Henrietta's House

If you were to be invited into the parlor of Henrietta Baker's house, you might not be able to stand upright--that is if you were older than ten or eleven. When Henrietta's parents, Henry and Clara, built the playhouse for Henrietta in 1905, she was 11 years old and an only child. A Victorian-style home in miniature, Henrietta's house was situated beside the Baker family home at 428 Crescent Street. The playhouse was fashioned with horizontal siding below and scallops under the sharp peaks of the roof. Inside all was gracious and elegant. It was furnished with child-sized furniture, the walls were papered with colorful spidery flowers, filmy curtains were hung at the windows, and small-scale oriental rugs were laid on the floors. And there were dolls. Lots and lots of dolls. The black and white photo featured here (used with permission from Fort Walla Walla Museum) shows Henrietta and many of her doll friends standing on her house's front porch, probably soon after the house was completed.

The Baker name is a familiar one in Walla Walla. Henrietta's grandfather, Dorsey Syng Baker, was a pioneer doctor and railroad builder. He organized the company that built a line from Walla Walla to Wallula and he was a prominent local business man.

Now her lovely little playhouse stands at Fort Walla Walla Museum and is one of many fascinating buildings in their Pioneer Village. I visited the museum when I first moved to town a few years ago and was intrigued by its small-scale design and charming furnishings. Buildings are of course more than structures; they are manifestations of the people who built them or inhabited them. I wondered what the story was with this very cherished and privileged little girl.

I tracked Henrietta through the years using old issues of the Union Bulletin. She grew up as girls generally do: she went to Sharpstein Elementary, she performed as a snowdrop in a children's opera, she attended St.Paul's School, and she graduated from Whitman College in 1914. But no one would call Henrietta a typical young woman of the times. Her degree was in mathematics, unusual for the that era, and she even taught math for a while at Whitman College during World War ll. She married Lincoln Earl Kennedy and she had a son and a daughter. Outside of work and home she was an energetic participant in community activities and organizations. She was a member of PEO, Phi Beta Kappa, and the Arts Club, and she was an actress in the Little Theater production of Harvey, a charming play featuring sweet, gentle Elwood Dowd, who insists he sees a giant rabbit (invisible to everyone but him.) Henrietta was cast as Elmer's staid, conventional, disbelieving sister and got good reviews for her performance. The Union-Bulletin said Henrietta "carried the brunt of the acting burden with eloquence and feeling." The role must have been a challenge for Henrietta since in real life she was anything but conventional.

In fact, she was somewhat of a character. She gave numerous lectures. She spoke to the Phi Beta Kappa chapter; her talk was "A Mathematician Looks at the Idea of God." And her speech for the Seattle Northgate Brunch Club gives us even more insight into Henrietta's personality. The title of her talk was "You Never Know What She Will Say," and in the advanced publicity for the speech Henrietta is quoted as saying that "being alive is wonderful. She says it all in one breath. She is a mother. She runs a home and cooks and writes stories and poems. She went to several colleges and won all the honors in mathematics---unimportant, she thinks compared to making good pie dough and stitching a neat seam."

Yes, she even wrote books--two of them. In later life she traveled extensively and then organized grand group tours of Europe.

But while Henrietta was flourishing, her little playhouse was languishing. The house remained at Crescent Street until Henrietta's parents moved to Park Street and relocated it there. It was moved again in 1970 to serve as a storage shed at the Kennedy's cabin on Mill Creek. Over the years the house fell into serious disrepair, and her grandson encouraged Henrietta to donate it to Fort Walla Walla Museum to make sure the little treasure of a house be saved. A trust for its maintenance accompanied its donation and local PEO chapters provided for its restoration. Happily, Henrietta was able to guide its repair and furnishing based on her memories. In 1986 the little house came to rest in the grounds of Fort Walla Walla Museum's Pioneer Village, where it can be seen today.

Go to Fort Walla Walla and visit the little house. You can peer into each of the rooms through one of the many windows and pretend you have been invited to spend the day there by that very interesting little girl, Henrietta Baker.

Walla Walla's Sweet Tooth

When I say Walla Walla Sweets, I am not referring to baseball or onions. I am talking candy. Residents and visitors certainly appreciate Bright's on Main Street and many remember fondly the many years Russell's Candy was in business. But there is a "ghost sign" on an elegant brick building at 108 South Third that marks Walla Walla Candy Co., an important business in our town's candy history. The sign is faint, but one can make out "Manufacturers and Jobbers." The candy made in this factory was sold wholesale--all over town and beyond. This company existed for years with various owners and different names, but maintained the tradition of supplying the sweet stuff to young and old. An 1889 ad says that the Walla Walla Candy Company (then on Main Street) are "Manufacturers of the Finest French and American Candies and Confectionery. Tropical and domestic Fruits and Nuts. Arctic Soda, Ice Cream and Oysters in their Season." Oysters? Yes, oyster sales often went hand in hand with candy, and many places that you could buy candy sold tobacco too. The vocation of candy maker could be a prestigious one. The Walla Walla Candy Company brought Earl Remington Davenport and his family all the way from Seattle in 1927 to be "head confectioner" and manage their company. By this time the company was owned by two gentlemen whose names Bybee and Burton merged into Burbee, and the Burbee Candy Company became famous not only for their chocolates, but for also for their Bingo Bar. (I'd love to know what a Bingo Bar consisted of. )

