Streets of the Week: Brien Drive, Shannon Drive, Bjune Drive

Location: Winslow waterfront.

History: Developer Ed Stafford worked in the area just south of the bustling Winslow Way business district.

Nearby Eagle Harbor and the island yacht club kept the area busy while Waterfront Park ensured the developement’s natural beauty.

As Stafford’s work in the area drew to a close, he had to decide what to name the development’s streets. He looked to his three children for inspiration when christening the three parallel roads.

Brien got his own street. So did Shannon. But what about Betty June? It was from a light-hearted blending of Betty June’s names that Bjune Drive was born.

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers.  If you have an island road story to share, email Ringland at elinorjoe@msn.com.

Street of the Week: McDonald Avenue

Location: Runs north/south between Eagle Harbor Drive and Old Mill Road

History: Old McDonald had a farm, yes, but on Bainbridge Island he also owned two hotels and a popular community pavilion.

In the early twentieth century, Malcom “Mack” McDonald was one of the largest landowners in all of Kitsap County. As owner of the Port Blakely Hotel and Pleasant Beach Hotel, McDonald was a well-known leader in the island’s community.

McDonald’s Pleasant Beach Hotel featured more than 20 rooms, a bowling alley, a saloon, a swimming pool and a bathhouse.

The posh hotel was, as the name may suggest, adjacent to a rather pleasant beach. The hotel’s large pavilion and picnic grounds covered 30 acres, an expansive property which drew huge crowds throughout the year and particularly during sunny summer months.

Pleasant Beach’s beautiful location, delicious food and wide variety of fun activities contributed to its widespread reputation as the Coney Island of the Puget Sound.

Locals and tourists alike would arrive by boat at the hotel’s lengthy deck. Many traveled across the Sound to see the famed hotel and equally well-known grounds.

Visitors frequently shipped in from Seattle, Port Orchard and even as far south as Tacoma. Crowds of more than 2,000 were known to swing by during the course of a single day.

The Pleasant Beach Hotel’s pavilion was also popular among locals, and it became famous for hosting prize fights. One story about a world championship fight shares the adventure of several ambitious but shortsighted sailors who climbed to the very top of the pavilion. Hoping for a bird’s eye view of the excitement below, they tore shingles off the roof—and promptly fell into the crowd below.

McDonald’s personal home was nearly as impressive as his hotel holdings. The family ranch in Eagledale featured a large house, several barns and many acres under cultivation.

There was even room to spare. In the early 1900s, McDonald donated part of the land for the amptly named McDonald School. It was located on the corner of what are now McDonald Avenue and Eagle Harbor Drive.
The McDonald School was built in 1905 and enlarged a decade later. Generations of children from all over Bainbridge Island received an education at the school until it eventually closed in 1940.

Source: “Bifocals,” Elsie Frankland Marriot, Gateway Printing Col., Seattle, 1941.

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers.  If you have an island road story to share, email Ringland at elinorjoe@msn.com.

Street of the Week: Grotle Road

Location: Off County Park Road

History: Born in Norway, Rasmus and Kawlein Grotle spent more than 30 years on their 3-acre farm, which the family still owns after more than a century.

Source: Bertha, daughter of Rasmus and Kawlein

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers.  If you have an island road story to share, email Ringland at elinorjoe@msn.com.

Street of the Week: Henderson Road

Location: Runs north/south between Seabold Road and Hidden Cove Road; west of Highway 305

History: Scottish-born John Maurice Henderson wanted to be a doctor. But when his father died, 16-year-old Henderson put a pause on that dream and headed west from his family’s home in London. He was just 18 when he arrived in Oklahoma.

The year was 1884, and Henderson found himself in the midst of the Wild West. Over the years, he made his fortune in cattle and land, eventually sending for his family to come join him in America.

Three years after his arrival, Henderson gave his dream another shot. He entered medical school in New York and graduated four years later. He began practicing out east before moving to Washington State. Once here, he purchased land in the Seabold area.

During World War I, Henderson served at an army hospital in France. He kept working with the government after the war before opening his own practice in Seattle. Dr. Henderson continued to see patients on Bainbridge, braving land and sea when duty called.

More stories of the doctor can be found in his file at the Bainbridge Island Historical Museum.

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers. More than 180 histories have been compiled so far. If you have an island road story to share, email Ringland at elinorjoe@msn.com.

Street of the Week: Gertie Johnson Road

Location: East off Rolling Bay business district

History: Gertrude Johnson was accustomed to being first. She lived in the first beach house off Logg Road; she helped create the area’s first park; she was Bainbridge Island’s first women legislator.
Outside her accomplishments at the capital, Johnson may be best known for her ties to Fay Bainbridge.

In the wake of the Great Depression, the state was looking for land. Johnson heard the property of a longtime Island family, the Fays, was up for sale. On a hunch it would be a perfect spot for a new park, Johnson picked up the phone.

The state couldn’t afford the $15,000 asking price, she explained. That’s fine, the Fays replied. You can have it for $5,000, just name it after the family. And Johnson did just that.

Source: “A History of Bainbridge Island,” Katy Warner, 1968

Street of the Week: Olallie Lane

Location: Off Skinner Road on Battle Point

History: Olallie is a hard word to know how to pronounce. Start with the “o” then follow with “la-leh.” You’ve just said “berry” in many Pacific Northwest Native American dialects.

