LYNNWOOD — Bert Rowe built a house and a life in Lynnwood.
He’ll soon be responsible for building a park there, too, even though he died two weeks ago at age 99.
Four years ago, Rowe sold his nearly 2.5-acre lot on 60th Avenue SW to the city at the "bargain rate" of about $335,000 and moved into a retirement community across the street.
"It was a gift," local historian Marie Little said. "Certainly, he sold it to the city of Lynnwood, but he probably could have sold it to someone else who might have developed it, but the neighborhood wouldn’t have had the park."
Although there is enough space for about 10 houses on the property, the city is already in the process of planning a park. Ironically, the first of a series of previously planned public meetings about the new park was held one week after Rowe died.
"The neighborhood around 60th Avenue W. needed its own park that was accessible," said Laurie Cowan, Lynnwood’s park planner. "We’re always happy to find a homeowner who will sell their land to the city."
A consultant is expected to have three design plans prepared for a second meeting in December, and a final, preferred park design will be ready in January for City Council approval.
The plans could include a playground and a picnic area, and the city will "certainly endeavor to save as many of the trees on the site as we can," Cowan said.
A second planned park on 33rd Place W. is going through a similar process.
Despite the city’s 14 parks, including a handful of larger community parks that include sports fields and other amenities, Cowan said some parts of the city lack recreational space.
"There’s relatively little open space left," Cowan said, adding that the city actively seeks longtime residents who own large lots with few homes on them for future parks.
"For neighborhood parks, we like to have at least 2 acres. Ideally, we’d like 5 to 10 acres, but there just isn’t that kind of space available in the city anymore," she said.
Lynnwood certainly has changed since Rowe first laid eyes — and eventually some brick and mortar — on it. It was 1944 when Rowe and his wife, Bernice, first drove to the then-Alderwood Crossroads, which is now the intersection of Highway 99 and 196th Street SW. Soon after, they "moved to the country," said Rowe’s attorney, Russell Hermes.
There, he built a brick house, fulfilling the lifelong dream of his wife, an avid gardener who belonged to the Alderwood Garden Club.
"She maintained the garden so well, it already looked like a park," said Little, the historian who interviewed Rowe in July 2000 after he had sold the land to the city. "Mr. Rowe would have liked to have seen the house stay, but he understood that it couldn’t."
He sold the land to the city in 1999, five years after Bernice died. The city tore down the house a couple of years ago in preparation for the park.
"That didn’t matter to him," Little said. "Because his wife had wanted the brick house, and she had that. So the house had served its purpose."
Rowe and his wife were active in the community through Trinity Lutheran Church and were heavily involved with Work Opportunities, a private, nonprofit organization that has offered vocational services throughout Snohomish County since 1963.
Little said it’s fitting that the couple will leave a lasting impression on the city they helped grow.
"He was happy the property would be a park for all the people who had been his neighbors over the years, and the new people who moved into the area," Little said. "There are still some little pockets of what was once forest that really need to be preserved."
Reporter Victor Balta: 425-339-3455 or vbalta@heraldnet.com.
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