Family donates shelter for Wilcox Park

Published 10:59 pm Sunday, August 5, 2007

LYNNWOOD – Cows, pigs and chickens once roamed the park known for its flag pavilion.

Al Wilcox, 86, of Lynnwood grew up there.

“That’s a beautiful site,” said Wilcox, whose family moved into a farmhouse on what is now Wilcox Park during the Great Depression. “I was raised there, eight of us kids were raised there.”

The Wilcox family, which owns a construction company, is donating up to $100,000 of supplies and labor to build a picnic shelter in the northeast corner of the park, Lynnwood park operations superintendent Bob Colinas said.

Other picnic shelters in the city are at North Lynnwood Neighborhood Park and Lynndale Park. Both are usually booked up most summer weekends.

The city has wanted to build a picnic shelter at Wilcox Park for years, Colinas said.

“With the kindness of the donation, that will finally allow us to construct it,” he said.

Grading at the park has already started and construction is expected to be finished by October or November.

Wilcox Park, at 5215 196th St. SW, was acquired by Snohomish County in 1965 and later deeded to the city. Forest covers more than half of the 7.2-acre community park, which is highly noticeable from the road for its plaza filled with American flags.

Al Wilcox’s family moved from North Dakota to Snohomish County in the mid-1920s, when he was 5 years old. His father was a carpenter.

After the Great Depression hit, the Wilcox family could no longer afford the payments on their home. In 1932, they moved into a farmhouse across the street, which sat in about the same place where the new picnic structure is planned to be built.

It was a great place to grow up, Wilcox said. He had three brothers and four sisters.

“A lot of that park down by the flag pavilion was kind of a swampy deal,” Wilcox said. “The city has put quite a bit of fill in the lower part of the park.”

The family’s home was destroyed by an electrical fire in 1967, said Bob Wilcox, Al Wilcox’s son.

Bob Wilcox remembers spending time at the homestead with his grandfather, who operated a small saw filing business there. Bob Wilcox knows how much his father enjoyed his childhood.

“The community has been very good to them, and our family, and he wanted to give something back,” Bob Wilcox said.

“My dad was, is and always will be my hero,” he said.

Reporter Scott Pesznecker: 425-339-3436 or spesznecker @heraldnet.com.