Cemetery tour
When: Wednesday, Aug. 20
Where: Pioneer Park, 387 E. Washington St.
More info: Call 808-3434
Join the Sequim Prairie Garden Club for a journey through Sequim’s past on a tour of Pioneer Memorial Park, the town’s first cemetery.
The cemetery tour is 1 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 20, at the park, 387 E. Washington St. in Sequim. The $20 admission fee, payable at the door, will help fund the club’s ongoing park improvement efforts.
Now a serene roadside park within Sequim’s downtown core, at the turn of the 20th century the four-acre site served as the town’s only cemetery before continual flooding problems hastened its abandonment. While reburials elsewhere took place until about 1920, many headstones remained in the park and were preserved in a memorial in its southwest corner.
“The tour is a wonderful opportunity to learn some of the history of early Sequim, how Pioneer Memorial Park came to be and how the garden club continues to provide a beautiful, peaceful oasis for the community,” said Sequim Prairie Garden Club president Laura Singer.
“Many people driving by on Washington Street are not aware of the beautiful park located there,” she said.
Prior to touring the grounds, the event begins in the park clubhouse with several short presentations highlighting the family histories of those whose headstones remain, the park’s history and the unique cultural artifacts residing onsite including a Jamestown S’Klallam totem carved by the late Harris “Brick” Johnson.
A hand-stitched quilt made by the Clallam C’lectors Chapter No. 1409 of Questers featuring the names of those buried in the park also will be on display, along with Sequim Prairie Garden Club scrapbooks that chronicle the club’s history.
Founded in 1948, the Sequim Prairie Garden Club spent years transforming the long-abandoned burial site into flourishing park grounds.
The club’s annual plant sales, clubhouse rentals, donations and fundraising events such as the cemetery tour help fund ongoing park care and educational scholarships.
For more information, call the Sequim Prairie Garden Club at 808-3434.
