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After sustaining heavy graduation losses from its NW2B football title team, La Conner High School will likely sport a youthful lineup this fall. It only made sense, then, that the school district would tap someone with past success developing young talent to succeed championship coach Jeff Scoma at the Braves helm when the season kicks off in a few weeks. Charlie Edwards, a longtime local youth sports coach and member of the Braves staff this past spring, has been promoted to fill the head coaching vacancy created when Scoma left La Conner in...
The Blue Heron Canoe Family camped at the former Maple Avenue ballfield in La Conner last week, a stop on their Healing Waters 2021 journey to Lummi Island. The Willapa Spirit canoe accompanied it. Swinomish tribal member Eric Day joined the journey in La Conner to help skipper the second canoe. The Snohomish tribe crew and supporters totaled 65 people, Karen Condos, director of Natives United Journey, told the Weekly News Thursday. Vehicles arrived at the ballfield site late Wednesday morning...
The two-time defending state champion La Conner High School volleyball team is already laying the foundation for a post-COVID fall net campaign. La Conner players did so by sweeping a traditional cornerstone event – the Burlington-Edison Invitational Summer Tournament – in late July. The Lady Braves, limited to a shortened, primarily NW2B spring schedule because of pandemic restrictions, made the most of their opportunity to match up at Burlington opposite teams from larger enrollment schools. La Conner defeated Nooksack Valley,...
La Conner High will remain the home of the Braves. The school district’s board of trustees on Monday formally approved a unanimous Swinomish Tribal Senate resolution supporting retention of the Braves name for La Conner athletic and academic teams. Board president Susie Deyo joined members Amanda Bourgeois, John Agen and Lynette Cram in approving the Senate measure. Board member J.J. Wilbur, who also serves on the Swinomish Senate, abstained. The joint tribal-school district action is in accordance with state legislation passed earlier this y...
An American youth softball team playing in the Dominican Republic last week had an Edge against its competition. Make that two Edges. Twin sisters Alissa and Kelsey Edge were selected to play seven games in the Caribbean for a national team assembled through the American Based Sports Abroad organization. The Edge sisters are products of the Marysville-Pilchuck High School softball program, but their dad, Bernie Edge, is a La Conner alum who played baseball for the Braves. “It’s been a lot of fun watching them develop and play,” he told the W...
C.J. Woods represents the latest branch off a decades old Friday Harbor basketball coaching tree dating to the late Dean Turnbull, for whom the gymnasium at the island school is named. Woods is now looking forward to setting down roots in La Conner as the new Braves head hoops coach. The Friday Harbor and University of Idaho alum was chosen to succeed Todd Hinderman, an award-winning science teacher at La Conner Schools who guided the Braves to a State 2B sweet sixteen berth in 2019 and whose up...
On Friday, November 13, 2020, Marilyn Alice Frey, loving wife, mother, grandmother, sister and friend, passed away peacefully of natural causes at age 87. She was a resident of Serenity Assisted Living in Bellevue, Washington Marilyn was born on April 30, 1933, on San Juan Island to Roy and Mary Gresli. After graduating from Friday Harbor High School, Marilyn attended Western Washington State College (now WWU) in Bellingham, Washington, where she met her future husband, Stanley Frey. Married on...
The two-time defending state champion La Conner High School volleyball team has had few close calls in recent seasons. But a clothes call is part of the Lady Braves game plan this summer. La Conner players are serving up a five-week “Clean Out Your Closets” campaign, collecting clean and sellable clothes and household textiles as part of an eco-friendly team fundraiser. They are asking participants to place gently-used items in bags to be collected between now and the third week in August. “We would like everything by Aug. 20,” said head co...
La Conner High School teacher Daniel Castillo believes in giving his students all the tools they need for success. And thanks to a major building trades organization, he will be able to fill their toolboxes when classes resume in the fall. The Building Industries Association of Washington recently presented Castillo a check for $2,500 to purchase tools for a new introduction to residential carpentry class at La Conner that will be part of the school district’s expanded career and technology e...
Local moms are tackling a sport once blocked to young women. La Conner High School alum Bobbi Carlson Crawford and former La Conner business owner Liz Vargas have suited up several seasons for the Mount Vernon Warriors women’s football team, whose schedule this spring included a game against the semi-pro Seattle Spartans. The Skagit County team, launched four years ago as a fundraising vehicle for area youth sports, plays what can best be described as a tough brand of flag football. “We actually play in full pads and helmet,” Vargas, a team...
For years he was the face of the Pioneer Picnic, one that always bore a smile. Pat Good (1928-2008), whose forebears settled on Fir Island a century and a half ago, was a longtime mainstay at the annual picnic in La Conner’s Pioneer Park, where he prepared salmon as the main course of a luncheon that often drew more than 300 people. He did so gladly. Good was immensely proud of his Skagit heritage, part of which – a large part, in fact – was based on volunteerism and public service. “Nobody was more giving of himself,” says his s...
First there was the COVID-19 shutdown in 2020, then a hip injury this spring. But La Conner alum Matty Lagerwey, now a pre-med student at Western Washington University, remains on schedule to compete in national track and field trials within the next two years, she told the Weekly News July 5. Lagerwey, a multiple State 2B title winner while at La Conner High School, had improved her speed, recorded an 18’3” long jump, and posted a 35’-9 ¼” triple jump during her freshman indoor track season at WWU. Then came the pandemic. COVID-1...
