Shacktown occupied 60 acres along the Wenatchee side of the Columbia River from 1898 to 1945. Its buildings ranged from rag tipis to multi-room wooden structures. The pipeline bridge can be seen in the background.
A Wenatchee policeman, left, informs Shacktown residents that the community will soon be burned down. Authorities followed through with the warning, torching structures on June 14, 1945.
The site of Shacktown is now a Chelan County PUD park just south of Fifth Street in Wenatchee. For a time the location was used by Funtastic Shows Carnival during the Apple Blossom Festival.
Shacktown occupied 60 acres along the Wenatchee side of the Columbia River from 1898 to 1945. Its buildings ranged from rag tipis to multi-room wooden structures. The pipeline bridge can be seen in the background.
Wenatchee Valley Museum (82-0105-123)
A Wenatchee policeman, left, informs Shacktown residents that the community will soon be burned down. Authorities followed through with the warning, torching structures on June 14, 1945.
The site of Shacktown is now a Chelan County PUD park just south of Fifth Street in Wenatchee. For a time the location was used by Funtastic Shows Carnival during the Apple Blossom Festival.
A Swedish immigrant riding a westbound freight train into Wenatchee in 1898 stepped from the slow-moving train near the bank of the Columbia River and liked what he saw. Unconcerned with land ownership, the Swede built himself a shack out of boards, a few packing boxes and two pieces of sheet iron roofing — and got a job at a sawmill. This was the start of a settlement that came to be known as Shacktown.
Over the next half century, hundreds of others built homes on 60 acres of undeveloped land between the railroad tracks and the river, from Orondo Avenue to Fifth Street. These dwellings ranged from rag tipis and cardboard hovels with tarpaper roofs to multi-room wooden structures with porches and shingles. Piles of bottles and cans, wrecked buggies, cast-off automobile tires, stray dogs and cats, and clothes fluttering from clotheslines were the backdrop for a neighborhood of transients and bootleggers, prostitutes, junk dealers and alcoholics — “the scum of the community, bums and renegades,” in the words of Wenatchee Mayor J.V. “Jack” Rogers.
Jack Rogers successfully campaigned for mayor in 1940 on a promise to rid Wenatchee of Shacktown.
Colorful Shacktown characters included Shacktown Annie, a “scarlet character” and bootlegger; junk dealers Ben and Whitey; restaurateurs Tex and Alice; and “Pigeon Man” Henderson, who placed boxes in trees to house pigeons and cut holes in his roof so they could fly in. A crippled door-to-door spice salesman and rag picker who called himself the Mayor of Shacktown commandeered one of the two available water spigots, charging a fee to draw water; he also pre-empted vacant shacks and rented them out. But Shacktown residents were welcomed by some local businesses, including Polison’s Café. In the 1940s, some “bums” were buying Liberty bonds and supporting Allied efforts to win World War II.
Nevertheless, most Wenatchee citizens wanted the unsightly settlement to go away. On several occasions, the city tried to evict Shacktown residents, and high water in 1928 flooded many buildings — but it didn’t take people long to rebuild.
Eventually, Mayor Rogers set a date of June 14, 1945 to burn down the shacks. Policemen notified residents and inventoried the buildings, counting 137 structures (many vacant) and 60 current occupants. Some objected to being evicted, including a horse wrangler who had fenced in an area for a dozen horses and threatened to shoot anyone who tried to burn him out.
Firemen worked for seven hours on that brisk June day until the last building was burned. No injuries were reported. Shacktown was gone for good.
Chris Rader is the author of “Place of Plenty: A History of Wenatchee,” in English and Spanish, available at the Wenatchee Valley Museum & Cultural Center. She also edits the museum’s Confluence magazine.
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