Anyone know the history of this 62nd Street house?

By Kay F. Reinartz

In 1891s this modest, yet charming, "Victorian vernacular" house was built on a 5-acre plot that is now Ballard Corners Park.

The lot provided room for a large vegetable garden, a chicken coop and a place to keep the family milk cow for the couple who built it, and their growing family, to enjoy a sense of "country living" in the newly incorporated city of Ballard.

They undoubtedly had a small orchard of apple, cherry and plum trees. If they loved pears, they probably cultivated a seckel pear tree and possibly a fig tree. The bounty of the garden and orchard were "put up," i.e. canned, by the industrious wife with the help of her children to provide for the family in the winter.

Her husband most likely worked at one of the many thriving mills that lined Salmon Bay (Shilshole Avenue).

The lot where the home was located eventually acquired the address of 1702 W. 62nd St. "West" was the address designation of the City of Ballard, not Seattle, as the community was not a part of Seattle at the time.

As Ballard was built up the acreage was sold off until all that was left was the house and a modest lot that allowed for a small garden. In the rush to modernize that followed World War II the pleasant 19th century home was demolished in favor of a simple "modern" one-story house.

If you have any knowledge of this lot and the people who lived there throughout the 20th century please contact me, your community historian, at bnteditor@robinsonnews.com