The year was 1944.  We had decided we should buy some property.  There was to be a sale of tax title property at the County City Building in Seattle.

I looked over the list of available properties and decided I would like a piece in the north end that is now in the city of Shoreline, WA.

It was approximately six acres that was below Richmond Beach Road.

It did have a southerly exposure which was essential for the home I wanted to build.  I went to the auction and was able to buy it for $1050.00 dollars.

Subsequently, I was drafted into the army, dreaming of the home I would build on the first of our lots.

Eventually, I finished my time in the army.  I went back to work at the shipyard from which I had been drafted.  It was very evident this would not last long.  I was laid off within a few months.

Since I wanted to get into the homebuilding business, I should become a carpenter.  I went down to the carpenter’s union to see about becoming an apprentice carpenter.  Unfortunately, I was 28 years old and too old for their apprentice program.

We were living in the lower unit of a duplex that my dad owned on Queen Anne hill.  It needed some new steps for the back porch.

I was replacing those steps when the man who lived in the little rental house on the rear of the lot came out and saw me.  He said I ought to go to work as a carpenter.  I explained that I had tried to become a carpenter but that I was too old.

He said that he could get me into the union by telling them that I was a carpenter.  He and another friend perjured themselves by claiming that I’d been a carpenter for years.  Voila!  I was a journeyman carpenter.

There followed quite a few jobs of two and three days duration.  There was a job where we were building a house with a hip roof.  The rafters required a semi-trick cut on the DeWalt saw.  There were quite a few rafters that someone else had cut that were unacceptable.  I was able to cut all the rest of the rafters.  At least I wasn’t the worst carpenter on the job.

I worked as a carpenter for about six months when I decided I was ready to build the house I had been dreaming of all the time I was in the army.

I drew the floor plan on an eight by eleven piece of square lined engineer paper.  At that time I was able to get a building permit on such a flimsy arrangement.

My next chapter will tell of the adventures in the building of the house.