The Curse of Anacortes

Anacortes is a city in Skagit County in Washington State on Fidalgo Island which is an island in the Puget Sound Area. It was named after one of the very first settlers wife Annie Curtis her husband was named Amos Bowman. Amos and Annie moved to the eastern area of what was known as Ship Harbor in the year 1876 and in 1877 Amos established a post office with a zip code of 98221 and named the town after his wife. By 1891 the town was booming and it got it's identity and a fish and lumber town. The town has been booming ever since.

Since before 10,000 B.C many Native Americans lived throughout the island's in the Puget Sound, mostly the Swinomish Natives and the Samish. Explorers did not come into the Puget Sound area until the 1700's. The first known of explorer was Carrasco a Spanish explorer who discovered the entrances to the Rosario Strait and Deception Pass in 1790. After him many new explorers and trapper's came and went and between 1790 and 1840 the animal population was almost depleted. This angered the Natives and some say this is where the start of the curse came from.

If you have ever been to Anacortes or know someone who has then you probably know about the curse. The story goes that when the settlers and their family's came in and started taking over the land a Native American who lived there was so angered by what was happening that he made a curse upon the island and the curse was; that whoever shall lay there head to sleep on the island shall forever have heartache if they should ever leave it. Thus creating an overpopulated land where people must fight for land, jobs etc... Sort of a payback for what they went through when they were becoming overpopulated with unwanted visitors who would not leave. The Natives lost a lot of the area and even though they have a few Reservations set up around Skagit Valley it still is not the same I'm sure.

No one knows exactly where this curse came from but everyone who lives on the island of Anacortes knows of this curse, at least everyone whom I have met. Most have their own interpretation of the who's and where's of the curse but it never steers far from the main point that I already stated above. Almost everyone I talked to believes in it as well.

When I was first told of this curse I had just moved to the town a couple months back. I thought it silly at the time but I could not discount that there was something about the town that I felt pulled me to it, like I was meant to be there. I had visited the town once before a few years earlier as a teen with my family and for the next three years I often thought of the town and had wanted to go back to it. I had hoped one day to move their. At that point I had not heard of that curse or the reason for it. Three years later my family moved their and then I followed.

I lived their for over ten years and in that time I knew many people who kept trying to move away. Well it's not that they tried they succeeded but only for a short amount of time. People would get bored there, it's a small town in size no major retail chains no real fun activities for teens and young adults of any kind. So people would get a little stir crazy so they would pack their bags and leave but always came back. When you would ask them why they came back they usually said they just missed the place but could not really figure out why.

Is this curse true? I don't know however I think so but maybe it's just that such beauty in a place is so hard to find elsewhere. The ocean is all around you, the trees are so big and green and the air smells so nice. The people are friendly and it's just an all around nice place to raise a family. So maybe it's just the beauty that calls us all back or maybe it's that dreaded curse but can you really dread any place that inviting?

I was told that no one ever makes it more than a year away before they come marching back, so far I have made it three but oh how I do miss the place and I long to lay my head there to rest at night once again. If you have any doubts then I suggest you take a trip up to this town yourself ask the local townspeople, stay a couple night and see for yourself. You will see and understand once you gone, trust me.

References

http://museum.cityofanacortes.org/timeline.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/anacortes_washington