La Conner childhood adds up for tax accountant

Neil Bretvick was in his early 20s when he left La Conner to embark on a career as a tax accountant. Along the way he has traveled the world and attended concerts played by the biggest acts in the music industry.

Even so, he insists that his hometown – where as a youth he enjoyed sledding down Maloy Hill (Second Street), smelt jigging on Swinomish Channel, swimming in the nearby Skagit River, learning to drive big farm trucks at West Shore Acres and scoring one of the more storied touchdowns in La Conner High School football history – “is still in my blood and bones.”

The connections are many, including Jeff Hellam, owner of Hellam’s Vineyard on North First Street, the son of a co-founder of the Bellevue accounting firm where Bretvick has worked since 1985.

Bretvick insists his career is truly rooted here. The 1976 La Conner graduate then earned degrees from Skagit Valley College and Central Washington University and a master’s from Golden Gate University.

“I was good in math in high school,” he recalls, “thanks to teachers like Mr. (Steve) Crawford and Mr. (Rudy) Leander. They really left a positive impression on me with their ability to explain complex concepts.

“Initially,” Bretvick notes, “I thought I’d be a math teacher like them. Unfortunately, I didn’t seem to have the gift nor the patience, so I thought accounting would be a good choice, and it was. I remember my business and accounting classes at La Conner High with Mr. (Gene) Fowler and how much I enjoyed them.”

He received no small amount of encouragement at home.

“My parents, Duane and Helen Bretvick, grandmother LaVerne Bretvick and aunt Lorraine and uncle Bill Van Brocklin were my most consistent advocates for college and career success,” Bretvick says. “My aunt and uncle, being educators in the Stanwood Schools, were hugely encouraging to me. ’Your education is something that can never be taken away from you,’ my mother used to say.”

Bretvick grew up on the hill here, where summer weekends were highlighted by salmon barbecues at home or with neighboring families.

“It seemed like every week in the summer, the Alvords, Byrns, Van Wieringens, Wipfs or we would have one,” he says. “Our neighbors were an extension of family to me. Actually, the whole town felt that way.”

His youth was an idyllic time of playing sports – “We ‘hill kids’ would often compete in basketball or baseball against the ‘flats brats,’” says Bretvick – and parlaying a paper route into getting to know just about everyone in town.

“As a paperboy in the early ‘70s,” Bretvick says, “I knew so many of the people who lived in town.”

A favorite customer was legendary artist Guy Anderson.

“When collecting the paper route money,” he says, “I would sometimes get a glimpse of what he was working on.”

In high school, where he first caught the accounting bug, Bretvick made his mark as a top-flight tennis player, outstanding musician and author of a signature touchdown play for the 1973 Braves team that reached the state playoffs under head coach Landy James.

“We were playing Friday Harbor at home,” Bretvick says, looking back almost 50 years. “Their running back had made some big runs cutting to the outside. Landy put me in at defensive end and told me; ‘Whatever you do, turn the play in. Don’t let him get outside of you.’

“Two plays later,” says Bretvick, “they attempted an outside run in my direction, but the quarterback initially fumbled the snap, and in his rush, pitched the ball to me instead of his own player. I ran about 60 yards for my first and only touchdown. My legs felt like lead as I was so shocked to be holding the ball. Thanks to some key blocking by my teammates, I made it to the end zone untouched. I heard that someone in town filmed the run, but I never saw it.”

It was no accident that Bretvick took to music at an early age – a favorite pastime that has since led to attendance at concerts headlined by Elton John, Bruce Springsteen, Led Zeppelin, Peter Frampton, Jethro Tull, James Taylor, Steely Dan, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Chicago, The Moody Blues, John Prine, Al Stewart and Brandi Carlile.

Bretvick’s dad was an accomplished accordionist, taught by the famed Hugo Helmer.

“My dad’s father, Lud Bretvick, also played a small accordion,” he says. “Dad said when he was very young, he asked grandpa where the music came from, and grandpa had told him there was a little man inside making the music. So, one day, dad cut the bellows open to see if he could find the little man.”

Neil Bretvick opted for the trumpet, inspired by his mom’s two Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass records.

“I loved them,” he says. “They made such an impression on me I decided to learn to play the trumpet when I was about nine. I played in the high school band starting in seventh and grade for Mr. (Bill) Hoy.”

After college, and as his career grew, Bretvick and his late first wife Donna embraced public service, devoting time to PTA, scouting and recreational league soccer.

“My accounting career has given me many wonderful opportunities to learn about businesses and communities and provide the financial wherewithal to travel and pursue philanthropic endeavors,” he says. “Through my career I have become associated with a number of wonderful charities, becoming a supporter and board member of a couple that advocate for homeless and for high school and college mentoring for students who are often left behind in our society.”

As a member of the Bellevue Breakfast Rotary Club, Bretvick is involved in projects related to autism, promotion of clean water and malaria and polio eradication.

Being an accountant has had its stressful moments, he concedes, but there was also the time Bretvick flew in a client’s helicopter in heavy fog to tour oyster beds at Willapa Bay.

“The pilot had to put the chopper down on the side of a hill until it was safe to take off again,” says Bretvick. “Watching him negotiate the fog and make that landing was quite a thrill.”

He and his current wife, Carolee, also a La Conner alum, travel as time allows, often in their RV. It was on a trip to Cannon Beach, Oregon where he proposed.

Travels abroad have taken Bretvick through Europe and the Mediterranean rim, including a stop at the D-Day beaches at Normandy, which he says every American should visit.

“If you have the opportunity,” he advises today’s La Conner students, “do a bit of travel abroad. It will provide some perspective outside your own world.”

Having put his 40th tax season in the books, Bretvick counsels teens to take an accounting of their lives and explore potential avenues for personal growth.

“Don’t be afraid to step outside your comfort zone and try new things,” he implores. “Talk to your elders. Listen to their stories and learn from their experiences.”

And when it comes to varied experiences, few can match Bretvick, who anticipates even more adventures in the years to come.