Potential creek names draw out family histories

Kingston Parks, Trails and Open Space committee is putting together a ballot with a narrowed down list that will be circulated at the Kingston Farmers’ Market on the Fourth of July.

Now that suggestions to name seven Kingston creeks have been submitted by community members, the Kingston Parks, Trails and Open Space committee is putting together a ballot with a narrowed down list that will be circulated at the Kingston Farmers’ Market on the Fourth of July.

At that time, the community will have a chance to vote for their favorite names, said Karl Compton of KPTOS who is leading the project. KPTOS will take that input then make final decisions for each creek, based not only on which name gets the most votes but also taking into consideration the historical significance of the suggestions and letters of support from members of families the creeks might be named after. The Kingston Community News will reprint the ballot in the July issue.

Of the names suggested, Osier Creek (Creek #2 on the map) and Fukuzawa Creek (Creek #5 on the map) have brought forward family members who in support have provided a glimpse into their histories which are briefly recounted here.

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The Washington State Board on Geographic Names, a branch of the Department of Natural Resources, requires an application for each proposed name. The Board reaches a decision on a name proposal based on an accurate description of the feature, a complete history and justification for the name that best serves the public interest, and clear supporting information. KPTOS hopes to have applications to the Board in September, Compton said.

The Osier family:

a legacy of critters, a creek and love of the land

By Rebecca Pirtle

Cherie Rogers remembers watching her great-grandmother, Blanche Osier, slowly twisting a mayonnaise jar off the head of an unlucky skunk that had gotten stuck trying to sneak a snack. Once freed, the skunk headed off into the woods – without spraying its rescuer. Another time, Rogers said she attended a funeral for Blanche’s cat, Tom, who was laid to rest in a miniature coffin she had built and lined with satin. These were just two of “hundreds of little incidents” Rogers recalls about her great-grandmother who was a nature lover and raised goats, bees, chickens and sheep.

“She could pick out what kind of seaweed, what mushrooms to eat,” Rogers said. “We were so lucky when we were kids, spending time there.”

The headwaters of what is proposed to be named Osier (pronounced O-zur) Creek start south of Jefferson Beach Road at a beaver pond. The creek runs through a steep ravine lined with second-growth fir and cedar, stinging nettle, deer paths and old-growth stumps charred by a long-ago fire, with telltale notches where loggers balanced on springboards. The creek runs along property once owned by Blanche and Howard Osier off the outer Taree loop road before it flows into Apple Tree Cove.

The Osier house is still there, surrounded by stunning gardens, huge rhododendrons and a cedar grove where extended family and friends would gather for a Fourth of July picnic before heading down to the beach to watch fireworks. The house and surrounding five acres are now owned by Tad Parrington and occupied by renters who have helped restore the house and maintain the gardens.

Howard and Blanche Osier, known as “Pap” and “Mam” to their family, moved to the house in the 1930s from Bellingham where they had met and fallen in love. Howard worked for a lumber mill in the area and later for Washington State Ferries. They had a daughter, Helen, now deceased, and son, Dick, 82, who lives in Redding, Calif. Helen had two daughters, Kay and Becky. Kay’s children are Michelle, Bobby and Cherie, all raised in Kingston. Rogers now lives on Bainbridge Island and shared photos and family history after she heard the creek might be named for her great-grandparents .

The house has had a few changes to it, including the big picture window that the Osiers put in, which Rogers said came from a school that was being torn down.

Joe Alexander, a photographer who also made fishing flies he sold to retail stores in the Seattle area, owned the house before the Osiers. When the Osiers bought it, the house came full of Alexander’s furnishings, letters and hundreds of glass photograph slides, some of which depict early Kingston community gatherings, Rogers said. She’s sorted through the slides and hopes to donate some of them to the Kingston Historical Society. Her former stepfather, Bob Johnson, is an enthusiastic member of the society.

Letters from family members supporting the Osier name for the creek were given to the Kingston Parks, Trail and Open Space Committee. One great-grandson, Sgt. Michael Osier, who recently returned from duty in Iraq, pointed out that ‘Osier’ is a French word meaning ‘willow tree;’ there is also a red-twigged dogwood species called ‘osier’ that by coincidence is indigenous to the area. Michael’s dad, Jim, now living in California, wrote to KPTOS, “… for my father’s sake, please feel compelled to name this obscure creek after a legacy that began on this parcel of earth.”

Blanche and Howard are buried in the Kingston Cemetery. Howard died in 1973, Blanche in 1974.

The legacy they left behind wasn’t a long list of great accomplishments, rather a love of life, of family, community, the cove, creek, forest and creatures inhabiting it.

The Fukuzawa family, their farm and

connection to the creek

By Karl Compton

(EDITOR’S NOTE: Information for this article was drawn from “The Story of My Life” by Jun Fukuzawa, a self-published history of the Fukuzawa family in Kingston.)

Shortly after Kingston was founded in 1890, Toshisaburo Fukuzawa came to America to make an opportunity for himself working on the railroads and lumber mills of the Pacific Northwest. By the end of World War I he had established himself and so returned to his home in Japan and married his wife, Yoko. In Japan, his family were successful farmers and had provided their son with a formal education before sending him abroad.

With this background, Toshisaburo and Yoko chose Kingston as the place they would make their new life as vegetable and strawberry farmers. Several children soon followed, and after several years of work they saved enough money to buy their own approximately 20 acres of property on the outskirts of Kingston. The property was purchased from another older Japanese farming couple, the Ukegawas, for $3,000. The farm had a large field and lots of apple, plum, cherry and pear trees. Occasionally they would hitch up their horse and buggy to bring their produce to market in Kingston. This property, where the Fukuzawa family farm still stands, is just north of the meadow next to Highway 104 and is transected by one of Kingston’s very special little unnamed creeks.

In the early 1930s, Toshiaburo built a small Japanese-style hot tub over the creek that ran behind the farm house. It was made of wood with a copper bottom and had a little fire pit underneath. Yoko would start a fire each day at noon so that the water would be hot for Toshiaburo to enjoy a good soak after working all day in the fields. The Fukuzawa children were educated at Kingston’s original four-room schoolhouse and recall spending summers digging clams at the beach and fishing at the abandoned ferry pier called Newell’s dock in South Kingston or watching the occasional meteor shower. As a farming family, they didn’t do very well during the Great Depression but with a good bit of hard work they managed to survive. Sometimes in the spring they would need to run up a line of credit at the Andre Clay General Store in Kingston for store bought goods to meet their needs.

When World War II started, the family was sent to an internment camp in Pinedale, Calif. near Fresno and then to Tule Lake, Calif. near the Oregon border. The eldest son, Jun Fukuzawa completed high school at a camp in Heart Mountain, Wyo. and promptly enlisted in the U.S. Army serving through the end of the war with an all-Japanese combat brigade in Italy. It was also at Heart Mountain that eldest sister Yukie Fukuzawa completed her education and served in the Cadet Nurse Corps.

After the war, Toshisaburo and Yoko worked as domestic helpers in Seattle before getting their family all back together and making their return to the family farm in Kingston in 1946. The Fukuzawas restarted the farm and maintained it for several years while the children continued their educations, got married and moved away for new careers and opportunities. Eventually the family farm was sold and the Fukuzawas left Kingston, having enriched the community as good farmers and neighbors.

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