Family History During Covid

When Covid 19 hit in 2020, I was forced to put aside my research project on Seattle Architect Ellsworth Storey due to the lack of access to the Storey archives at the University of Washington. So, when looking for another project to occupy my time during lockdown I returned to a project that I had started many years ago regarding transcribing my great grandmother Anna Anderson Johnson's diary. Anna was my mother's father's mother. She immigrated from Sweden with her husband Peder Johnson in the early years of the Twentieth Century having been recruited by the Church of Latter- Day Saints (Mormon). Her diary tells the story of trying to eke out a living on various farms in Utah and eventually in Naf, Idaho, on a god-forsaken homestead. I also had the memoirs of her son, my great uncle Bert, so I added that and wrote some background and added a number of family photos. I finished that project in 2023, and published the result as Hardscrabble.

As Hardscrabble covered much of the early family history on my mother's side, I thought it would be only fair to tell the story of my father's family, focusing on the grandparent's Erick and Ella Johnson who also emigrated from Sweden in the early 1900s. Since I didn't have a memoir of diary to work with, I had the do a bit of research and rely on my memories of my father's parents. I especially enjoyed writing about the wonderful Christmas Eves I spent as a child at their small north Seattle house that had been imported from Scandinavia in the 1950s. I finished the small book on my 75th birthday and published it in November of 2024—Erick & Ella Komma Till Amerika.

Ellsworth Storey Research

Since the early 1970s I have been interested in the work of Seattle architect Ellsworth Storey who practiced in Seattle from 1904 until the Great Depression essentially ended his career. His designs were generally quirky, standing out from the from the standard eclectic interpretations of his fellow practitioners.

After my retirement I finally had time to research his accumulated works seriously. I found a database builder, Tap Forms, that was easy to set up and started with the projects I already knew about. I then Looked through the Seattle Times archives for Storey projects and was about to start looking through the collected drawings the professor Victor Steinbrueck had donated to the University of Washington when COVID shut down Special Collections where the archive was kept. I had to set aside the project for a couple of years and work on other projects until the archive was once again available.

I've Spent the last six months visiting the library once a week and working through the catalog with the assistance of University of Washington graduate student and archivist, Kelly Daviduke.

I'm also thankful to have a copy of a thesis written in 1994 by University of Washington graduate student Chistine Carr focusing on Storey's residential projects.

I am getting close to finishing my initial look through the drawings. Here is a sample page from the database:

Sauna Project

I usually spend a couple of nights a week at my cabin on the north Fork of the Stillaguamish River. For the last three years I have been building a deck and sauna connected to the guest hut. Last week I finally got the benches in and I should be close to done this week.