What Was At Diamond Point, WA?

 

The Diamond Point Quarantine Station across Discovery Bay from Port Townsend. was a 156-acre federal facility opened in 1893 to control infectious diseases on ships entering Puget Sound. The station featured barracks, labs, staff housing and disinfection services for vessels wishing to enter Puget Sound and an isolation hospital for passengers or crew members found to be suffering from or suspected of carrying infectious disease. The site grew from three to 27 buildings over the course of its 43 operational years. Moved eventually nearer Port Townsend, it is now the site of Miller Peninsula State Park. 

If you'd care to learn more about this episode in Washington history, click to www.historylink.org (a free website) and look for the article by Paula Becker, posted in 2007 on this subject. 

All vessels arriving from foreign ports were required to pass through quarantine. When deemed necessary, vessel were fumigated with burning pots of sulphur in order to kill fleas, rats, live and other vermin. Passengers or crew members were inspected for any symptom of infectious diseases such an influenza, cholera malaria, smallpox, yellow fever, diphtheria and leprosy. This place was not a happy place. Quoting from a 1937 book: "Port Townsend's pest-house was situated in the dense woods about two miles west of town. Here the unfortunate patients was kept under the care of a volunteer nurse, usually an old sailor, and a doctor visited the sufferer when he could spare the time."

In 1878, Congress had passed the National Quarantine Act which prevented vessels from carrying infectious diseases into any U.S. port. In 1888, the Diamond Point station was authorized and a total of $55,000 allocated for the construction. 

There is much more to learn about this episode, event and place in Washington history. Ask Google to help you find more information. 

Trivia Time!

 

The phrase "mad as a hatter" referred to the 19th century hat-makers were were poisoned by the mercury they used to treat the felt.

Christmas was not declared a national holiday until 1890.

The phrase "second string," which today means replacement or backup, originated in the Middle Ages, when an archer carried a second string in case the one on his bow broke.

During the peak of the western cattle drives, as many as one in four cowboys was African-American.

After she was crowned, the first act of Britain's Queen Victoria was to move her bed out of her mother's bedroom and into a room of her own.

The first bomb dropped by the Allies on the city of Berlin during WWII claimed an unusual casualty...the only elephant in the Berlin zoo. 

During his invasion of England in 1014, King Olaf's fleet of Viking ships managed to pull down London's wooden Thames River bridge. Hence the children's song about London Bridge falling down. 

The last soldier of WWII, Japan's Lt. Hiroo Onoda, didn't surrender until 1974. He refused to be "fooled" by allied stories about the war ending in 1945 and only gave up the fight after his old unit commander was flown to the Philippines and ordered him to lay down his arms.

And where did these wonderful bits come from? The Armchair Reader: Amazing Book of History, published in 2008, and found in a thrift store. Are they true? 

FamilySearch Offers Full-Text Searching

 

Quoting from FamilyTree Magazine, May-June 2025:  "For many years. optical character recognition (OCR) was limited to converting typed text on a record image into a searchable machine-readable text format. However, FamilySearch's Full-Text Search has been training its AI to do the same with handwritten historical records. 

"This new website feature has the potential to fundamentally change how we do family history. Full-text search, lauded by FamilySearch as a 'new era in search technology' uses AI to make unindexed record images available to search for the first time. This allows genealogists almost instant access to valuable records that once would have taken hours to page through.

"At launch in March 2025, the tool has 1.2 billion images in more than 3000 collections that includes US land, probate, emigration, naturalization, birth, marriage and death records. In the coming years, FamilySearch will roll out the technology to every unindexed record in its collection, prioritizing records that have high genealogical value but are currently inaccessible to researchers."

Having looked for Seaborn Phillips............. well, I digress here. I skipped to check out some of the findings for dear old Seaborn (husband's ggggrandfather) and lost my place and time to finish this post......... that's how good this opportunity affords!!

I do recommend to you "to try it, you'll like it." Click to FamilySearch.org, then Search and then Full Text. You will be glad you did. 

P.S. The FamilyTree Magazine, May/June 2025 issue carried a 4-page tutorial titled "Full Force" to teach us how to fully use this great new resource. Again, this is my favorite genealogy magazine and it is always full of "good timely stuff."

Social History Websites

 

The FamilyTree blog recently used this very image to head their article titled 31 Free Social History Websites. Today's post is a Part 2 from last week's post.