When Dallas Young’s mother christened her family’s street, she thought “olallie” specifically meant “blackberry,” a fitting title for the area’s bursting bushes. Young, who lives on the property his grandparents bought in 1906, later discovered there’s a specific berry bearing the tongue-twister of a name.

The olallieberry was developed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture at Oregon State University as a cross between a loganberry and a youngberry. Both of those berries, in turn, are hybrids: blackberry meets raspberry and blackberry meets raspberry meets dewberry, respectively.

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers. If you have an island road story to share, email Ringland at elinorjoe@msn.com.

Street of the Week: Wacky Nut Way

Location: A residential street running east off Rockaway Bluff Road

History: When submitting the required three suggestions for his new street, Jared Vogt added his daughter’s idea of “Wacky Nut,” never thinking it be used. But the county opted for the wackiest option. Vogt decided to keep the name, silly as it may be.

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers. If you have an island road story to share, email Ringland at elinorjoe@msn.com.

Street of the Week: Yankee Girl Lane

Location: East off Fort Ward Hill Road, just south of Blakely Harbor Park

History: Developer John Green’s deep love of Sparkman & Stephens sailboats led to this road’s name.

The company was founded 75 years ago when self-taught sailor Olin J. Stephens went into business with yacht broker Drake Sparkman. Twenty-one-year-old Stephens shared a passion for naval architecture with his brother Roderick. Rod worked at the legendary Nevina Yard in City Island, New York, and was key in helping Sparkman & Stephens survive the financial storm of the Great Depression.

Since its founding, Sparkman & Stephens has completed more than 2,600 designs, four of which are also Bainbridge street names: Bolero Lane, Charisma Lane, Intrepid Court and Yankee Girl Lane. All four designs are yacht cup winners.

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers. If you have an island road story to share, email Ringland at elinorjoe@msn.com.

Street of the Week: Cosgrove Street

Location: Runs north-south between Wyatt Way and Shepard Drive.

History: John Cosgrove lived on the Sound for two decades until evenutally meeting his end thanks to a bunch of bananas. When he arrived in 1858, Cosgrove claimed a plot near Port Madison and began working at the local mill. Eventually, he sold the claim to the mill’s owner. His price: the steamer Mary Woodruff.

Now a captain, Cosgrove set sail. Known as “Humbolt Jack,” he lived with a Native American woman and their children.

One day Cosgrove visited a Port Blakely blacksmith shop carrying a bunch of bananas. He wanted to hang the fruit from the ceiling to ripen. While standing on a chair, Cosgrove lost his footing and fell to the floor.

The local paper later reported the captain shouted such things as “Get up steam” before murmering his last words: “I’m going.”

Sources: “Port Madison, Washington Territory, 1854-1889,” Fredi Perry. Perry Publishing, Bremerton, 1989.

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers. If you have an island road story to share, email Ringland at elinorjoe@msn.com.

Streets of the Week: Agate Street; Agate Beach Lane; Agate Pass Road; and Agate Point Road

History: In 1841 Captain Charles Wilkes found himself on the Puget Sound, leading the United States Exploring Expedition.

The expedition was the result of more than a decade of political debates and personal conflicts. Finally, with the support of Congress, six U.S. Navy ships left Norfolk, Virginia, on August 18, 1838. On board: 424 crew members and nine scientists set to explore the South Pacific.

After almost three years of sailing, the expedition reached what is now Bainbridge Island. There, Captain Wilkes dubbed the waterway separating the island from the peninsula the Agate Passage.

The name was in honor of artist, Alfred T. Agate. Only 26 when the expedition set sail, Agate traveled around Cape Horn, throughout the South Pacific, to the Antarctic, and, of course, along the Pacific Northwest.

Agate’s contributions to the expedition extended beyound detailed drawings and portraits for the crew. He also documented shipboard life and scientific discoveries with much of his work still celebrated today.

After four years at sea, Agate returned home in 1842. Shortly after he married Elizabeth Hill Kennedy. Unfortunately, only four months after their marriage, Agate died. His health had suffered from his various expeditions and he eventually succumbed to tuberculosis on January 5, 1846. He was 33.

Agate’s name, however, is remembered throughout the island he first helped document all those years ago.

Sources: “Picture Bainbridge,” Jack Swanson. Bainbridge Historical Society, 2002.
“Bainbridge Through Bifocals,” Elsie Frankland Marriott. Gateway Printing Co., 1941.
“A History of Bainbridge Island,” Katy Warner. 1968.

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers. If you have an island road story to share, email Ringland at elinorjoe@msn.com.

Street of the week: Beans Bight Road

Location: Runs off Upper Farms Road, just west of Restoration Point.

History: The farmer who first claimed the land above Blakely Harbor had a name reminiscent of two foods: Reuben Bean. It’s unknown whether either snack had anything to do with his move west from Maine; Bean was killed in 1859 before he could begin using his 148.5 acres.

Thirty-one years later, the newly formed Washington State Legislature authorized the purchase of Bean’s land. The resulting Fort Ward sits upon Bean Point. It protects the island’s curving south shoreline, geographically known as a “bight.”

Sources: “Picture Bainbridge,” Jack Swanson. Published by the Bainbridge Historical Society.
“The Story of the Little Fort at Bean Point,” Ivan W. Lee, Jr. & Lois B. Lee.

This occasional Islander series explores the history of island street names, as compiled by Elinor Ringland and fellow Bainbridge Island Historical Society volunteers. If you have an island road story to share, email Elinor at elinorjoe@msn.com.