Thank you to Humanities Washington!

Historic Whidbey would like to thank:

for their generous award of a SHARP grant during the recent pandemic. 

Their support helped keep our engine running!

Funding for Historic Whidbey has been provided by Humanities Washington and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) as part of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARP) approved by the U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Joseph R. Biden.  This 2022 SHARP grant (Sustaining Humanities through the American Rescue Plan) was indispensable, enabling us to continue our mission through the the Covid-19 pandemic.

Our board extends their deepest gratitude!

Pullin' Nails

While winter delays construction progress, Historic Whidbey has been planning out 2023 and what we hope to get done. A lot of projects are on the list for 2023, and we are really excited to share those with you in the future.

With the help some active Board Members, we have completed the arduous process of removing the thousands (literally) of nails that once held the old lathe boards to the wall. Unfortunately, the plaster was not in good enough condition to keep, so the decision was made to remove the old plaster and put-up drywall as well as additional structural pieces that will assist the house to remain standing for much longer in the future. Even to endure large earthquakes.

NOTE: The old lathe boards are available for sale at Aqua Gifts across the street. These roughly ~12in long boards are bundled together and only cost $5 each. This bundle is great for kindling, enjoying in your fireplace or while out camping. I have also heard a few people have decorated with these old boards, so the opportunities are endless. Recycling and supporting a local cause, we make it pretty easy!

Remember to hit that donate button below to keep our train chugging along and getting more and more projects done!

Getting a new coat!

The lovely weather we’ve been having has given us the chance to begin the arduous task of re-siding and paint the house. We have enlisted the help of Sound Colors Painting. You can see them this week spraying and scraping the prep for primer. If we are lucky, we may even, see some color start popping up of the building this year!

Yellow! While prepping the house for work we actively removed baseboard, sanded wood, and scraped a century worth of old paint to find the original color. We believe this is the oldest color on the house. Using Benjamin Moore’s historical collection, we matched this with a lovely light ochre for the siding and a butternut squash color trim.

However, for the winter the house will only be primed. So, the yellow you see now is not the final stage of color. In spring we will put the final coats on and watch the house blossom along with the flowers.

Remember, none of this is possible without your help. Keep us moving forward with a donation today!

The conservatory is reborn!

Passersby in downtown Coupeville are happy to see—at long last— serious progress in the rehabilitation of the full exterior of the Haller House . This dream deferred—of the return of the 1866 Haller House to Front Street life—is finally being realized! Our Heritage Capital grant helps fund the reconstruction of the Hallers’ conservatory bay, the structural stabilization of the failing plank walls of the Brunn House ell, installation of two new ADA entrance doors in the Brunn ell, repair and painting of all clapboard siding. It will also help fund the installation of new house systems: water, power and heat in 2023. We hope you share our happy satisfaction in this progress.

Our Conservatory Window CamPANE was been a huge success! Following a windowengraving tradition popular in England and America in the 18th & 19th centuries, we have offered our “Haller House family” the chance to engrave their names on one of 94 new panes in the new conservatory windows. We are sold out and have been the long process of manufacturing the special panes that will be with the house forever.

150th Anniversary of the end of the Pig War

Join Historic Whidbey for an educational ‘Walk & Talk’ tour with 2 speakers talking about the boundry dispute on San Juan Island.

The Pig War

In 1872 arbitration settled a 13-year stalemate in the battle for legal possession of the San Juan Islands archipelago. Both Great Britain and the U.S. had been claiming the islands since the poorly written Oregon Treaty of 1846 had left a fog over the islands’ fate. The argument escalated to a military crisis on San Juan Island in 1859 when an American settler shot a Berkshire boar owned by his English neighbors at the Belle Vue Sheep Farm – owned by the Hudson Bay Company. Conflict ensued and before long, American soldiers from the 9th Infantry occupied the south end of San Juan Island, and warships of the Royal Navy were pointing their big guns at them. The stand-off resulted in a joint occupation that lasted 13 years, ending only when arbitrator Kaiser Wilhelm I of Germany decided the islands belonged to the U.S. in 1872. Thus ended the last international boundary dispute between Britain and the United States – 150 years ago this year.

What did it have to do with Whidbey Island?

The “special relationship” between the U.S. and Great Britain did not exist in the mid-19th century. Veterans of both the Revolution and the War of 1812 were still telling their tales. The Landing’s namesake, Isaac Ebey, was a committed anti-British agitator and played a big role in fomenting friction between the two nations. Although he died shortly before the Problem of the Pig, Coupeville’s own Major Granville Haller was an active participant in the military engagement on San Juan Island. It fell to Haller and the Army to resolve the brouhaha that Ebey helped start.

Want to know more? Join us at Ebey’s!

This event has passed.

Event included an introductory presentation at the Pratt Sheep Barn by Historic Whidbey’s Lynn Hyde and a delegation from San Juan Island National Historical Park. Where a hike began at the Jacob & Sarah Ebey House via the Prairie/Ridge Trail; continuing to Bluff Trail; ending at Ferry House. Following was a presentation on the significance of the Ferry House at Ebey’s Landing by former Reserve preservation coordinator Sarah Steen.

For more info, please contact us at historicwhidbey@comcast.net.

Become etched into history...

The age-old tradition of inscribing graffiti in windowpanes with diamond rings goes back at least to Queen Elizabeth I in England.  Imprisoned by her half sister Mary I while still a mere princess in 1554, she wrote acerbic verses on a window in the Tower of London.  The practice was common in England and America up until the 20th century.

In this country, the most famous example is that of Nathaniel Hawthorne and his wife Sophia, who engraved romantic musings on the home they rented in Concord, Massachusetts - the Old Manse - during their 3-year honeymoon there in the 1840s.  

The custom even reached Whidbey Island, where an echo of it survives in the 1866 Haller House. Long-time residents of the house, the Willhight family, found the signatures of all the Haller family inscribed in windowpanes upstairs when they moved in in 1952.  They were inspired to leave their own marks in the bay windows of the east parlor in the 1960s - inscriptions that still survive (though sadly, the Hallers’ 1870s signatures do not not).

We at Historic Whidbey are inspired by the tradition, too!  Our reconstruction of the Hallers’ large conservatory bay window gives us an extraordinary opportunity to invite our supporters to inscribe their names for posterity as well.  

We have 94 individual windowpanes available for inscribing the names of you or someone you love! (We reserve 2 panes to reproduce the Hallers’ originals.)

All panes have been sold!