Kitsap Museum Audio Tour

Welcome to Main Street, Kitsap County, with its storefronts depicting life in the county in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Many of the artifacts are from actual stores that existed in the county and others are taken from the museum’s extensive collections. Several storefronts have been given names reflecting real businesses that existed in the county. This exhibit honors a generous bequest from the Keith Birkenfeld estate. You have just passed through an archway that was part of the Washington School. Located in Bremerton, at the corner of what are now Burwell and Montgomery Streets, the school was built in 1919, extended in 1930 and demolished in the late 1990s. The metal sign at the entrance to Main Street is a crossing guard sign. These signs were placed in the middle of the road to protect students crossing the street to and from school. The sign is named ‘Betsy’ and was modeled after the daughter of Art Morken, Bremerton’s Chief of Police in the 1920s.

During pioneer times, both getting to school and preparing for the school day required work. Imagine having to walk through the woods, ride a horse or even row a boat to go to school each day. As one person recalled “I was going up into Port Washington Bay…and passed the place just as school was being dismissed, and I never shall forget the sight of these children climbing into their canoes and scattering in all directions.” When students arrived they were given chores such as bringing in water from a nearby stream or well, gathering and chopping wood for the wood stove, cleaning the kerosene lamps and ringing the school bell.

Schools were usually one-room buildings where all grades were taught together. At any one time, students from different grades would be doing math on individual slates with chalk or writing using pens made of bird feathers (with the end sharpened to a point), or quill; pens were dipped into an ink well fitted into each wooden desk. Teachers were often not much older than the students.

The school building also served as a community gathering place and a place for worship. The ringing of the bell signaled the start and end of each school day, the announcement of religious services and, if rung continuously at any time, an emergency. Above the roof, in the belfry, is the bell from the Tracyton School. It was shipped from San Francisco and installed in 1909.

In Kitsap County, the mill towns were the first to have a store. These were ‘company stores’ run by the mill owners to supply the loggers, mill workers, sailors and neighboring Indians with basic items and a few luxuries. They stocked everything from fresh produce and fruit to eggs, spices in tins, cloth, and dogfish oil for lamps. These stores also outfitted the sailing vessels that were loaded at the mills with lumber for different parts of the world. As settlements grew, the General Store, or ‘Mercantile’, was a focal point for residents to meet and talk while buying necessities (such as flour, sugar, cloth). Some stores had a Post Office, frequently located in a corner of the store. Telephones were rare in private homes but calls could be made at the store by picking up the receiver, or ear-piece, clicking the lever to attract the attention of the operator, and speaking into the mouthpiece to ask the operator to connect you. No rotary dials and no keypads! Many settlers raised vegetables, grew berries, or had orchards. Whenever anyone had too much to use fresh, or preserve, for themselves the excess would be bartered between neighbors for items that they could not grow for themselves. Sometimes thing went awry, such as the Great Tomato Experience. “We planted lots of tomatoes and they produced prolifically. Dad loaded the flat-bed wagon with the crimson harvest and headed out toward Port Orchard to vend house-to-house. Well, it was a good year for tomatoes; everybody had more of the things than they could use, or give away. It was a good thing we had pigs that absolutely loved them…Next year we had no pigs but lots of tomatoes growing in the old pig-pen.”

Kitsap County has been home to several well-known photographers. The Curtis brothers, Edward and Asahel lived next door to the Gorst family, between Bremerton and Port Orchard. Edward and his father, a Civil War veteran, came here from Minnesota in 1897 thinking the climate would be better for Johnson Curtis’ health. Edward’s mother, sister Eva and brother arrived the next year. Edward was always interested in photography and after a few years, both brothers opened photographic studios in Seattle. Edward became known for his photographs of Native Americans and Asahel for his photographs of nature, agriculture and industry. Both brothers acted as guides on Mt. Rainier and Asahel helped start REI, the big Seattle outfitting company. Harry Ward was another well-known photographer from Kitsap County who lived in Port Orchard. His photographs document many events throughout the county from the 1920s to the 1940s. Photographers have used several different types of cameras over the years. The large cameras in this exhibit are similar to those used by these three men and are the kind where the photographer placed a covering over his head and the rear of the camera to cut out the light. This was known as a focusing cloth, or ‘dark cloth’. The photograph frame on the left in the window is an example of ‘Tramp Art’. German and Scandinavian immigrants traveled the country from 1870 to 1930 selling their ‘Tramp Art’. Using wood from cigar boxes, geometric shapes were cut, pieced together and layered to produce boxes, lamps, picture frames, and even some furniture. Kitsap County welcomed many families of European and Scandinavian descent and one young schoolgirl wrote: There were lots of Swedes and Norwegians, and Scandinavians too.

In the early days of the county, towns didn’t have hospitals, but they did have doctors. With few roads and homesteads scattered in the surrounding countryside, doctors made house calls. Each doctor had to be his own pharmacist and folk remedies used in ‘the old country’ were also used here. As settlements grew, a doctor would set up an office to receive patients who made the trip into town. Dr. John Schutt, whose diplomas you see on the walls, was one of the first doctors in the county to have a clinic. A doctor’s office had a stock of medicines kept in bottles frequently labeled in Latin. Each office had an examination table such as the one seen here, which is from the museum’s collections. Water drawn from a well was put into a jug and poured into a basin, or ewer. The instruments, books, and jars in this exhibit were all used in doctor’s offices through the county. In 1908 a young girl had to have her tooth pulled by Dr. Creelman, a local dentist. It cost 25¢ for an extraction and he gave her 10¢ because she was “such a good girl”. At that, her brother made a big fuss so the doctor had to give him 10¢ also. Which meant Dr. Creelman got 5¢!

