic? Leave your comments here.
Dogwoods Adds an Event Center to Local Community Facilities
Leslie and Shane Hernstedt have for some time provided local dog boarding services at Dogwoods Canine Play and Stay. They have now added an Event Center to the facilities they offer our community.
Whether you are planning a sit down dinner or a gymnastics event, this conveniently located 50 foot x 60 foot heated space is worth a look. It is clean and airy, with a lot of windows. It might just be “The Right Venue for Your Event.”
 |
| 50 x 60 foot interior heated space available for rent by the day or by the hour. |
Rentals are available by the hour or by the day. The hourly rate is $25.00 and for the day is $150.00. The building includes bathroom facilities. Says Leslie, “Someone could use it for anything from a wedding to an indoor soccer match.”
As far as dog boarding, the Hernstedt’s have recently finished a major building project and “We are extremely happy with the way it turned out.” Rates are $22.00 a night for the first pup and $18.00 a night for additional family members.
 |
| The new dog boarding kennel. |
For more information about either Dogwoods Canine Play and Stay or the new Events Center, contact Leslie Hernstedt at (360) 866-7290 or leslie.dogwoods@gmail.com
Cedars on the Sound an Exceptional Local Rental Home
 |
| A tranquil home where you can relax, reconnect, and create lasting memories. |
The Cedars on the Sound Rental House is one of the newest additions to the GriffinNeighbors online business directory. This vacation rental is owned by local residents Vicki and Amir Salim. If you, your family or friends are seeking a truly stellar rental vacation home, look at what the Cedars on the Sound can offer. “We have had people from all walks of life come stay for all sorts of reasons,” says owner Vicki Salim. “Vacations, retreats, weddings, reunions, birthdays, holidays, funerals, girls’ weekends, guys’ weekends, scrapbooking, visiting family or friends in the area or from the base, and people who want to have a ‘stay-cation’.”
People generally choose to stay at a vacation rental home because it can be less expensive than a hotel. There is more room, people can relax together in a comfortable environment, cook their own meals (eating in restaurants can be expensive), and they can live like locals. Vicki and Amir like to stay in vacation rentals, when they travel. They like to see what ideas they can take away and find it is more fun to stay in a house than a hotel.
 |
| Wood stove, games, movies, books, sound system, and a flatscreen TV. There is lots to do! |
Vicki explains, “Before moving here, we lived in Wisconsin, Malaysia, California, and China; we moved around a lot for our jobs. At one point, we decided we wanted to find the perfect place to live: temperate climate, near the water with great natural beauty. We toured around the Northwest four different times and as soon as we came to Olympia, we knew this was home.” During their first summer here, they had 26 different visitors. “We thought wow, people really like to visit this area; we should get a vacation rental house down the road!” When a gorgeous waterfront property on 7.7 acres came on the market, they didn’t hesitate to buy it. They made some renovations, furnished the house, and started renting it out April 2012.
Vicki brings a personal touch to her relationship with guests at Cedars on the Sound. “We greet our guests and give them a welcome tour to answer any questions they may have about the property or Olympia; people seem to really appreciate this personalization and we have loved meeting all our guests! My favorite part is when they open the door and see the view; they always get so excited! One lady started crying!”
The high season is summer and Cedars on the Sound was almost completely booked by the end of January. In the fall and spring, they mostly get weekend visitors. As you might guess, the winter is quiet. “Winter is a great time for us to do major work on the house.” Amir is a great handyman and the two of them manage almost everything to do with the house, from reservations, guest relations, cleaning between guests, marketing, and repairs and maintenance.
 |
| Gorgeous views on 7.7 acres of forest and waterfront. Very private and peaceful |
Vicki and Amir advertise on three different websites: VRBO, Homeaway and Trip Advisor (Flipkey). They currently have 54 reviews from our guests, making them the highest rated vacation rental house in Olympia.
“We work hard to make people feel comfortable and at home during their stay. People often comment that our attention to detail and high standards of cleanliness help them relax and feel at home.” Says Vicki, “We often hear, ‘you have thought of everything!'” Guests also appreciate Vicki and Amir are locals and know the area. They have begun to assemble “Vicki’s Picks” – maps and descriptions of different parts of town with Vicki’s top picks of what to see, do, eat and experience.
We welcome Cedars on the Sound to our online business directory. Do you have a local business? Click here to learn how to get your business listed. If you are looking to purchase services or materials, look to our local business directory first; you may find one of your neighbors offer exactly what you are seeking!
Blueberry Bash Set for August 25th at St. Christopher’s Community Church
St. Christopher’s Blueberry Bash is Sunday, August 25, 12 noon to 4 PM. This year’s featured musical guests are the Oly Mountain Boys.
St. Christopher’s Community Church is located at 7902 Steamboat Island Road NW, Olympia, WA 98502.
The Blueberry Bash will celebrate its 36th year offering up food, games and entertainment for the entire family.
Watch this space and the web site for St. Christopher’s for more details closer to August 25th.