NORDLAND — East Beach County Park was endangered last summer when the Jefferson County Parks and Recreation placed yellow tape at the entrance, blocking public use of the fallen-down picnic shelter and sandstone fireplace.
That spurred Marrowstone Island resident Mary Karen McHattie into action.
“I come down here almost every day and walk my dog on the beach,” she said of the park at the end of East Beach Road, east off Flagler Road.
“I just think it’s such a special place here.”
She put out a call for volunteers and donations of materials, and the project took off.
Celebration
About 24 volunteers worked to replace rotting poles supporting the shelter’s roof and rebuild the fireplace. Carl’s Building Supply and Cotton Redi-Mix, both in Port Hadlock, came through with the materials.
McHattie found stone mason Bob Hicks of Hicks Brick and Stone, who donated much of his time and materials, along with his co-workers, Roger Risling and Brian Snively.
The official ribbon-cutting on the refurbished park was Friday.
A smiling McHattie was joined by about 20 volunteers and county officials inside the chilly shelter, which was soon warmed after the restored fireplace was ceremoniously lit, exhibiting perfect draft up the gray, newly stuccoed chimney.
Another fire ring is being installed on the beach overlooking the waters and shipping traffic to and from the Seattle area east of Marrowstone.
Volunteers also cleaned up the grounds, a parking point for beach walkers along the island’s long eastern shore.
Model project
Matt Tyler, county parks and recreation manager, praised the volunteers in what he saw as a model project.
“None of us would have done anything if it wasn’t for Mary Karen,” said Tyler, addressing the group gathered around the fireplace that included Jefferson County commissioners David Sullivan and Phil Johnson, along with Philip Morley, county administrator.
Tyler presented McHattie with the county’s first “Big Dog Award,” which says, “If you can’t run with the big dogs, then stay on the porch.”
The county parks department has been struggling to maintain and repair the county’s 24 parks and other facilities in the face of a declining general fund and a maintenance backlog of about $4 million, Tyler said last fall.
He said then that his department — which has nearly eight full-time employees — depends upon some 175 volunteers who help keep the parks up.
Involved in or donating to the Friends of East Beach County Park project were Lawrence Johnson of Carl’s Building Supply, the Kurtzo Fund, Jefferson Land Trust, Jefferson County Historical Society, county parks and recreation and the Department of Community Development, Lisa Painter, Jeanne Clendenon, Tracy and Peter Wise, Rita Kepner, in memory of Robbie Robinson, John Matthiesen, Conserve Water First and other individuals.
Volunteer workers were Marjorie and John Illman, Jo and Roger Beachy, Scott Campbell, Daniel Collins, Candice Cole, John Pate, Patricia Earnest, Ray Harker, Mary TennBrink, Denny Justice, Lauri Chambers, Hank Hazen, Bill Kepner, Owen Mulkey, Tom and Jean Ollard, Joyce Johnson, Willi Smothers, Janet Welch, Robert Doerflein and Garth McHattie.
“It was a real community effort and I think we had fun,” Mary Karen McHattie said.
Park history
According to the book, Marrowstone, by Karen Russell and Jeanne Beane, published in 1978, Jacob Johnson and Carl Jensen in the late 1930s donated 100 feet of waterfront land to the county for use as a public park, which was then situated on the farm Jensen shared with his wife, Inga.
It was named East Beach Park.
The Works Progress Administration sent a work crew to build the picnic shelter with logs, according to the book.
A shingled bathhouse, outhouses and several outdoor cooking grills were installed with a lower bulkhead constructed to protect the shelter from high tides and winter winds.
It became a popular gathering place for school picnics and social clubs.
“When the tide was very low in the summer, the men used the hard flat beach for a baseball field,” the book says.
The Nordland Garden Club later assumed responsibility for cleaning up the beach and park grounds and planting roses and shrubs around the log shelter and bathhouse.
________
Port Townsend-Jefferson County Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.
