“Sturdy Folk” back in publication

“Sturdy Folk,” a compilation of personal accounts of life and work on the Olympic Peninsula, is back in print and available at select Olympic Peninsula retailers.

Editor Mavis Amundson decided to reprint the book because people continued to ask about its availability.

“Sturdy Folk” is a book of reminiscence, a collection of stories written by people recalling their life and times on the Olympic Peninsula. “It’s people telling their own stories,” said Amundson.

One story is about a railroad man who worked on the Milwaukee Road out of Port Angeles. Another story is about a young woman from Spokane who took a job as a logging-camp cook in Neah Bay during the Great Depression. She later opened her own restaurant in Sequim. Another story tells about a schoolgirl who watched President Franklin Roosevelt’s procession through Port Angeles in 1937.

These first-hand accounts in “Sturdy Folk” are a time capsule of daily life on the North Olympic Peninsula in the 1900s, as experienced by people who lived there. A major theme that runs through their recollections is sheer durability: When life knocked them down, they dusted themselves off and got up again. In every sense of the word, they were “sturdy.”

The Peninsula Daily News published the first edition of “Sturdy Folk” in 1994, and the press run sold out in less than a month. The book went through several publications but fell out of print several years ago.

Thanks to optical scanning, an Everett printer was able to reprint“Sturdy Folk” from a remaining copy.

“Sturdy Folk” is once again available at several Peninsula retailers. They are:

• Chinook Pharmacy, Forks.

• Duffy’s Restaurant, Aberdeen.

• Port Book & News, Port Angeles.