Not all candy was made in a factory though. In 1929 the City Directory listed eight "Confectioners, Retail." Besides the larger businesses, such as "Den of Sweets" and "Keyes Confectionery," you could also buy candy from ladies such as "Mrs. Dunnington" and "Mrs. Irene Owen"--probably selling their homemade fudge or divinity from their homes. And of course there is the tobacco connection again. Van's Cigar Store is listed as a candy retailer. Lutcher's, of "Chief Smoke" (the Cigar Store Indian) fame sold candy along with tobacco products.

Walla Walla folks have always appreciated their sweets; the 1931 directory lists an equal number of Retail Confectioners and Dentists. The Union Bulletin stated that in the immediate prewar years Americans ate an average of 19 pounds of candy a year. World War II did make a difference as to the availability of candy due to sugar shortages and rationing. The UB talks about sugar shortages affecting candy makers nationally in 1944. An ad for Russell's says "Candy Hungry? We are at it again as far as it goes---" implying they were getting back to normal candy production after years of war-time sugar rationing.

Candy in Walla Walla is still in good hands, but what happened to that lovely old building on south 3rd after the Walla Walla Candy Company left it? Duff's Creamery moved in in 1933 and operated from there until 1969. After that the building was occupied by a calculator company and then was briefly an art gallery. Vacant since 1983, the windows are boarded and it has a desolate look. Happily, though, we still have the ghost signs on both sides of the charming brick building to remind us of the richness, variety, and history of Walla Walla "sweets."

Thanks, Joe Drazan for the 1923 photo of the Walla Walla Candy Company

Baumeister Building: Made With Metal

I can't walk by the elegant mauve and gray Baumeister Building without rapping one of its columns with my knuckles. Each rap is answered by a gratifying metallic clunk because this building is a "Mesker" and that means it's faced by a "galvanized storefront system." All its lovely ornamentation that looks carved and handmade is actually pressed sheet metal, a combination of galvanized steel and cast-iron. A small plaque affixed to the column identifies it as such. " Mesker Bros, Front Builders" it says. The manufacture of metal fronts for buildings began in the eastern U. S. in the 1840s and by mid-century there were foundries throughout the United Sates. The builders of the Baumeister Building ordered its sheet metal facade from the Mesker Brothers Ironworks of St Louis. A builder chose a front from a catalog, had it shipped by railroad, and--voila--he had a ready-made, durable and attractive front ready to affix to the structure. 

Also fabricated in metal, over the second story windows, is stamped big and bold that Max Baumeister built this structure and he did it in 1889. When it was first built the address in the city directory was listed as "between 2nd and 3rd" but now we find it by going to 27 West Main. Max Baumeister was a real estate and insurance agent in partnership with Harry Reynolds. You might expect that Mr. Baumeister would set up his own office in his handsome new building, but he worked from 8 E. Main and later he occupied space in the impressive Die Brucke building, which he also built. 

I spent many enjoyable hours poring over old city directories in the library and was able to discover what businesses occupied the downstairs spaces and for how long. The Walla Walla Savings Bank moved in there in 1889, the year the Baumeister was built, but over the years these high-ceilinged, big-windowed stores were mainly occupied by sporting goods stores such as Meyer and Keeny, which was not only a place you could buy a bicycle, but also a "rentery." Their ad in the 1901 city directory promised "Sporting Goods, Guns, Ammunition, and Bicycles", and you could get advice about your choice of a gun from Pleasant Le Francis, "gunsmith." The tradition of sports shop was carried on by Jackson's, who in the 30's often photographed hunters posed with their trophy deer in front of the shop. The sign in the window behind the hunters in one photograph says "Bargains-Balloon Tire Bicycles, $31.95 and Up." Ann Hamada, whose colorful quilt shop, Stash, occupies one of the store fronts today, remembers Soper's Leather Goods as being there when she was a child. Soper's sold more than leather; it also carried sporting goods. Ann told me that a gentleman came into Stash one day and asked her if she'd noticed any bullet holes in the basement walls. He remembered doing some target practice down there when he was young.

