Index Historical Society Vol. 12 – Issue 11 From The Index Eagle 1995

This item is reproduced from the Index Eagle under the Index Historical Society section, November 1995 with permission.

Copyright © Dr. David A. Cameron. Reproduction prohibited without express written permission from the author.
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Yesterday as I walked down the street to the store to pick up my mail I heard a slowly moving automobile coming up behind me, gradually slowing down and then edging along side with a couple of men inside rolling the window down.  They had the advantage, as I was staring into the morning sun low over Heybrook Ridge, and they also obviously were flatlanders, having a new, clean car in Index.

The passenger spoke with a German accent, and I had visions of both a bad imitation of “Casablanca” and the summer spent working on the Department of Natural Resources fire crew out of Sultan. There the locals used to pull that trick and then speed off after depositing a quarter stick of dynamite. Something about out of town guys stealing all the available girls.

These fellows asked me, “Is the tunnel closed?” Not the usual, “Where are the Satan worshippers?” or “What do people do for a living around here?” It took a while before I unraveled that they actually were wondering about the old Cascade Tunnel of the Great Northern Railway or the more recent (1929) one still in use, not the highway tunnel at Money
Creek with its construction area or the Robe Canyon railway tunnels where I recently had been working. But, being a good emissary for the town, I managed to give them relatively straight answers and send them on their way to find out more about the Iron Goat Trail.

Thinking about the incident on the way home, I realized that really we do not build many tunnels anymore. We tend to blast mountain sides apart and create sweeping curves capable of 70 mile an hour speeds instead. Trains and cars and the routes they run really have changed a lot in the last 50 to 70 years. The same is true of other machinery once powered by steam or hand.

All the timber around this town was felled by crosscut saws, yet now they are museum pieces or painted with mountain scenes to hang above fireplaces, replaced by heavy gasoline-powered drag saws such as Wes Smith proudly maintains, and then by later generations of chain saws. This summer 1 had to use a crosscut while working with the Volunteers for Outdoor Washington on the Robe Canyon trail, making a difficult undercut in a log under stress on a steep slope as well as the routine bucking. It was a time warp, half an hour and a lot of sweat when the Stihl could have roared its way through in a couple of minutes. Steam-powered logging donkeys and old tractors still can be seen working through the efforts of President Jerry Senner’s antique tractor club in the Monroe area, but not on today’s farms or logging shows.

A couple of months ago while putting on a program for the Marysville Rotary Club at a motel on the reservation I happened to see a gleaming Model A Ford in their restaurant lobby. For only 30-odd thousand I could drive it home, although the price did not include a gas cap or a minor cosmetic repair to a scratch on the side. Actually I would be
afraid to drive it for fear one of the Alpine gravel trucks might give me a flying ding and cost me a few thousand. Fortunately, given the state of my wallet, that was not going to be a problem.

It does come to mind, though, as I am looking through a 1930 Western Auto Supply Co. illustrated catalogue. Their local outlet was at 2718 Colby in downtown Everett, a store I remember from my youth. The catalogue has a winged radiator cap for a Model T for only forty five cents (same price for Chevies up to 1928), one that looks like the “Mercury” hat on a dime. But next to it is a real classic, an “Aeroplane
Radiator Ornament” with black enameled motor cylinders of a radial engine with a real propeller in chromium plate. The lighted model cost only $2.85. What a deal! A crummy Daisy gas cap model cost only fifteen cents. Wimpy. The Senior Flying Lady (chrome plated) was a buck forty five. Choices.  When is the last time you had a car with a great looking
radiator cap up front to lead you down the highway?

A few other items also seem to be passé. Here is a standard flower vase for smaller, closed cars for ninety five cents. A metal hand signal (yes, a pivoting black enamel painted metal arm with a red painted metal hand) to attach to the side of the cab is only $3.25. A new rubber cloth roof for your roadster is as low as $3.75, $2.65 for a closed car model.  Rumble seats still were in vogue, and an elderly female friend recently exclaimed to me, “Why, people don’t even know what mad money means anymore!” For those of tender years and
limited experience, think of what might happen in a rumble seat and why a good girl might need an extra dollar in her . purse at the close of a date.

Hand grind your own valves, scrape your bearings, shim your spokes, and don’t break your arm on the crank when it backfires. I think I’ll stick with the rumble seat!  Who said history and a good imagination can’t be fun?