PORT ANGELES — Family and friends of Terri and Woody Bertelson were rocking out to help them out on Sunday.
The Bertelsons’ Joyce home was damaged in a fire seven years ago on Easter, Terri Bertelson said.
Then in 2004, Woody was injured in an accident.
The fundraiser, held at Castaways in Port Angeles on Sunday, was to help the couple complete their new home.
The Bertelsons have lived in their two-story home for 17 years.
“We bought that house together when we got married,” Terri Bertelson said.
But in 2003, an electrical fire damaged much of the second story.
They inhabit the first floor.
“The entire upstairs was destroyed,” she said.
“For a long time we had the blue tarp up there on the roof, but then we finally got some plywood up there temporarily.
“Really, the house probably should have been totalled, but it wasn’t.”
The couple began building a new home behind the old one using insurance money, but in 2004, Woody was in a head-on collision in his logging truck.
He sustained serious cognitive injuries and has not been able to return to work, Terri Bertelson said.
“The medical bills basically put us in the poorhouse,” she said.
The medical bills mounted.
The Bertelsons depend on her salary from her job at Olympic Veterinary Clinic.
Heather Williams, who organized Sunday’s event, said the first goal is to get the foundation inspected and up to code.
Ultimately, her goal is to raise $80,000 to finish the house and put the final touches on it.
The money from the fundraiser at Castaways on Sunday hadn’t been totaled, but the bar was packed full of people listening to the Jimmy Hoffman Band and participating in the silent auction.
Silent auction items included everything from gift baskets to saws for logging.
Williams said she hopes that the funds raised can help put the couple over the top to finish the half-built house.
“We have already put about $40,000 of our own into it,” Terri Bertelson said.
The couple has seven children together — two are hers and five are his, all from previous marriages — but all are grown and not living at home.
“But right now we have about 800 square feet for the two of us,” Terri Bertelson said.
“We have a stairway going upstairs and that is completely boarded up,” she said.
The response for the fundraiser surprised her.
“This is more than we could have dreamed,” she said.
“We have been to our share of things and donated to many causes ourselves.
“We have always heard that what goes around comes around.
“But sometimes it isn’t exactly when or in the way that you think it will be.”
Family and friends have been busy getting permits, Terri Bertelson said.
They got a septic permit and a building permit this week.
“That will help immensely,” she said.
A Bertelson fund has been set up at West Sound Bank for those wishing to donate.
For more information on helping with the building of the house, phone Williams at 360-452-3603.
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Reporter Paige Dickerson can be reached at 360-417-3535 or at paige.dickerson@peninsuladailynews.com.