Matika Wilbur’s fame continues to grow. The Swinomish Indian Tribal Community member and La Conner High School grad, one of the country’s leading photographers, was interviewed on national television Sunday in her role as co-host of a critically acclaimed podcast addressing key Native American issues. Wilbur appeared with Desi Small Rodriguez on a segment of the Yasmin Vossoughian Show on MSNBC. Wilbur and Rodriguez, a Northern Cheyenne tribal member, are hosts of the “All My Relations” podcast that explores contemporary and cultural Native...
July 1 started a new month and was the day Will Nelson was sworn in as La Conner’s new school superintendent at a school board meeting called for that purpose. Board chair Susie Deyo called it a very special day, “obviously,” for the school district and for Nelson. She asked Lynette Cram, the longest serving board member, to administer the oath to Nelson. “Excited” was the word most repeated Nelson said he was “super excited to be a part of the community here. I am excited to start the journey...
Recent La Conner High School graduates MacQuaid Hiller and Avery Sloniker enjoyed one last hurrah last week as they closed out their school careers here before taking the next step on their life’s journey. Hiller and Sloniker, graduated June 18 in commencement exercises at Whittaker Field, but were recognized by the school board June 28 for serving as student representatives during a year marked by on-line and hybrid instructional models employed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Board members expressed appreciation for Hiller’s and Slonike...
La Conner’s longtime field of dreams will soon become a field of memories, visible merely in the mind’s eye as the property becomes new housing and a yet to be defined public park covering a half-acre or so. Hedlin’s Ballfield, a youth sports hub here for decades, has heard its final cheers. But there is still more than a smattering of boos from those who lament loss of much of the revered rare green space along busy Maple Avenue. The Town purchased the property earlier this year and immediately...
John Allen Carr, of Carmel, CA and La Conner, WA passed peacefully from cancer of the liver in the comfort of his home on June 9, 2021. John was born in San Francisco and attended Menlo High School, where he met his beloved life partner and wife of 59 years, Judith “Jackie” (Jackson), who passed February 25 of this year. John graduated from Stanford University with a BA degree in Biology in 1963. John and Judy were married in the chapel on the Stanford campus on his 20th birthday, following Joh...
There was no state 2B Hardwood Classic in Spokane this year. But there was a state level tournament in Mount Vernon last week. And as was the case in Spokane in 2020, La Conner High’s entry advanced to the final round, earning top runner-up honors. La Conner (15-2) placed second in the girls’ Summer State 2B basketball tournament hosted Wednesday through Friday by Mount Vernon Christian. The Lady Braves routed Toledo and edged Wahkiakum before falling to top-seeded Warden 72-66 in overtime for the championship. The three-day, eight-team event p...
Jeff Scoma had a successful first season as a head football coach, guiding La Conner High to a 4-1 mark and the NW2B spring grid crown, its best showing in several years. Turns out, Scoma might have been too successful – at least as far as Braves fans are concerned. The former Bellevue High assistant was announced last week as the new head coach at 3A Stanwood, whose campus has a student enrollment approaching 1,300 students. Despite the move up in classification, it was not an easy decision for Scoma to leave La Conner. “I loved La Conne...
Mikki Gifford is looking forward to her new role with La Conner schools. Make that, roles. Gifford is the new combination middle school-high school assistant principal and athletic director, a dual post she says is ideal given her extensive background in secondary level academics and extra-curricular activities. She arrives at La Conner after 15 years with the Oak Harbor School District and more than two decades in public education. “I entered the field of education to make a difference,” Gif...
The Town of La Conner moved swiftly Friday to open a cooling center for area residents to take shelter from last weekend’s record high temperatures. The suggestion made by Robin Carneen earlier in the day was a reality by 6 p.m. June 25. The La Conner school district made its elementary school commons available Saturday-Monday, from 12-8 p.m. Drinks and snacks were brought by Scott Thomas, La Conner town administrator. He provided transportation and oversaw and managed volunteers. Thomas made “accommodations for anyone, they just need to tel...
A Good family that has had a great impact on the history and agricultural development of Fir Island and whose members have since been actively engaged in an array of public service projects will be honored at the Skagit County Pioneer Association Picnic Aug. 5 in La Conner. Descendants of William and Rebecca Eady Good, who emigrated from Ireland to North America in the 19th century will be saluted as the Skagit County Pioneer Family of the Year when the annual picnic resumes after a one-year...
LA CONNER — Take shelter from the heat today through Monday, June 26-28, 12-8 p.m., at the La Conner elementary school commons, 305 N. 6th Street. This is the entrance up the steps at the circle drive, 305 North 6th Street, across from the high school. Drinks and snacks are being brought by Scott Thomas, La Conner town administrator. He is providing transportation. Thomas will “make accommodations for anyone, they just need to tell us what they need,” he wrote in an email Saturday mor...
It has often been dark and gloomy during the COVID-19 pandemic, but Friday was not one of those times. At least not for members of the La Conner High Class of 2021 and their families and friends. It was, instead, a rare opportunity to celebrate. Together. Bright sunshine and a spectacular view of Mt. Baker greeted the class and about 500 people attending outdoor commencement exercises at Whitaker Field for what was an often emotional 75-minute program. Valedictorian Sarah Malcomson and...
La Conner is one step closer to having some of its historic buildings don a more modern look. The Town Planning Commission voiced support last week for placement of small reader bar codes that when accessed would provide anecdotal and historical information about those structures, with owner approval. Deemed historical commemorative plaques, the QR codes do not require the Town’s official blessing if they do not exceed three square feet in size, according to Town Planner Michael Davolio and Mayor Ramon Hayes. Even so, they wanted c...