In 1911, Allie Belle Hood Hager settled in Lowell.
A Pennsylvania native and daughter of a Union Army Civil War veteran, she and her husband, Amos Hager, came to the Everett area in 1891. The mother of three was active in many groups.
On June 14, 1911, she gathered some women friends to start a new chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. Allie Hager had been a member of Seattle’s Rainier Chapter of DAR. With the new group started in Everett that day, she became the first regent — the leader — of the Marcus Whitman Chapter of the DAR.
Since its founding nationally in 1890, the women’s group has promoted patriotism and historic preservation. In Snohomish County, the Marcus Whitman Chapter founded by Hager now has about 45 members. It’s one of 38 DAR chapters in Washington state.
This spring, members Candy Thoreson and Cheryl Healey are planning the chapter’s 100th anniversary celebration.
Thoreson, of Arlington, is now regent of the local chapter, which was named for the doctor and missionary who came west with fur traders, settled near Walla Walla, and was killed by American Indians in 1847. Healey, a former chapter regent who lives in Everett, is the group’s historian.
The Daughters of the American Revolution is a nonprofit, volunteer women’s service organization. Who can join? That’s the big difference setting the DAR apart from other groups.
To join, a woman must prove lineal descent from what the DAR calls a “patriot ancestor.” Eligible ancestors include men or women who served between 1776 and 1783 as a soldier, sailor or civil officer in one of the colonies or states, or as a “recognized patriot” who rendered material aid to the cause of the American Revolution.
“You have to prove it,” Thoreson said. She means prove it with paper documentation.
“Lots of diaries were kept. There are family Bibles, military records and county records,” Healey said. “There are wills. Widows filed for pensions. There are many real documents that far back,” added Thoreson, whose ancestry can be traced to Virginia.
Healey’s DAR link was found through her father’s ancestors, who came from Maryland. Her mother, whose maiden name was Kathleen Marincovich, was from a Croatian fishing family.
Healey figures that about 1,000 women have been members of the Marcus Whitman chapter over the past century. The group meets the second Saturday of each month at Everett’s Central Lutheran Church.
Veterans issues and caring for people with Alzheimer’s disease have been discussed at recent meetings. Still, history is at the heart of the DAR.
“Cheryl loves history,” Thoreson said Wednesday. She and Healey turned pages in a scrapbook filled with old photos and newspaper clippings chronicling the group over a century.
One picture is a history lesson in itself. It was taken May 2, 1931, in Mukilteo. That day, for the chapter’s 20th anniversary, a granite marker donated by the DAR commemorating the signing of the Point Elliott Treaty was unveiled. Among dignitaries in the 1931 picture are Gov. Roland Hartley, University of Washington history professor Edmund Meany, and many tribal people, including William Shelton of the Tulalips. Signers of the 1855 treaty with the U.S. government included representatives of today’s Tulalip, Stillaguamish, Lummi, Swinomish and other tribes.
History will repeat itself at 1:30 p.m. May 14 when the Marcus Whitman Chapter will rededicate the Point Elliott Treaty monument, which is now near Mukilteo’s new Rosehill Community Center. Tribal members have been invited to that event, which is open to the public.
Closer to the 100th anniversary, at 11:30 a.m. June 11, another monument rededication will take place in Everett’s Grand Avenue Park. It was June 4, 1915, when the Marcus Whitman Chapter of the DAR first unveiled a large granite marker in the park commemorating the 1792 arrival of Captain George Vancouver into Port Gardner.
Also on June 11, at Everett’s Evergreen Cemetery, a new DAR marker will be placed at the gravesite of founder Allie Hager. She died in 1934 after being hit by a car while walking home from a meeting of a different group in Everett. A great-granddaughter of Allie Hager, Kathy Lehmkuhl, plans to travel from Nevada to Everett for the cemetery event, Thoreson said.
The centennial celebration began last month. The Marcus Whitman Chapter’s most senior member, Clara Emery, was presented with an engraved DAR silver spoon. Emery, who is 98 and lives in Everett, has belonged to the chapter 67 years.
In the group’s photo album is an early 1900s picture of an Everett Fourth of July parade. Riding on the float is Cora Emery — Clara’s mother-in-law, Healey said.
Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460, muhlstein@heraldnet.com.
Events
The Marcus Whitman Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, chartered in Everett on June 14, 1911, will mark its centennial with these events:
•May 14, 1:30 p.m.: Rededication of Point Elliott Treaty monument outside Mukilteo’s Rosehill Community Center, 304 Lincoln Ave.
June 11, 11:30 a.m.: Rededication of Captain George Vancouver monument at Everett’s Grand Avenue Park, 1800 Grand Ave. Earlier June 11, a private ceremony at the Evergreen Cemetery gravesite of chapter founder Allie Belle Hood Hager will include dedication of a new DAR marker.
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