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Blessed with a broad skill set and diverse interests, the late Jim Frey, who served La Conner Schools for more than a decade as a teacher, coach, counselor and principal, is most remembered for having brought out the best in others. He did so, according to those who knew him well, not only by unfailingly putting service above self-interest but doing so with a blend of compassion, encouragement and humor that his strong faith assured never faltered regardless of circumstances. Frey, who died Jan. 30 at age 83, was by nature a motivator. His...
Late Saturday afternoon, approximately 40 people came to the La Conner Civic Garden Club to hear from newly elected Rep. Clyde Shavers of the 10th Legislative District. Shavers began by sharing three principles that guide him when researching, drafting and submitting legislation to the House: 1) Does the legislative policy reflect a story or an issue that was shared by a constituent? 2) Does the policy positively affect not just one individual, but the entire district and state? 3) Can we carry this policy forward into the future? In other...
Bernice Jane Stevens 10/1/1927 – 7/10/2022 Bernice Jane Stevens, longtime resident of Mount Vernon, Washington, died July 10, 2022 at the age of 94. She was born on a forty-acre farm in Mount Vernon to James and Elizabeth. She had three older sisters: Isabelle, Joyce, and Gladys. Bernice went to Ridgeway Grade School and she usually got there on her roller-skates. She graduated from Mount Vernon High School in 1945. Her position as a song leader and a cheerleader in high school set her up for a...
James (Jim) L. Frey, 83, a longtime resident of the Skagit Valley passed away in Mount Vernon on Monday, January 30, 2023. He was born in Madison, Nebraska on March 14, 1939 to Ervin and Alice Frey. He graduated from Mount Vernon High School with the Class of 1956, and earned his college degree from Bob Jones University in Greenville, SC in 1963. In 1961 Jim married Kay Randles in Mount Vernon. He taught school in La Conner for 13 years and then started his own business as Frey Construction. He...
Though shorthanded at times, the La Conner High School Lady Braves held the upper hand in three lopsided hoops wins last week. La Conner defeated 1A Meridian and NW1B/2B rivals Mount Vernon Christian and Friday Harbor by double digits to improve to 16-4 going into last night's late action at league foe Coupeville. The 65-18 weekend home victory over Friday Harbor was especially impressive since the team was without injured point guard Shaniquah Casey and leading scorer Ellie Marble saw only...
In an age of specialization, senior Ellie Marble is having a ball as a multi-sport standout. The proof was provided Jan. 31 before a standing room only crowd at Landy James Gym. That’s when Marble, a prized Central Washington University volleyball recruit, was presented a commemorative basketball in recognition of having passed the elite 1,000-point career hoops scoring mark. Marble, the reigning Washington State 2B Volleyball Player of the Year, was honored in front of the scorer’s table by Lady Braves head coach Joe Harper as part of the Sen...
On a night when La Conner School Board members were recognized for their service to the district, the panel first deflected attention to retiring faculty member and coach Suzanne Marble. At its two-and-one-half hour Jan. 23 hybrid meeting, the championship volleyball mentor was lauded for her upcoming induction into the Hall of Fame of the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association, the state’s governing body for schools athletics and extracurricular programs. Marble joins the 2023 WIAA Hall of Fame class in a May ceremony. She guided t...
The La Conner Kiwanis Club's High School Student of the Month for January is Nathan Haley. Nathan's parents are John Haley and Bonnie Beddall. He is a freshman at La Conner High School. Nathan enjoys his English and art classes. He has been part of ETC – a service club at school. Outside of school he enjoys videogames and drawing. He is not sure what his future career will be but plans to go to college. Middle school Student of the Month is Eva Porter. Her parents are Brian and Laura Porter. She...
Math has been a top priority for La Conner Schools, with the district adopting new K-12 curricula designed to engage students and improve standardized test scores. Students, teachers, parents and community members now want the same emphasis given to the arts. Concerned that likely spending cuts, primarily linked to declining student enrollment, could lead to reduced learning opportunities in music, drama and related subjects, supporters of arts education urged the school board Jan. 23 to spare those programs. Several pleas were emotional. La...
Betty May Jackman Wilson left La Conner, Washington for her next adventure on her 95th birthday, Sept. 23, 2022. She was born at home in Dayton, Oregon in 1927 to May and Walter Jackman. Her family moved to McMinnville so she could attend school. They lived in the Methodist parsonage until her father built them a house (hand digging out the basement at night after work). Betty loved music and was always singing; she sang in the school choir, played in the band and also played piano. Later she...
La Conner Schools served up a dinner menu that included food for thought during the district's winter open house last Wednesday. As the over 200 attendees finished a community ham-and-potato meal served by school staff, the district's administrative team outlined the status of on-going programs and its recipe for student success and achievement going forward. Superintendent Will Nelson, hired in 2021, shared with the public the building blocks of a major five-year plan: social-emotional...
After being eclipsed by one of the state's budding shooting stars, the La Conner High School Lady Braves brightened their prospects for a deep post-season run with a stellar 81-77 win at 4A Skyview in Vancouver, WA. Saturday afternoon. La Conner (13-4 overall) rebounded from a 79-54 setback Friday night to 4A Union High and its freshman phenom Brooklynn Haywood, who at 14 already has scholarship offers. Haywood poured in a Union school record 50 points – including seven three-pointers and a p...
