Mike and I had to see the legendary Deception Pass Bridge. It's is beautiful, but the land around it is what makes it breathtaking. Carved by glaciers, the steep cliffs and sharp edges of the islands create natural barriers and divert tides flowing from the Strait of Juan de Fuca past Whidbey and Fidalgo Islands. Deep, mist-shrouded forests add a touch of mystery to the appearance. Tidal flow can be extremely rough and low tides create standing waves, huge whirlpools and roiling eddies. With the small islands (Ben Ure, Strawberry and Pass) between them, Whidbey and Fidalgo Islands appeared to many early explorers to be sides of a small bay or perhaps the mouth of a river. It probably looked too dangerous to sail into the waters of the pass.
In 1792, Captain George Vancouver spent months exploring the area. He, too, named many local features (Puget Sound, Admiralty Inlet, Mount Rainier, and Mount Baker). It was Vancouver’s chief navigator Joseph Whidbey who sailed into the pass and followed the water south into the Saratoga Passage, disproving the bay theory. Honoring his chief navigator’s courage and discovery, Vancouver named the island to the south of the pass after him: Whidbey.
This great achievement began with an idea from a New England seaman, Captain George Morse, who sailed through the narrow, turbulent waterway called Deception Pass and eventually settled in the tiny village of Oak Harbor on Whidbey Island. Pointing at the two promontories of Whidbey and Fidalgo in the 1880s, he told his children that “one day we will have a bridge across this pass with Pass Island as a center support.” Fifty years later, with the persistent work of citizens and legislators, and the public works support of the Great Depression, the bridge became a reality.
During the Great Depression, the Public Works Administration sent the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) to build park facilities and bridge approaches. The Park had rapidly become popular with residents of both Oak Harbor and Anacortes, yet had few facilities. Two CCC camps were established, one at Cornet Bay on Whidbey and one at Rosario on Fidalgo. About 200 young men built kitchen shelters, ranger residences, roadways, trails, restrooms and the log railings along the highway. In less than one year, from August 1934 to July 31, 1935, the bridge fabricator Puget Construction Company of Seattle built the two-span bridge. CCC workers helped build the road bed leading to the bridge.
Some 700 cars traveled on the bridge on July 31, 1935, the day it was dedicated. About 20,000 cars now cross the bridge 180 feet above its swirling water every day. Dramatic and intriguing, the bridge is the Pass’s great connector because it links three islands together.
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