Online Histories of Snohomish County

Keeler's Korner :  Old-timers witness change along Highway 99

Gunnysack Hill is the section of Highway 99 located approximately between 170th St. SW in  Lynnwood and 148th St. SW in unincorporated Snohomish County. According to an article in the Everett Herald at the time, it was part of "the new Everett-Seattle link in the Pacific Highway" which opened to traffic on October 25, 1927.   Photo caption: Keeler's Korner, now listed on the National Register of Historic Places, was built in 1927 when Hwy. 99 linking Everett to Seattle was opened to traffic.  Photo courtesy of the Everett Public Library, ca. 1980s

Richard Telford of Edmonds recalls that his family lived on a triangle of land on the northeast corner of what is now 156th St. S.W. & Highway 99. He and his sister Dolores had the job of  putting kerosene lanterns out on the wooden bridges built across the new concrete at 156th and 164th. He recalls watching the workers spread gunnysacks over the fresh-ly set-up concrete and putting dirt over that to season the concrete. That is not why the name gunnysack came to be attached to the hill, however. That occurred after traffic began to flow along the new 14 mile long, 20 foot wide strip of pavement between the King County line and the Everett city limits. 

As the new section of highway neared completion, the Everett News reported "Road opening to mean new law problem.",  Road houses, Chicken dinner inns and dance halls were expected to be erected along the new route, but Sheriff George I. Stever warned that the south end of the county  would not be permitted to become a "honky tonk."    A squad of deputies was dispatched on a Saturday night and made three arrests at Jungle Temple No. 2 and Doc Hamilton's barbecue ranch, confiscating "a small amount of alleged moon-shine whiskey, and arresting three people." 

On the hill that would become known as "Gunnysack Hill," the first-building was certainly not a "honky tonk." G.C. Keeler, a grocer, built a two-story building with living quarters upstairs and a "mom & pop" grocery store and gas station downstairs.    Keeler's daughter-in-law, Gladys of Lynnwood, recalls that another building was erected east of  their property at the same time. Although the owners of the two buildings shared a common well,  the Keeler family did not patronize the Willows road house.  "The old milk trucks would chug a chug up the hill so slow, I could grab on to the back and get a  ride up the hill," said Telford with a chuckle. A few years later, he got a job pumping gas at the Texaco station built near his family home north of Keeler's Korner. 

Doc Brimmer sold produce grown behind the station, and although Telford said he wouldn't want to mention the word 'bootleg," he believes some customers bought liquid from jugs kept under the desk in the office. 

When the weather turned cold, early autos would skid out of control on the ice before they  reached Keeler's Korner. Vi Grand of Edmonds recalls that a man named Ole Bloss, who had a farm at the bottom of the hill on the west side, supplied stranded motorists with empty feed sacks to put around their tires. Eventually, the 'hill became known as Gunnysack Hill. Next to the farm some people referred to as the Gunnysack ranch, Horace Nelson built a gas station, Loop Service. His daughter, Jan McGill of Camano Island, recalls he put in two telephones because the west side of the highway was served by the Edmonds phone company, and it was a long-distance call to phones serviced by the Alderwood phone company across the new highway. 

During the winter, older children who lived within walking distance of the highway, would go sledding. "The highway was wide open all the way from the top (of Gunnysack-Hill), and you could get up tremendous speed" relates Jack Thompson, of Carbonado, Washington. Look-outs would  watch for lights and warn of approaching cars.  In the summer, Thompson re-calls, he and his friends would ride their bicycles up Gunnysack Hill to Mud Lake (Lake Serene) to swim. One lucky day he and Bill Marson were passed by an ice cream   truck. The doors had come open and ice cream was falling out in front of them. Today's children must wait for the traffic light at 168th St. SW to turn green if they want to buy ice cream at the franchise on the northwest corner of the inter-section. Loop Service has been replaced  by a convenience store. 

The gunnysack ranch has disappeared and building supply discount stores, fast-food restaurants and strip malls line both sides of the highway down to 180th where the hill levels off and a discount  appliance store has replaced the Levelton Feed Store Mr. and Mrs. Grand built in 1929. 

Keeler's Korner, listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982, now sells antiques instead of gas and groceries and 'Doc Brimmer's gas station has evolved into a clock shop. 

The High Point feed store at the top of the hill said to be the "highest point between Seattle and Everett" has been replaced by a strip mall - the High Point Plaza.   Old timers have witnessed many changes along Highway 99 in south Snohomish County, but the name Gunnysack Hill remains as a reminder of days when life, as well as traffic, moved through  Snohomish County at a slower pace.