As a popular song says, there are few ways better to gain fame than to have your picture on the cover of the Rolling Stone. A La Conner singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist may not be on the iconic magazine’s cover, but she is featured on its digital pages as an artist readers need to know. Locally and regionally, Katherine Paul, the face of Black Belt Eagle Scout, needs no introductions. Her brand is now getting plenty of national exposure, thanks to a glowing profile penned for rollingstone.com by Philadelphia-based writer, editor a...
The La Conner Braves went from heartache to heartened in 48 hours last week. The high school team (7-7) rebounded from a tough 57-56 home loss to Coupeville Wednesday with a 64-14 blowout win over Darrington at Landy James Gym Friday night. With the two-game split, La Conner was 3-2 in NW1B/2B play before last night's conference action at Orcas Island. The lopsided Darrington triumph helped take the sting out of the last-second setback to the Wolves, which was no ordinary one-point defeat. It...
There was plenty of highlight reel material when the La Conner High School girls' basketball team swept conference foes Coupeville and Darrington at home last week. The Lady Braves routed Coupeville 72-16 Wednesday and romped past Darrington 69-9 Friday, extending their winning streak to four games and improving to 11-3 going into Tuesday's action at Orcas Island. "Those two games gave us the opportunity to get playing time for everyone," said head coach Joe Harper. "It was also a chance for us...
Rachel Haley, a senior at La Conner High School, is the January Honored Student of the Month for Soroptimist of La Conner. Rachel is a member of the McCauley family and attributes much of her artistic leanings to her family. The late Curt McCauley, her grandfather, was an artist and was very involved in MoNA, the Museum of Northwest Art, as both a docent and a supporter. Gretchen, her grandmother, served on the board. Her aunt Eve is an accomplished painter. Rachell wants to represent all of...
When the La Conner and Mount Vernon Christian basketball teams tip off next Tuesday, winners will have already been determined. They being the La Conner High senior class and lucky raffle ticketholders. The seniors will be raffling over $1,000 in donated items at Landy James Gym that night to raise funds for their graduation trip in the spring. Tickets will be sold during the boys’ game, which gets under way at 5:15 p.m., with drawings held at halftime of the girls’ game that follows immediately afterward. Ticket prices are $5 each or five for...
A sudden shortage of bus drivers at La Conner Schools is forcing daily routes to be combined while threatening cancellation of student field trips and overnight travel to athletic events. Randy Swift of the schools short-handed transportation department apprised school board members of the troubling situation during their two-hour meeting Jan. 9. Swift said one driver retired over winter break. In November supervisor Kim Pedroza left for a similar post with the Stanwood School District. “We don’t have enough drivers to do our regular rou...
La Conner area residents are invited to engage this week and next with the two local institutions that define and make a difference in our lives. This is where citizens can have the most impact, making self-governing a reality. Your participation is needed first Saturday in a Town community conversation for the development of a communication plan. La Conner’s Council seeks conversation with citizens to clearly define the priorities, strategies and tools the town will use to communicate with the community. Open communication facilitates p...
By proclamation of the governor, January is School Board Recognition Month. It’s a great time to recognize our elected community members who selflessly give their time and energy in support of high-quality public schooling for our youth. School board members in La Conner are entrusted by this community with responsibility for an annual budget of $13,856,000 in 2022-2023, with an average of 527 students, 116 employees and nine buildings. School boards are charged with making decisions that can sometimes be quite difficult, or require sifting t...
They had to shuffle their lineup, but a league hoops triumph was still in the cards for the La Conner High School Lady Braves at Friday Harbor Saturday afternoon. Minus two starters, including Skagit County leading scorer Ellie Marble, the visitors dealt the hosts a lopsided 76-31 NW1B/2B defeat. Seniors Makayla Herrera and Josie Harper each matched Friday Harbor's team point total with career best 31-point outings. Herrera's point production included her first two perimeter treys of the...
There's no doubting Thomas regarding the La Conner High School boys' basketball team's resurrected post-season hopes. Senior transfer Braden Thoma confirmed that in a big way at Friday Harbor Saturday, scoring a game-high 19 points to pace La Conner in a key 61-45 NW1B/2B win at Turnbull Gym. Thomas, making his sixth start after transferring from Anacortes, delivered two of the team's nine outside treys as they won their third straight game and squared their season mark at 6-6. La Conner has...
When Taylor Brink visited La Conner High School last Thursday, he was fully armed – and armored. The butcher/meat cutter for Northwest Local Meats, the retail butcher shop for the Island Grown Farmers Cooperative, used all the tools of his trade to break down two quarters of a steer in teacher Peter Voorhees' cooking classes. Before employing his knives and saws, Brink put on a chain mail apron to prevent accidental stabs and a Kevlar arm band and glove to ward off cuts. Then he tackled the s...
Fate intervened on Dec. 27. First is the fact that the day before, Monday was a municipal holiday. Secondly the Dunlap Towing stopped running their weekly ad providing the tide tables to the community in this newspaper three or four years ago. At approximately 7:40 a.m. on the 27th, my wife alerted me to flooding around our house. I tried to contact Public Works and the Town offices to no avail, I called 911. I moved quickly to move our vehicles to higher ground. Next, I went to the source of the water, which was flowing down Caledonia Street...
Frederick James Mesman passed away on Sunday, Dec. 18, 2022 at the age of 98 at Life Care Center of Mount Vernon. Fred was born Aug. 30, 1924 on the family farm near Rocky Point, Whidbey Island to parents Sam and Tiena Mesman. He was raised there with his brother Francis and sisters Betty and Darlene, surrounded by relatives, as well as horses, cows, dogs and chickens. He especially loved times on West Beach, searching for agates with his mother or finding salvage on the beach. He attended...