Notice the stairway to the left of the office. Many buildings were two-story with different businesses on the ground and second floors. Above a store or business might be a hotel or law office. Above, on the left, you can see signs for an Attorney’s office and for a Title Abstractor. Above the doctor’s office is the Eagle Hotel which actually existed in Bremerton in the early 1900s.

Diseases such as chicken pox were often deadly so the infected person was isolated and quarantined. Signs were posted to warn people to maintain the quarantines and stop the spread of the disease.

The word “Emporium” means a trade center or store carrying a diversity of items, from clothing to household goods. The museum has extensive collections of textiles, clothing accessories, household goods, glass, china and furniture. The museum’s volunteer registrar/curator changes the exhibit with the seasons or to reflect events of interest to the community, and to show the diversity of items carried in such a store. The “Emporium” was the early version of the department store. In Bremerton, the first true department store was opened after World War I by Sophia and Matilda Bremer (the widow and daughter of William Bremer, the town’s founder).

1908 was the year of the start of the Kitsap County Bank, organized by George Miller in Port Orchard who operated it until 1914. Frank Langer was president of the bank from1923 to 1952. Frank’s widow, Hannah Langer, took over the position after his death rather than selling the bank. She became the first woman bank president west of the Mississippi River. Their daughter, Helen Langer Smith, later became the bank president. At the bottom of the case, on the left, is a check writer, also known as a check protector. First introduced in 1870, check writers punch holes, or leave inked impressions, in the shapes of the numbers of the value of the check, thus protecting it from being changed. On the right is a blotter to absorb excess ink on documents. In the 1930s, during the Depression, ‘Bank Night’ helped draw audiences to movie theaters. Bremerton’s Rialto Theater had a drawing during intermission for items donated by banks. No purchase was necessary other than buying a movie ticket. The window on the right of the Bank exhibit shows some of the dishes donated for ‘Bank Night’. Colonel W.L. Ames, a Civil War veteran, became the first superintendant of the Veterans Home at Retsil, near Port Orchard, which opened in 1908. Governor Lister was in office at the time and the name ‘Retsil’ is his name spelled backwards. Colonel Ames’ butter dish is shown here. Above the bank exhibit is a window depicting the office of Lent’s Plumbing and Heating, a Bremerton business since the early 1900s.

George Moeller first opened a jewelry store on Cambrian Avenue in Charleston, a part of Bremerton, in 1918. In 1927 he moved the store to Farragut Avenue. George Moeller and his son John sold jewelry and also sold and repaired all kinds of clocks and watches. In 1954, John moved the store to Callow Avenue, also in Charleston, and operated it until his death in 2003. The work bench, clocks and all the tools were all used by George and John Moeller. Outside the Callow Avenue store was a Joseph Mayer street clock. The clock has been restored and is now in its original location on Callow Avenue. It is similar to the Jorgen Nelson clock outside this museum. Jorgen Nelson was also a jeweler with a store on Pacific Avenue. Both clocks were repaired, renovated and re-erected by the Tacoma branch of the National Association of Watch and Clock Collectors.

Homesteaders needed feed and equipment for their farms. Many items were made by a cooper or blacksmith. A ‘cooper’ made wooden barrels and then bound them with metal hoops, or staves. Barrels were used to store many things, even nails. Some of the museum’s collections of blacksmith’s and cooper’s tools are shown here. On the right-hand wall, near to the door, is a saw gauge used in the sharpening of saw blades. There are a variety of items that were needed on any homestead, many of them fashioned by a blacksmith or by the homesteaders themselves. Note the beautiful wheel of the fence-line marker (far right). Also note the egg carton maker in the center. In the front of the exhibit is a candle holder known as a ‘sticking tommy’. With a hook to hang on a miner’s cap, and a spike to stick into a wood support or crevice in the wall, this tool was made by blacksmiths and used in the mining, fishing and shipbuilding trades. This particular example was used in the 1880s by William Copland, who worked at the Hall Brothers Shipyard at Port Blakely Mill, on Bainbridge Island.

The Bremerton Fire Department was used as the model for this exhibit. At first, the hose and ladder wagons were pulled by men. In 1903, Bremerton had its first horse-drawn wagon, but then there was no money left for the purchase of horses. The problem was solved by offering $5 to the man who could get a team of horses to the firehouse first after the alarm was sounded. The result was chaos as wagons were abandoned in the streets because the drivers had unhitched their horses in order to race to the firehouse. In 1904 the city purchased a team of horses and the financial offer was withdrawn. Motor-driven fire trucks eventually replaced the horse-drawn wagons. In 1915, Bremerton purchased its first motor-driven fire truck. A photograph in the exhibit shows the Bremerton Firehouse in the early 1930s. The long brass pole along the floor of the exhibit is the fire pole from that firehouse. Too long to be placed upright in the exhibit, it could also be considered an ‘attractive nuisance’. We didn’t want anyone to try climbing it, so it was placed on the floor! Fireproof helmets were essential equipment in fighting fires. The second one on the left is made of leather, a better material than metal, which got hot! Fire hoses were of two types. You can see one round hose on the cart and the other that is flat. The vise on the ground was used to flatten the hose to store it more efficiently when not in use. Many early Fire Departments were manned by volunteers. As towns grew in size, some changed to paid staff. Bremerton’s Fire Department changed to paid status in 1920 and Shippy B. Lent, of the Lent’s Plumbing family, was the first Fire Chief.