I’ve written about Gig Harbor and salmon purse seining several times while describing my experiences when  in high school and college working on purse seine boats in Alaska and here in the San Juan islands. See  https://paulluverajournalonline.com/weblog/2023/06/purse-seine-fishing-in-the-northwest. also: https://paulluverajournalonline.com/weblog/2021/10/the-gift-of-working-on-salmon-purse-seine-boats.

It’s unique that I ended up living in Gig Harbor, where Lita and I have made our home for the last twenty-five years. That’s because I was born and raised in a very similar fishing & lumbering town of  Anacortes and fished one summer on a purse-seine boat from Gig Harbor.

Gig Harbor was founded as a fishing and lumber town, with purse seining as a major occupation of the town.  But, it is also remembered for the 1940 Narrows Bridge collapse, which connected Tacoma and the Kitsap Peninsula over the Narrows water. The $6.4 million dollar toll bridge opened on July 1st of 1940 and was the third-longest suspension bridge in the world. Drivers almost immediately were aware of a “peculiar oscillating movement” of the road deck when the wind blew.  It became known as “Galloping Gertie.” On November 7, 1940, only four months after it opened, Galloping Gertie added a new, frightening twist, and drivers hurried to get off the bridge, which collapsed shortly afterwards with no loss of human life.

The history of Gig Harbor involves explorers from the Wilkes Expedition who discovered the harbor’s well-hidden opening in 1841 and named it Gig Harbor. They selected that name because they had entered the bay in a small “gig,” which is a small, light, narrow boat typically used by the ship’s captain. In 1867, three Croatian fishermen entered the harbor and decided to make it their home. Over the next few decades, Gig Harbor grew into a bustling fishing and lumber village with distinctive Croatian and Scandinavian communities.

While in high school and college, I fished in the summers on salmon purse-seine boats. One year I fished on a boat named “Welcome” run by Captain John Stanich. The Stanich family has a long Gig Harbor history. Martin and Katherine Stanich were from Dubrovnik, Croatia, and after meeting & marrying in Oregon, moved to Gig Harbor in 1910 with their four children. Martin built a home and a net shed on the waterfront on Dorotich Avenue.  He had a purse seiner, Welcome, built in 1913 by a Tacoma shipyard. Later, Martin sold that vessel and had a second purse seiner built at the Gig Harbor Skansie Shipyard in 1920, also named Welcome. The family lived in a tent during the construction of the home and net shed. The original net shed was a simple wood structure on pilings with a gable roof. The interior space consisted of one large room used to store the nets, cork, and gear for the Welcome. Two planks bridged the net shed to the land. To the left of the entrance was a small outhouse.

In 1924, Martin purchased the property adjacent to his home in 1924. The property was where St. Peter’s Bros. grocery had been located, but had burned down previously. Martin replaced it with a new grocery store, the Stanich Grocery Store. Martin built the second net shed on the waterfront in the 1940s, immediately to the south of the original one, which had been demolished. Martin’s sons assumed responsibility for operating the family business. Tony, the oldest son, took over management of the grocery store, and John became the skipper of the purse-seine boat for the family.

When Martin died, John and Tony inherited the dock and net shed. The house was left to their sisters. Tony married and built a home on the lot between the family home and the grocery store. Tony continued to run the store until the late 1950s. The Stanich Store served the commercial fleet, supplying groceries on credit at the beginning of each busy fishing season, with family members helping in the store as needed. Tony retired in 1971, and the location was rented as a realty company and bakery, plus a deli. Tony died in 1995.

John had been involved in purse seine fishing since age 16. In 1920, he became the skipper and operator of the Welcome when his father retired. He married Pauline Castelan, and for the next 50 years, he operated the purse fishing boat. He and his wife lived half a block from the grocery store on Harborview Drive with their daughter, Jane. In 1974, John unexpectedly died. The following year the the family sold the Welcome.  The net shed and dock space was rented by a local commercial fisherman, who used it to store fishing nets and equipment. The maintenance and repairs were maintained by  John’s grandsons, John and Tom Dempsey, until the property was sold in 1983, and a complete remodel of the shed was done. It was converted to a series of rooms for storage, office space, and an art studio with an elevated dock extending in front, and low floats for moorage.

My connection to the Stanich family and the vessel “Welcome” is that I worked with the crew in 1954 with John Stanich as skipper. It was just after graduating from high school and I didn’t have a position on a fishing boat yet. I decided to pack a duffel of clothes and take a chance of being hired by a purse seine boat by going down to the docks on Sunday afternoon when the boats would be leaving for the week’s fishing. I picked a dock with a lot of purse seine boats and asked if they needed a crew member. When I asked at the purse-seine boat Welcome, it happened that one of the crew members had failed to show at the scheduled departure time. John Stanich, the skipper, was very unhappy as they were anxious to leave. He questioned me about my experience and discovered John knew my dad. There was also a connection of ownership of our grocery store in Anacortes and the family’s grocery store in Gig Harbor. I had several summers of experience on purse-seine boats, and  I told him I was ready with my gear. He hired me to operate the skiff that pulled one end of the net while the boat pulled the other end and with that. told me to get on board.  We left without the missing crew member.  I fished on the boat that season and we had an outstanding year for catching Sockeye at the Salmon Banks fishing grounds off San Juan Island. The price for Sockeye was high, and we caught a lot of fish. I ended up making enough money to buy a car and pay for the entire year of college, plus money for savings as well.

I remember the Welcome very well. The history of the purse seine vessel “Welcome,” originally built in 1913 in Tacoma, it was sold in 1920. The vessel sank at Admiralty Island in 1961. A second purse seine boat, “Welcome,” was built for Martin Stanich at the Skansie Shipyard in 1920 and sold in 1975. That vessel was rammed by a research vessel near Foulweather Bluff and sank in 1978.

I have a family connection to purse-seine fishing and am indebted for the many lessons of life I learned while working on the fishing boats. My mother’s family (Babarovich) were fishermen, and one of my mother’s uncles owned the first fishing boat in Washington that used power the Uncle John. This relative is also the one who is buried in the Anacortes cemetery under a stone that gives his name and says, “known among men as honest John.” Our family grocery store, Luvera’s Market, depended upon the business of the fishing fleet in Anacortes for its survival. Fishing income paid significant amounts for my college education. It also taught me most of what I know about people, hard work, and life.