Perhaps you are reading this column, month after month, maybe even for the past three years, with a family album of 19th-century photographs still in storage; and, with the nagging thought of doing something about it one of these days. If so, I hope to inspire you with the story of Richard Guttormsen’s gift of Edith Blackman’s Album to the Snohomish Historical Society this past August.
Richard grew up in Everett, with his parents but in his grandmother’s house on Hoyt Avenue. He raised his own family in Lakewood, Washington and when his mother died in 1984, his grandmother’s effects, including her Victorian album of family portraits, were passed on to him, which he kept in a box in his garage for over 20 years!
His grandmother was Edith Blackman, who was born in Maine to Elhanan and Francis in 1871. The following year the four Blackman brothers and families migrated to the Pacific Northwest. Edith was the only child in the group that most likely traveled by ship around Cape Horn to San Francisco, then to Port Gamble for work with the Pope and Talbot lumber mill. Within a couple of years, the brothers established their own logging operation on a small lake that now carries their name. All three families built homes on Avenue B in the newly named settlement of Snohomish City, but only one has survived. It has been the Blackman House Museum at 118 Avenue B since 1970.
Back in Lakewood, around 5 years ago, Richard’s son, Michael, told him of the museum in Snohomish that carried his grandmother’s maiden name. Perhaps they would be interested in the album since neither he nor his siblings were interested in keeping it. Finally, this past August, Richard and his domestic partner, Alberta, made the trip to Snohomish where they met Marcia O'Hair on duty at the museum. Marcia eagerly accepted the album and even helped Richard identify some of the photographs.
We learned from Richard that Edith married William Morris in 1891, though she did attend classes at the University of Washington when it was located in downtown Seattle. The marriage ended suddenly in divorce in 1911, one year after building a new home at 1231 Hoyt Avenue in Everett, (which is now gone). She never remarried, raising her two children, Francis and Douglas, alone. Beginning in the 1930s with Richard's birth to Francis and Andrew Guttormsen, his family lived with Edith at this address. Richard has many memories of his time with Grandma Edith, including trips to Snohomish to visit old friends. Edith died in her home in 1965. She was 94 years old.
About the THEN photograph: A formal portrait of Edith Blackman, circa 1885, from her album, donated to the Snohomish Historical Society by her grandson Richard Guttormsen.
About the NOW photograph: Richard Guttormsen with Edith Blackman’s album whose portrait is on the first page.
Published by the Snohomish County Tribune, November 18, 2009