Old Pump House 'Visible' With Just a Little Imagination

Wherever we look in our neighborhoods, there are often vestiges of what was before. The “then” has not disappeared entirely, but is just partially buried under a newer layer. I think this is the case with today’s entry into the annals of “Then and Now,” which takes us to a site at the south end of town, at North 145th Street and Aurora Avenue North. 

Beginning with the earliest Euro-American immigrants in the area, obtaining a reliable source of clean water from the ground was essential to maintaining a healthy rural lifestyle. Wells could be as simple as a hand-dug hole in the ground with a bucket attached to a rope on a windlass. Or they could be a professionally drilled job with all of the accoutrements as seen in our “then” image. 

For many years, at least a half-dozen pump houses stood watch up and down Aurora between 145th and 205th. They were recognizable for their height and general shape, but each one told the tale of the builder’s style. Some bore a neatly painted clapboard or shingled cover, looking a lot like those that dot the picturesque landscapes of Holland. Others had a more simple bare framework, with the gravity-flow water tank sitting unprotected atop a simple structure below, where the well pump was protected from the elements. The pump house in the hollow at 145th and Aurora was built about 1920. It was unique for its height and elaborate construction, complete with a windmill and platform, gravity flow tank and a chicken coop. Although city water was brought into what is now the Shoreline area in the 1930s, many people opted to continue using their wells, eschewing the expense of plumbing and monthly water bills. According to a few folks who were around during World War II, the towering structure at 145th was still an active  pump house at that time, and was routinely used by civilian plane-spotters looking for enemy aircraft. Further research might tell us where, exactly, people perched while they performed that crucial service! 

The photo, however, was taken in 1960, after the structure had seen better days. The unknown photographer stood behind a protective railing that ringed the back ledge of the parking lot of the grocery store on the corner, which had been built in 1954. When the pump house structure was torn down in 1962, the demolition crew tried to fill in the well. Yards and yards of dirt were shoveled in, but to no avail. Eventually, according to a newspaper report, it was discovered that the well connected to an underground river that flowed toward Puget Sound. Other pump houses continued to stand after this one met its demise, and even to this day there are still a couple of small ones in Richmond Beach.  

Today’s photo nearly replicates the location of the 1960 shot. We look down from the back of Walgreens onto a somewhat different scene. But the ledge is still there, and the hollow is still there. The property drops down sharply to the neighboring business, 145th Aurora Storage, which has several buildings where the pump house once reigned. The surrounding asphalt still follows the lay of the land as it dips to the east. In standing at that location, with neighboring trees talking in the light breeze just as they must have when the pump house was there, it was not difficult to get a sense of the site’s past. And somewhere under our feet, perhaps a river still flows to Puget Sound.