Meet Cyndi Upthegrove

Cyndi Upthegrove was at the mike Nov. 3rd during a launching party for scores of dignitaries, donors and Burien officialdom at a long awaited mortgage burning signifying the drive to raise funds for a handsome new building to house the collections of the Highline Historical Society.

Cyndi has been the driving force in pursuing a dream once sought by Dottie Harper, now a resident of Spokane. She and Cyndi were next-door neighbors on Lake Burien.

As part of Olde Burien, the property was purchased from Jim Pelletier four years ago and paid off with the help of state, county and local community citizens

The new museum is expected to cost upwards of $5 million.

Meet Jeanne Pfeiffer

I met Jeanne about 10 years ago. I had wandered into a room at the Highline Community Center, which was formerly an elementary school, and it was full of women dressed up in early century outfits with leg o'mutton sleeves, hoop skirts and hair done in huge buns.

It was a fundraiser and they were selling cookies and cakes and the benefit was for the Highline Heritage Society. I started to back out and Jeanne Pfeiffer shook her finger at me like my mom used to do, so I decided to stay and find out what all those women in charming costumes were doing.

Last week she saw me again. This time at the mortgage burning for the new history museum to be built in Burien, and she shook her finger at me again. She wanted to talk. She still has me hypnotized.

She and Cyndi Upthegrove, Kitty Milne, Terry Anderson, Linda Isernio, Helen Kludt, Gary Long, Rita Creighton, Mike Emerson and the omnipresent Dick Dahlgard and scores of others have done what at first seemed an impossible dream.

They paid off the mortgage on a location Dotty Harper, who first nurtured the museum idea, would rejoice over.

The board of directors of the Historical Society had bought and paid for the Pelletier building, which had housed Tradewell, Bartell, Pacific Linen Fabrics, a fitness center and many other companies.

Now it would be torn down and a dazzling new structure will be a showplace for Highline's past.

The job is not done yet, though. Now we have to raise the money to finish the job. It won't be easy but I would never underestimate the dedicated dreamers. You will be invited to participate

And this night they wanted to party a little. Burn the mortgage.

I sure learned the world steps aside for a group who know where they are going.

Burien is on the march. The Town Square is rising rapidly, First Avenue South is lined with orange cones, workers are toiling 24 hours using bright lights, detours are common and vexing, but it is an exciting atmosphere at the same time.

It is fun to witness the changes taking place. In a few years it will settle down, the traffic cones will be gone, the derricks and bulldozers will be history, and we will be enjoying the shiny new museum housing the remnants of our past.

Jacob Ambaum, Gottleib von Boorian, and Mike Kelly, some of those earliest pioneers whose efforts put Highline on the map, would surely be pleased that we do remember them.