PORT ANGELES — Ellsworth “Ells” Swett doesn’t understand what all the fuss is about.
The former Coast Guard lieutenant will take center stage — and be the focus of a Coast Guard helicopter flyby — when his family and friends throw him a 100th birthday party today.
Swett, who officially becomes a centenarian on Wednesday, was stationed at the Port Angeles Coast Guard base when it was commissioned as an air station in 1935.
The former Coast Guard Group/Air Station Port Angeles was recommissioned as Air Station/Sector Field Office Port Angeles on July 30 as part of a reorganization in Coast Guard command.
In 1935, Swett flew as a radioman on seaplanes that landed in Port Angeles Harbor and tied up to City Pier, said Jerry Sampont, Swett’s nephew.
Sampont and his wife, Louise, are hosting a private party for Swett at their Gales Addition home.
Ediz Hook and the Coast Guard station where Swett spent the bulk of his career loom below the bluff at the edge of the yard.
Being at the base when it became an air station makes Swett a “plank owner,” a club reserved for the first crew of a commissioned ship or station in the Coast Guard or Navy.
Barring a search and rescue operation or bad weather, the Coast Guard plans to fly a helicopter over Sampont’s home to honor the retired lieutenant at about 1:30 p.m.
A Coast Guard honor guard is also expected to attend the birthday, Sampont said.
Born in Spokane in 1910, Swett enlisted in the Navy at the age of 17. He served as an radioman on submarines in Hawaii.
In 1931, Swett transferred to the Coast Guard.
“He got out of the Navy because they wouldn’t send him to the South Pacific,” Sampont said.
“That’s where he wanted to go.”
After joining the Coast Guard, Swett was transferred to Port Angeles, where he worked on the cutter Snohomish.
Snohomish was a coal-burning tug that in earlier years had chased rum-runners during the Prohibition-era, Sampont said.
Sampont said his uncle was a “great fisherman and hunter” who stayed active late into his life.
“He would go out fishing and crabbing when he was 93,” said Louise Sampont, Jerry Sampont’s wife.
“He was out there pulling his weight, you know, pulling the pots,” Jerry said.
Swett also worked at Coast Guard stations in Seattle, Westport, St. Matthew Island, Alaska, New London, Conn., Elizabeth City, N.C., and St. Petersburg, Fla.
He retired as a lieutenant in 1957 after a 30-year career in the Navy and the Coast Guard.
“He could tell you a lot of stories,” Sampont said.
About a month ago, Swett’s health took a turn for the worst.
He is battling lung cancer and emphysema, and has trouble speaking.
“But his mind is good,” Sampont said.
“He has his good and his bad days.”
When reached by phone Sunday, Swett said Port Angeles is “the only place that fit” for him and his wife, Genny.
The couple married in 1947 and have lived permanently in Port Angeles since 1955.
Swett, who also goes by Ells, said he isn’t sure how the Coast Guard station now compares with the one he served.
“I haven’t been out there in so long, I have no idea,” he said.
“His dad and my dad put the plumbing in out there — and the pipes and guest pump,” Genny said.
When he was stationed at other Coast Guard stations, Swett would tell people it “rained all the time” in Port Angeles.
“He was very jealous of this place,” Genny said.
“I still think it’s the only place to live.”
Genny remembers Port Angeles having more grocery stores in the 1950s and 1960s.
“Now we just have Albertsons and Safeway,” she said.
Genny said her husband wishes he was “young enough to go up in the mountains again.”
Swett recalled seeing the Olympic Mountains for the first time from an airplane.
“He likes fishing, crabbing and hunting,” Genny said.
Jerry Sampont followed his uncle into the Coast Guard.
Two more generations of nephews have done the same.
After his retirement, Swett opened a TV repair business in Port Angeles.
He and Genny have one daughter, Sally Russell of Marysville.
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-417-3537 or at rob.ollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.
