Fortson, Washington

Fortson, Washington
Unincorporated community
Fortson, Washington Location of Fortson, Washington
Coordinates: 48°16′06″N 121°43′38″W / 48.26833°N 121.72722°W / 48.26833; -121.72722
Country	United States
State	Washington
County	Snohomish
Elevation [1]	472 ft (144 m)
Time zone	UTC-8 (Pacific (PST))
• Summer (DST)	UTC-7 (PDT)
Area code	425
GNIS feature ID	1519707[1]

Fortson is an unincorporated community in Snohomish County, Washington, United States. It lies along State Route 530 in the valley of the North Fork Stillaguamish River, between Oso and Darrington. The community developed in the early 20th century around a sawmill on the Northern Pacific Railway's Arlington–Darrington branch line and took its name from the Fortson Lumber Company; little remains of it today apart from the former mill site and two mill ponds.

History

The Northern Pacific Railway completed its branch line up the Stillaguamish valley from Arlington to Darrington in 1901, opening the surrounding forests to commercial logging.^[2] According to local histories, members of the McCaughey family bought about 113 acres (46 ha) of land on the North Fork Stillaguamish River in December 1904, and the McCaughey Lumber Company's sawmill began operating at the site in 1905.^[3]

The mill was later acquired by the Fortson Lumber Company, incorporated at Seattle in 1914.^[a][3] The company, and in turn the community, was named in memory of Captain George Hayley Fortson (1860–1899), a Seattle city attorney and U.S. Army officer who commanded a company of the 1st Washington Volunteer Infantry and was killed in the Philippine–American War in 1899.^[4][3] By the 1920s Fortson was a company town with a post office, a company store, telephone service, bunkhouses, and other buildings, and its population reached about 300.^[3]

After a fire damaged the mill around 1917 and the Fortson Lumber Company was dissolved in 1918, the mill stood idle until 1923, when it was bought by the partnership of Theodore Klement and Charles Kennedy; the community kept the name Fortson.^[3] The associated logging railroad ceased operating in 1936. The mill was sold in 1956 and largely dismantled over the following years, with much of its machinery moved to the Three Rivers Mill in Darrington, and by about 1960 little of the operation remained.^[3]

Geography

Fortson is located along State Route 530 in the North Fork Stillaguamish River valley at an elevation of 472 feet (144 m), between Oso to the west and Darrington to the east.^[1] Two former mill ponds remain at the site, fed by the surrounding watershed.^[3]

Mill site and Whitehorse Trail

The surviving concrete walls and footings of the steam-powered mill, overgrown with ferns and other vegetation, remain at the site, and the walls have become covered with graffiti.^[5][6] The 13-acre (5.3 ha) former mill site is owned jointly by Snohomish County, the Stillaguamish Tribe of Indians, and the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.^[7] The Fortson ponds are managed for coho salmon rearing; according to a Washington state grant record, they produce an estimated 5 to 8 percent of the coho smolts in the Stillaguamish River system.^[8] The site also serves as a trailhead on the 27-mile (43 km) Whitehorse Trail, a rail trail that follows the former Northern Pacific right-of-way between Arlington and Darrington.^[9] The trailhead was established after about 30 acres (12 ha) of adjacent land was donated to Snohomish County in late 2014.^[10] In March 2014, the 2014 Oso landslide killed 43 people about 5 miles (8.0 km) west of Fortson and buried a section of the trail corridor; the eastern portion of the trail between Darrington and Fortson was among the first stretches reopened during the valley's recovery.^[11][5]

Notes

References