SoTac Rocks

On February 5th I officiated the funeral of Dick Hopkins, a long-time member of our congregation and native of South Tacoma. Dick grew up just a couple blocks from Edison Elementary and later became an educator in the Clover Park school district. His combination of local roots and passion for teaching made visiting his house a little like returning to history class … a good history class. I learned from Dick that an Air Force plane crashed just south of 84th street on its landing approach (not a comforting story for a person whose house sits in that flight path). As we talked about gardening during another of my visits, he made the comment that I probably had found a number of rocks in my garden. “Yes,” I responded.

Then I inquired how he knew. At that moment it was as if he’d stepped back into the classroom. He proceeded to offer me a condensed geological history of South Tacoma. “The reason you have rocks is because millions of years ago the glacier that carved the Nalley Valley began to recede. As it crawled back toward Mt. Rainier/Tahoma it deposited debris like a garbage truck with a leak seeding what is now South Tacoma with billions of rocks.”

After talking with Dick, I continued not only to notice the plethora of rocks in my backyard, but also in many other places. I began to make mental notes every time I passed a prominent stone. After a few weeks I began to wonder if there was a neighborhood theme emerging. Is it possible that these pre-historic deposits are embedded in the DNA of South Tacoma? Is it possible that the quest to discover the South Tacoma Way has something to do with common, abundant, plain old rocks?

The Gateway Rock

If you have gotten of the interstate at 56th street then undoubtedly you have noticed this magnet for the expression of teen love. This unofficial icon has been welcoming visitors to South Tacoma for who knows how long. One could probably determine the age of this rock by boring a hole and counting the paint rings. I’d love to discover the origin of this stone. Was it unearthed by Eisenhower’s interstate or did it precede the 50’s? Was it moved or did the civil engineers simply decided to build around it like Mike Mulligan’s steam shovel? If you have clues, let me know.

Founding Rocks

“On the afternoon of April 1, 1868, a tall, blue-eyed man with sandy-gray hair and a face elongated by partial baldness sat astride his worn horse and looked out at Commencement Bay from the bluff above the southern shore … Morton Matthew McCarver saw not the all-but-empty bay, nor did he smell the clean, thin scent of fir. He envisioned a city: wharves and streets and steamships and locomotives …” So begins historian Murray Morgan’s description of Tacoma’s first developer, promoter and even namer. Without McCarver, there is a good chance we’d be living in a place called Commencement City (at least it doesn’t rhyme with aroma). Just seven years later McCarver died and the railroad he helped usher into Tacoma donated over forty acres to the city in his honor. This land sits just east of South Tacoma Way and is now known as Old Tacoma Cemetery. In 1875 Morton Matthew McCarver simultaneously became one of the cemetery and South Tacoma’s first residents.

Rocks beneath our feet

Walk a few blocks north of my house and you will eventually step on the stamp of our country’s original economic stimulus package. In 1939 FDR’s Works Progress Administration began crushing the glacial rocks of this area to form it into sidewalks that continue to enhance the life our community 70 years after they were first poured.

The Rock of Education

For decades, Mt. Tahoma students used this rock as their canvas, billboard, rallying point and memorial. When it was deemed too costly to move to the new school, the Gray Middle Schoolers inherited its layered history. Just a couple of months after receiving its latest coat it is already showing a few chips and dings.

The Rocks of the Future

Turn west from South Tacoma Way onto 66th Street and you may notice the first signs of new construction. In 2010, Metro Parks along with the Boys and Girls Club will break ground on a community center and new club. Despite the fact that over 21,000 people live in South Tacoma, there are very few places where the community is able to gather. Perhaps the South Tacoma Community center will become the WPA of 2009.

Once I started looking, it was hard to stop. In addition to the above images I could have added the image of the rocks at the entrance to the Oakland/Madrona neighborhood, a photo of McClain’s Soil Supply, the rocks that border the relatively new Wapato Hills Park or the stones inset into the public art of the new Sounder Station. Suffice it to say that rocks both native and foreign now cover the landscape of this 6.5 square mile community. But does this answer the question?

Are rocks in some way connected to the South Tacoma Way?

I enticed my two oldest kids on a neighborhood walk last Saturday with the promise of a visit to the library. As often happens, less than two blocks into the journey my daughter began to complain that she was tired. With almost a mile to go, I knew an intervention was needed so I reached into my bag of ‘Dad’s traveling games’ and pulled out a version of I Spy. “Hey, who can spot something that is pretty?” Silence. I decided to get things going. “I see a house that is painted a pretty color of red. What do you see Janie?” More silence. “Could it be,” my mind began to wonder, “that what critics claim is true? Is there really not much beauty in South Tacoma? If my 5 year old couldn’t find anything attractive, then what does that say about our neighborhood?” Just as I was about to point out something else my daughter finally mumbled, “I see a pretty yard.” I followed with ‘a pretty bush,’ which led to a pretty Holly Tree, pretty robins, a pretty car and on and on it went until we arrived at the library.

I don’t know if the presence of rocks is in some way a part of the DNA of this community, but what I do believe is that there is a great amount of beauty that goes unnoticed. Sometimes a crazy thing happens when we start to look for things … we see them. It reminds me of a line from Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Aurora Leigh, “Earth’s crammed with heaven, and every common bush afire with God; and only he who sees takes off his shoes; the rest sit round and pluck blackberries.”

I love the bumper stickers, “Admit it Tacoma, you’re beautiful.” Perhaps my borough should further refine this invitation to notice the oft ignored. “Admit it South Tacoma, you Rock.”