Some of those 31 sites mentioned in that article include:

* American History (www.USHistory.org)

* Digital Public Library of America (www.DP.LA)

*Library of Congress (www.loc.gov)

* American Rails (www.American-Rails.com)

*Erie Canal (www.eriecanalway.org)

*Food Timeline (www.foodtimeline.org)

*Old & Interesting (www.oldandinteresting.org)

*American Disasters (www.evergladesuniversity.edu)

*Documenting the American South (www.docsouth.unc.edu)

Whatever you want to learn about your ancestors' life and times, type that question into YouTube:  Immigration, Civil War, Recipes, Dress Styles, Oklahoma Land Rush, tuberculosis, U.S. Navy..... hopefully you get the idea. 

Ask these questions:

*What was a typical dinner in Maine in 1880?

*What was typical Sunday dress in 1910?

*Did my ancestor attend a World's Fair?

*Did my ancestor serve in the military?

* Did my ancestor come by steamship or sail in 1870?

*Why did my people settle in ______________? 

Social history is learning the answers to those questions.  

Is Social History Real Research?

 

 

 

Google AI says: Social history studies the everyday lives, experiences, and cultures of ordinary people, focusing on social structures, class, gender, and community rather than just elites or politics, often called "history from below". It explores how societies function through the perspectives of different groups, examining work, family, belief, and culture, using diverse sources like diaries, newspapers, and material artifacts to bring the past to life and understand societal change from the ground up. 

Social History is learning what our ancestors did and did not do. What they wore and why. What they ate and why. Why they feared bathing. Why they believed the homilies they recited. Why they moved to and/or lived where they lived. What sort of shoes did they have? Did colonial women smoke?  How did they cope with pain? What was share-cropping?

Amazon offers hundreds of books on this subject; just type in "social history California" or your state. Or just type those words into Google. 

If you're not satisfied with only knowing the names-dates-places for your ancestors, and what to know who they were, then dig into the social history of their lives and times. 

Sunset Highway.... Spokane to Seattle

 

Did you know that one of Washington's first cross-state highways, the Sunset Highway, provided the first automobile route over the Cascade Mountains? When it opened in 1915, the highway largely followed the route of an Indian trail that had been developed into a wagon road. The Sunset Highway changed designations a number of times over the years.... being known as Highway #2, U.S. 10 and Interstate 90. The route serves as the primary east-west route in Washington." So states the HistoryLink article by Jennifer Ott.

As early as 1853, a passable route over Snoqualmie Pass was becoming a necessity. There were several trails connecting points in Washington, but the Cascades were a major headache to cross. By 1867, a wagon road was open from North Bend to Easton. A 1906 report emphasized the importance of such a route, calling it "the most important trans-mountain road projected." 

The 1909 Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition's transcontinental auto race form New York to Seattle underscored the urgent need for better roads. During the race, cars were frequently bogged down in mud, particularly along some sections over Snoqualmie. 

By 1913, the Sunset Highway was designated as a primary state route and on July 1, 1915, it was officially opened. But what did it look like then compared to today??

I've been state-crossing in I-90 since 1954 and I can tell you that without a doubt there has not been a single year without road construction! The route is getting busier and busier and better and better all the time. 

And by-the-by, it's Sno-qual-mie NOT NOT  Sno-qual-a-mie. 

DAR....What's In It For ME?

 

"The DAR of our grandmothers has grown and flourished. Inspired by our Founders, we are celebrating history while shaping the future." So stated an email message from DAR headquarters inviting me into membership. 

The email went on to extole and explain:

*DAR member achieved 7.4 million service hours to their communities in 2024.

*DAR is heavily involved and promoting the America 250! celebrations nationwide.

*DAR gave a $2 million contribution to help preserve Washington DC's iconic cherry trees.

*DAR's Patriots of Color Database now featured on the 10 Million Names project, providing public access to research on those of African descent who lived in pre- and post-colonial America.

*DAR donated $250,000 to the Military Women's Memorial.

And the list went on for a full page. 

Did you know there are 36 DAR chapters in Washington State? Surely there is one in or near your town. Click to www.dar.org/national-society/become-member-chapters to find one.

If you've been doing family history for most any time at all, and if you have Colonial era ancestors, you do most likely qualify for DAR membership. You most likely do have a patriot ancestor. Be proud to recognize your connection!