San Juan County, Washington - Friday Harbor, Washington (Paperback)

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Pages: 103. Not illustrated. Chapters: Friday Harbor, Washington. Excerpt: Friday Harbor, Washington - San Juan County District CourthouseIn 1845 the Hudson's Bay Company laid claim to San Juan Island. In 1850 they built a salmon curing station. A few years later they started a sheep farm. The harbor got its name from Joseph Poalie (Poalima?) Friday, a Kanaka - a native Hawaiian man who worked at the Hudson's Bay Company's Cowlitz farm from 1841 to 1859-60. He moved north to San Juan Island and raised sheep around the harbor. After the peaceful settlement of the Pig War, the islands became a separate county in 1873. Friday Harbor was named the county seat of San Juan County. Friday Harbor was officially incorporated on February 10, 1909. It is the only incorporated town in the San Juan Islands. Sailing ships and, later, the steamships of the Puget Sound Mosquito Fleet visited the harbor on a regular basis, hauling passengers, mail and freight. They took the island's bounty: apples, pears, cherries, strawberries, peas, cream, eggs, chickens, grain, salmon, and lime. The Great Depression, World War II, the pea weevil, and competition from Eastern Washington growers brought about the decline of traditional island industries. Friday Harbor's fortunes declined with them. The 1960s brought new industries - tourism, retirement, real estate, and construction. Today, Friday Harbor is again busy and prosperous. Osamu Shimomura harvested jellyfish from the docks of the harbor. Eventually he purified the proteins that allow the jellyfish to fluoresce green when exposed to blue light. One of them, Green fluorescent protein is now widely used as a marker of molecular activity. Friday Harbor is located at (48.535260, -123.031055). According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 1.4 square miles (3.7 km), of which, 1.4 squar...