Ebey's Landing National Historical Reserve The Land, The People, The Place: An Introduction to the Inventory

THE LAND

"Come look from this eminence of bluff, now in the soft hour before daybreak . . . the island's farm fields are leather and corduroy, rich even panels between black-furred stands of forest. Tan grass . . . whisks soundlessly against a four-wire fence line.. Yes; rural America of the last century . . ."

Ivan Doig, Winter Brothers, 1980
[Overlooking Ebey's Landing]

The dramatic times and slow times that create lands and shape environments worked once to carve the island communities of Puget Sound in Washington State. Huge masses of ice, once covering all the land south to Olympia, began receding 13,000 years ago, leaving behind a variety of island forms. In the northern portion of this grouping is Whidbey Island, a long irregular mosaic of forests, inland waters, natural prairies and coastal bluffs. The face of the island is gently rolling, with most upland areas under 300 feet in elevation. East of the island, the silhouette of the Cascade mountains forms the horizon and west across Admiralty Inlet, the Olympics push the eye up from the deep water foreground.

In the central portion of Whidbey Island is Ebey's Landing National Historical Reserve, 17,400 acres of land and water that exhibit the past and present fabric of a strong rural community. The landscape of Ebey's Landing, its farms, fields, forests, and shorelines, have a subtle and quiet kind of beauty. It is not grand on the scale of the Olympics or the Cascades, but it can be just as breathtaking. It is a beauty that seems to lie in the harmony between natural and man-made elements and in the experience of generations shaping the environment into a community. Scattered groups of farm buildings seem a part of the land, not intrusive elements placed on it. Villages cluster around long-used transportation points while the pattern of forest and field follows natural contours on that same land. This gentle beauty this balance between the built and natural environment, is a dynamic yet harmonious ensemble as each generation adds a layer of use and meaning on the land.

While we all recognize that landscapes change, not every landscape carries the tangible reminders of times past (both on the land and in the lives of those who live and work it). It is this physical evidence of the past that allows a visual understanding of the slow process of change. Fortunately, the physical landscape of the reserve is suffused with such remnants. Old fence lines and hedgerows, old farm complexes, orchards, and Victorian houses in Coupeville all mix with the contemporary everyday workings of the reserve. It is this visible mixture of new and old that creates a cultural landscape, a place where generations have lived harmoniously with the land.

While the reserve may be viewed as a single landscape there are many areas within it that have an individual character or feeling because of physical features, visual boundaries or land uses. These areas create the larger landscape and are like the pieces of a large mosaic. They may be viewed individually as small segments of colored glass, but when viewed together in the context of the whole, they yield a single, composite picture. While the formal boundaries of the reserve follow the original Donation Land claims of the first settlers, these boundaries also encompass a rich mixture of physical features. There are ten basic land areas that characterize the reserve and as a way of picturing the whole landscape it is helpful to look at them individually.

Since Whidbey is an island, no place is far from the sight and sound of water. The reserve is outlined by two distinct water edges. The western shore and boundary of the reserve stretches eight miles along Admiralty Inlet. It is a dramatic margin of narrow sand and stone beaches that give way to windswept bluffs rising over 200 feet. Foot trails along portions of the crest reveal magnificent views to the inland waters, Port Townsend and the Olympics.

On the east side of the reserve, Penn Cove, a 4,300 acre bay that cuts deeply into the island, carves a more sheltered but equally rich beach character with small cottages, boathouses and lagoons which support various wildlife habitats.

Inland, the reserve is sculpted by wooded ridges and large natural prairies. Bordering the coastal strip in the southern part of the reserve are the Fort Casey Uplands, which consist of elevated woodlands and natural grasslands overlooking agricultural prairies. The area is sparsley settled and man's reshaping of the landscape is not obvious. What seems natural, however, has indeed been altered. The forests have all been logged once or twice and the meadows are full of introduced plants.

To the north lies Ebey's Prairie, the physical and symbolic center of the reserve. A gently sloping bowl of agricultural land, it cradles some of the island's most productive farmland. Perhaps because of this, Ebey's Prairie has undergone little change over time. Indeed many old fence lines, hedgerows and field patterns have remained the same for over a century.

Forming the northeast boundary of the prairie are the West Woodlands. Primarily a large ridgeline that levels and fills out into dense second and third growth forests, the area is rich in geologic history. Several glacial kettles are scattered throughout the woodlands leaving large areas of land relatively remote and undeveloped. One such depression is filled with water and forms Lake Pondilla along the north edge of the area in Fort Ebey State Park.

Forming the northern-most boundary of the reserve are the San de Fuca Uplands, an undulating patchwork of croplands, pastures, and residential development. The land extends east-west on a plateau and slowly rolls down to the shores of Penn Cove. A few old farm complexes and isolated homes punctuate an area rapidly changing in character as new subdivisions begin reshaping the landscape.

Following the shore of Penn Cove around to the southern edge is the town of Coupeville. Nestled on a natural low point, Coupeville is the commercial center of the reserve. It is here also, that one finds the highest visible concentration of alteration by man in structures, roads and the landscape. Here also is a strong sense of continuity as many original buildings and land patterns remain from its nineteenth century beginnings. Ornate Victorian homes, false front commercial buildings, a variety of bungalows, remnant orchards, wharf and waterfront all contribute to a sense of time and history.

East of Coupeville is another densely wooded ridge, the East Woodlands. They contain a large amount of second and third growth forest with rhododendron understory. The area remains largely undeveloped though there are signs of change as new roads are punched into the forest ending at a new home or clearing for a subdivision.

On the eastern edge of the reserve is Smith Prairie, a large open tract of land bisected by the reserve boundary. The prairie is framed by woodlands and dotted with a few scattered farm dwellings. Because the soil is rocky and difficult to farm, it is used primarily for grazing and feed crops.

Finally, with Crockett Prairie, we have toured the entire reserve. The prairie envelops Crockett Lake, a shallow brackish lake separated from Admiralty Bay by Keystone Spit. The wetlands surrounding the lake provide excellent wildlife habitats. North of the lake, agricultural prairie funnels between the tree covered ridges of the Fort Casey Uplands and East Woodlands. Several farms dating from original Donation Land claims remain viable working complexes, lending to the prairie not only scenic value but layers of landscape history.

These ten individual areas, when viewed in the context of the whole reserve, give us a composite picture of a landscape rich in physical and historical integrity. It is a landscape shaped by the people who came and the generations after them, reshaping the same land slowly and purposefully. The physical evidence of their experience on the land in the remaining structures and landscape remnants gives us a sense of history, but those alone cannot tell the whole story of the reserve. The glue that holds the pieces of this mosaic together is the history of the people who shaped the land. What is this history and how did their cumulative experience become what is today a community?