Doug Saturno, who owns the Baumeister (and restored it with such care), met with me, talked about his building's history, and--best of all--gave me a tour of the offices upstairs that are accessed via a marble-lined stariway. The halls have high ceilings; the offices are spacious and gracious. I was able to see where a long list of dentists and lawyers and real estate agents had their practices. The office number I sought was 211 and I was gratified to see that its large, light main office had an enviable view of Main Street below. You see, I chose to write about the Baumeister Building because it has some personal significance for me. My husband Mark and I live in a 102-year-old home built by S. E. (Sam) King, an attorney who had his office in # 211 in the Baumeister for many years, starting in 1906. I like to imagine Sam walking to work from Thorne Street. I'm guessing he took the quickest route, which was north on First to Main. Sam King may have taken the streetcar on cold days; a 1910 postcard shows a streetcar running right in front of the Baumeister. But I expect he walked if he could--up a pleasant street of big shady trees and handsome houses and then turning left onto Main, and in a few blocks there he was at the Baumeister, a metal beauty of a building.

Thanks, Joe Drazan for the historic photo (1890).

The BeeHive

There is a fond place in the hearts of many Walla Walla folks for the Bee Hive Building on the corner of First and Main. Built of dark red brick and featuring tall, gracefully curved upstairs windows, it now houses several businesses. It's really the Sayer building, named for the man who built it in 1890, but everybody calls it "The Bee Hive" because they remember the department store that was there for so many years. "You could buy anything you wanted at The Bee Hive," June told me. June's 88, but younger people, too, have vivid memories of what they bought there as late as the 70's. "Blue Bell Jeans," says Ron. Tina (too young to have any Bee Hive experiences herself) says her grandma went there every Christmas to buy still another Mr. Potato Head for Tina's father. "Oh, yes, the toys," says Diane, "all displayed upstairs at Christmas time on huge tables, and downstairs way at the back you sat on little metal tools to try on shoes."

That's what people told me about the Bee Hive Department Store, but when I shared my findings that the building was for many years also a lodging house, most were surprised. The 1892 city directory tells me that at first several separate businesses operated from the Sayer Building: Mr. Lynch, Steamfitter, Mrs. Howells of the Elite Dressmaking Parlor, and Regal Shoes with Mr. Schumaker (I am not making that up) in charge. Kind of an early mini-mall. The directory also says that Mrs. Howells and Mr. Schumaker had their "res" in the building as well as their businesses. I had trouble imagining Mrs. Howells setting up a cot amongst her dressmaker forms and sewing machines. And how could one have as many as seven men and women living in one building without "facilities" and privacy and some kind of communal space for Alonzo Robbins, "horsebreaker," and John Clary, "marker" at the Walla Walla Laundry, to have a friendly chat at the end of the day? Even though the directories say exactly who had their addresses at "The Bee Hive Lodging House" year after year, there was no way of knowing how the space was divided. I wanted the lodging to have been upstairs where the residents could enjoy the light from the windows and a view of the activity of Main Street, but how the lodgers and businesses occupied the building was going to be a history mystery and I'd never know for sure. Well, I wouldn't have known if it hadn't been for the fire.

So newsworthy was the blaze at the Sayer Building in May of 1902, that the Spokane Spokesman covered it. The fire broke out just before midnight, the paper said, and "In the building are the Bee Hive Store, conducted by William Ferguson and the Bee Hive Lodging House overhead." Although some of the stock and most of the floor was damaged in the store space below, no one was seriously hurt. All the residents escaped early, the news story reported, except "Winfield Scott Taylor, a ranch hand, who in trying to get out, lost his way, stumbled into a closet...and when found by fireman after an hour was almost suffocated."

Mystery solved. The lodging component of the Bee Hive was "overhead" and the lodgers did have the high ceiling rooms I wanted them to have, with the the lovely views of the growing town below. Over its twenty years it must have been comfortable and gracious enough to satisfy the superintendent of the hospital James Mullinix, and his wife (who was the hospital matron), plus carpenters, farmers, painters, and several widows and single ladies and gentlemen.

Mr. Ferguson's inventory must have grown and his need for space increased, because by 1910 the directories no longer mention the Bee Hive Lodging House or list its residents.. For years the Bee Hive Department Store's slogan was the same: "Why Pay More When You Can Buy for Less at the Beehive?" and it continued to sell "fabrics, cotton union suits, boy's trousers, soap, brassieres, junior dresses, toys" and more until the late 1970s, when it closed.

If you walk into the Main Street door of Starbuck's or through the South First entrance to The Coffee Perk, you are in the spaces where business was done and goods were sold by the Bee Hive Department Store. But if you climb the stairs that now lead to the Bee Hive Salon, you can imagine yourself a resident of the Bee Hive Lodging House, where you would have occupied one of those comfortable, sunny upstairs rooms with the high ceilings and terrific views.

Thanks, Joe Drazan for the 1910 photo of the Bee Hive.