On March 4, 1934, the first Sammamish Slough Race is held on the Sammamish River, which flows from Redmond on Lake Sammamish to Kenmore on Lake Washington in northern King County. Jack Colcock wins with an average speed of about 26 miles per hour. Within a few years the motorboat race will grow into a large annual affair, attended by tens of thousands who marvel at the thrills and spills the racers experience on the slough's 63 curves. The race will lose part of its pizazz when the river is dredged and straightened in the mid-1960s and will come to an end after an accident in the 1976 race in which a spectator is injured.
Thirteen Miles, 63 Curves
During the early years of non-Native settlement in the 1870s and 1880s, the Sammamish River (also known as the Sammamish Slough) was the primary transportation route from Lake Washington and Lake Sammamish to Bothell and Woodinville, located along the river between the north ends of the two lakes. Even after the railroad arrived in the late 1880s, steamboats continued to ply the narrow, twisting river until 1916. Once steamboat traffic ended there were no doubt informal boat races up and down the slough, but the first official race didn't happen until 1934, when the Seattle Outboard Association put on what The Seattle Times billed as the Lake Washington-Lake Sammamish Weekend Steeplechase.
At least eight boats participated in the first race on Sunday, March 4, 1934, which ran from Brown's Boathouse at Madison Park on Seattle's Lake Washington shoreline to Kenmore and through the slough to Gateway Grove (later Idylwood Park) on the northwestern end of Lake Sammamish, approximately 20 miles away. Jack Colcock of Seattle won the race in a "remarkable time of 46 minutes flat" ("Lake-to-Lake ..."). It was all such fun that the association hosted another race on April 14, this time called the Sammamish Slough Race. A dozen racers participated, but only five finished. After the race gained a significant number of participants (a typical year had around 60 or 70 racers, though some years there were more than 100), the completion rate was never 100 percent, and on some occasions hovered around 50 percent. The race typically started at Madison Park in its early years (sometimes at Sand Point), but by the 1950s it was starting at or near the entrance to the river at Kenmore. It was a big event, regularly attended by tens of thousands of spectators who perched in trees, on the riverbank, and on bridge overpasses to watch the racers fly by.
The river averaged 30 feet wide, but in some places it was as narrow as 12 feet. There were 63 curves along the roughly 13-mile river route, and it was almost a rite of passage for a racer to end up in the water. A slight miscalculation on a curve when a fraction of a second made all the difference, or hitting an obstacle in the water, could flip a boat and send the driver into the drink. There were plenty of weeds and sandbars to snag an unsuspecting racer, and logs lurked just under the water's surface waiting to catch a boat's motor and shear a propeller pin.
The slough had subtle changes between races depending on the water level and what happened to be in the water at any given moment, and racers tried to plan for this by scouring the river of floating debris before the race. But there were certain permanent obstacles that were guaranteed to trip up the drivers, including sharp curves near Bothell's Wayne Golf Course, a narrow passage between concrete bridge pillars and a sharp curve at the Bothell Bridge, and a persistent log jam near Woodinville (courtesy of a nearby mill) that sometimes reduced passage width to six feet. The river turned south at Woodinville and between there and Redmond there were some long straightaways, allowing the racers to push their boats up to top speed.
The earliest boats were simple utility boats, nine-foot craft with big motors, which could top out at about 30 miles per hour. As the race began to gain in popularity in the late 1930s (in 1938, there were three races between February and May) more types of boats began participating. By 1941 hydros were in the race, adding a more exciting element with their rooster-tail wakes and speeds of more than 50 miles per hour. And it was a hydro that won the 1941 race, and in spectacular fashion, when its pilot, Pat Cummins, found his way partially blocked by the notorious log jam near Woodinville. Traveling at top speed, he simply launched his boat over the logs and went on to set a new course record of just more than 36 minutes.
Thrills and Spills
The 1947 race was another especially exciting one. As racer Barney Siegel approached the Wayne Golf Course his boat's gas tank suddenly fell off, spilling gas all over the water. A three-to-four-foot tall ribbon of flame erupted. Al Benson, following close behind, had no option but to keep going forward. He flew through the flames and went on to win the race in 22 minutes, 32 seconds, an impressive two-and-a-half minute margin of victory over the second-place finisher. Benson eventually won three slough races and was one of the more successful and well-known participants in the 1940s and 1950s, although there were other big names, such as Lin Ivey and Bill Schumacher.
