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,...