Rich Patton walked to a spot overlooking the beach at Picnic Point Park. He thought about a father-son project, a table he and his dad once built there out of logs.
Now 54, Patton is Snohomish County’s parks operations supervisor and chief ranger. He began his career at 21 as a seasonal park aide at Picnic Point. His boyhood home overlooked the Edmonds-area park.
One of his first duties in that job was to dismantle the picnic table he’d built as a kid with his father. “I called him and said, ‘Dad, guess what I did today?’ ” Patton said Wednesday.
Looking out at gray water and clouds veiling the Olympics, Patton talked of outdoor adventures with his dad. Today, 78-year-old Richard Patton lives in Joseph, Oregon, with his wife, Carole. The father and son have more in common than great memories of hiking, fishing and camping.
They share a legacy of service to Snohomish County parks.
Long before Rich Patton enrolled in Skagit Valley College’s parks law enforcement program or became a ranger, his dad was a part-time caretaker at Picnic Point Park. He also had a 32-year career with the U.S. Postal Service.
By phone from Joseph, in Oregon’s northeast corner, Richard Patton recalled how he talked his way into the Picnic Point gig.
He and young Rich had been out camping. “I called my wife to tell her I was on my way home,” he said. “She was upset about an incident that happened the night before in the park.”
There had been a domestic dispute. An angry husband “had a shotgun and threatened to shoot,” Richard Patton said. “After that, I contacted the park department.” At the time, Picnic Point Park “was basically a dirt parking lot,” he said. There was no pedestrian bridge over the railroad tracks, nor any gate.
Richard Patton asked the county to install a gate, which it did. And the county asked him for a favor — to open and close that gate if a ranger wasn’t available.
The role evolved into watching for trouble on the beach. Richard Patton got a badge and a county shirt, emblems of authority. “I ended up getting paid — it wasn’t very much,” he said.
The family had moved to Picnic Point in 1974, after living near Meadowdale Beach, and had the house for a decade.
Young Rich played a role in his father’s side job. His dad’s Picnic Point duties included enforcing park hours and the alcohol ban.
“He had a VW camper van with a CB radio,” Rich Patton said. “He would walk on the beach contacting people, and I would be his lookout in the van.” Richard Patton remembers patrolling the beach with a walkie-talkie. “It’s a big area for people to wander, south and way north on the beach,” the elder Patton said. “Sometimes it would take a few hours to find everybody.”
Rich, who later graduated from Mariner High School, was in his early teens at the time. “When I was a little older, some of these kids on the beach were my friends. It was a little embarrassing,” he said.
His dad knew the neighborhood kids and their addresses. “I had carried mail in that area for years. I knew everybody by name,” Richard Patton said. “Kids would say, ‘How do you know my name?’ and I’d say, ‘Well, we keep track of troublemakers.’ ”
It’s Father’s Day for both Richard and Rich Patton.
Rich, who lives in Snohomish, has two daughters, Erica and Meagan, and a son, Christopher. Daughter Erica Keough is the mother of his grandson — his dad’s great-grandson — Daniel. His other daughter, Meagan Gray, ran for Snohomish City Council last year.
As young children, they were raised in county parks. Rich Patton was the first ranger at Meadowdale Beach Park. The job came with a small rent-free house on site. The family later lived in Lord Hill Regional Park and along the Centennial Trail.
Rich’s life came full circle when he was a young father. “As a young boy, my Dad used to take me hiking in Lund’s Gulch long before it became Meadowdale Beach Park,” he said in a short biography on the county parks website.
Asked about their best times together, both Pattons told the same story. Richard Patton was a leader of Rich’s Webelos Scout troop, but this tale involved just the two of them. Funny how tough times can become outstanding memories.
“We went over to the Olympic Peninsula, to Lake Ozette and a hike to the ocean,” Richard Patton recalled. “We could get most of what we’d want to eat — clams, fish — so we took a minimum amount of food. A can of Spam, four eggs, pancake batter and Tang.” They didn’t catch a thing. “It was pancake-batter dumplings. It wasn’t enough, but we got by,” said the elder Patton. “It was a great hike.”
Rich Patton has climbed many peaks, including Mount Baker, Mount Adams and Mount Rainier. He still remembers that hungry hike as one of the best times. “I was probably 13,” he said. “Dad and I went out there for basically four days with minimal food. We were going to live off the land. I got to really love that can of Spam.”
Rich was born in what’s now a park.
His dad was 23, on a temporary medical leave from the Navy, when Rich was born at Fort Lawton Army Hospital. Today, much of the old Fort Lawton is Seattle’s Discovery Park.
Rich Patton shares that history on the county website: “Parks have always been in my blood.”
Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460; jmuhlstein@herald net.com.
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