The race -- by then usually held once a year in April, sometimes in March -- continued to expand in the 1950s. By the early 1950s there were six different classes of boats participating, and this doubled to 12 in the 1960 race, all the way from hydros capable of reaching 80 miles per hour down to junior runabouts that the under-18 racers drove. Children as young as 8 also were allowed to race, though in separate heats held after the main event. Races in the early 1950s still focused on the fastest one-way time in upstream heats between Lake Washington and Lake Sammamish. This had changed by 1954, when it became a two-way race, one heat from Lake Washington to Lake Sammamish, followed by a second heat back to Lake Washington.
The 1960 race was a humdinger. Only 45 of the 96 racers finished, and there were thrills and spills galore. One racer had his thumb "virtually severed" ("Injuries, Heroics ...") in an accident. Six people, including two children, on a patrol boat stuck in the slough were forced to leap into the water to avoid a collision with an oncoming racer. They escaped without injury. The coup de grace came when race chairman Gerald (Red) Halliday flipped his boat and was thrown 50 feet onto the shore, landing face down on a muddy riverbank. He was knocked unconscious, suffered a dislocated shoulder, and taken to a hospital to be checked out, but was back at race headquarters in time for the awards ceremony.
Other racers reported another hazard, one that became more common in the 1960s and 1970s -- spectators throwing objects into the water in front of racers or at the racers themselves, sometimes causing accidents. The 1960 race winner, Howard (Andy) Anderson, commented dryly, "That can be somewhat scary when you're traveling 70 to 80 miles an hour"("'Andy' Repeats ...").
A New Slough
The race -- by then nicknamed "The Taming of the Slough" -- was last run on its original course in 1963, when Thomas O'Neill set the final course record of 33 minutes, 3.6 seconds. Later that year the Army Corps of Engineers began a $3.75-million dredging, straightening, and widening project on the Sammamish River. The riverbed was lowered as much as 7 feet in places, sandbars were removed, and the riverbanks shored up. By the time the project was completed in 1965, the river wasn't the same. The race wouldn't be either.
Still, racers were game when they returned in 1966. It was a different race in more ways than one. A barrier built near the slough's Lake Sammamish entrance made it too shallow there to continue into the lake, and the turn-around point was moved to Redmond's Marymoor Park, making the course about four miles shorter. The race remained popular with diehard racers and fans, but with the exception of 1968, which was a special event featuring radio DJs, old-time race winners, and Native American canoes, participation didn't approach its earlier peaks, and neither did attendance. Perhaps the most noteworthy achievement on the new course came in 1972 when Bob Waite notched his fourth consecutive win, on top of one in 1956 on the original course, a feat no other racer equaled during the race's history.
The End
In 1975 Barry Woods set the final record on the revised, 22-mile course with a time of 17 minutes, 43 seconds and an average speed of more than 74 miles per hour. By this time some boats were reaching 100 miles per hour on the straightaways. But interest continued to slowly fade, and a growing number of nearby residents were complaining about traffic and other issues flowing from the race. As early as 1973 there was talk of ending it, and an accident in the 1976 race forced the issue. Near Wayne Golf Course a boat spun out of control and ran up onto the bank, striking 21-year-old Ron Clausen and breaking his leg. It was a particularly consequential injury -- Clausen was an accomplished pole-vaulter, a two-time state prep champion from Shorecrest High School who had set records. He'd won an athletic scholarship to the University of Washington, but the injury ended his pole-vaulting pursuits. He subsequently lost his scholarship and dropped out of college.
Given the dangerous conditions and the lack of protection, it's amazing that no one was killed in any of the races. It seems equally amazing that racers and spectators alike accepted the risks with a casualness that you would never see in the twenty-first century. However, the race's insurer dropped coverage after the 1976 event and organizers were unable to replace it. At the same time the city governments impacted by the race, principally the City of Redmond, demanded increased insurance protection. It couldn't be done, and in early 1977 organizers announced the race was over, leaving many with only fond memories of a racing tradition now long gone.
