On January 25, 1982, the 7,200-square-foot Polynesia Restaurant on Seattle's Pier 51, which prospered during the Century 21 World's Fair and for years after, is lifted onto a large barge and moved to storage on the Duwamish West Waterway. Restauranteur Dave Cohn, who owned several other popular eateries in Seattle, had auctioned off all the equipment nearly a year earlier upon learning that the state was going to condemn Pier 51 for use by the ferry system. After the building is towed to the Duwamish, Cohn spent six months trying to find a new location, without success. In June 1982, the restaurant's stripped shell was advertised for sale, but there were no takers. Finally, the unique building met a fiery fate, burned down by a local fire department in a training exercise.
The Beginning
With Seattle's 1962 Century 21 Exposition on the horizon, David Cohn, president of Barb Enterprises (later renamed Consolidated Restaurants Inc.), hired Seattle architect Raymond H. Peck (1917-1998) to design a Polynesia-themed restaurant to be built on the water end of Pier 51, a site that would give diners magnificent views of Elliott Bay. The final design comprised three connected A-frame buildings, with most of the structural members -- large posts and massive beams -- salvaged from the building that had previously occupied the wharf.
Seattle artist Donald Wells Keys (1911-1995) adorned many of the posts and beams with carved Polynesian designs, and a life-sized monkey-pod-tree tiki from the Philippines graced the front to the right of the entrance. Many of the interior furnishings were custom made by the Western International Trading Company (WITCO), a family-owned "tropical furniture" company based in Mount Vernon, Washington ("What Is Witco?").
The Middle
In 1960 a company from Oakland, California, had introduced Polynesian-style ambience to Seattle with its second Trader Vic's restaurant, located in the now-gone Benjamin Franklin Hotel. Dave Cohn recognized the growing popularity of the style and anticipated the tens of thousands of potential customers who were expected to visit Seattle for Century 21, which would begin in April 1962 and run for six months. His entrepreneurial instincts proved accurate -- the Polynesia was an instant success and would remain popular for much of the next two decades. In 1963 it was joined on Pier 51 by Ye Olde Curiosity Shop, located at the street end of the pier. They would remain there together until 1982.
Polynesian food was never a major item on the menu, which was dominated by Chinese cuisine. Fashions come and go, and gradually over the years the public's attraction to Polynesian décor cooled. As the entire waterfront became more tourist-oriented, the Polynesia's location south of Yesler Way did not enjoy the level of visibility that benefited businesses farther north, and the ever-increasing traffic generated by the ferry terminal next door at Pier 52 (Colman Dock) could not have been helpful. But the restaurant apparently remained profitable and there was no indication that Cohn had any desire to sell or relocate. As it turned out, he would have no choice in the matter.
The Beginning of the End
Plans for a $33-million expansion of the Seattle Ferry Terminal were afoot by the late 1970s, and it was clear that the expansion would require the legal condemnation and taking by the state of Piers 50 and 51 under the law of eminent domain. On January 23, 1981, the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) published a notice that a draft environmental impact statement for the ferry project was available to the public. In that notice, the department acknowledged that "four businesses would be displaced by any of the build alternatives" ("Legal Notices"), including the Polynesia, with 50 employees (Cohn said 70), and Ye Olde Curiosity Shop, with seasonal employment ranging from 10 to 20.
David Cohn had realized for some time that the Polynesia's days were numbered and relatively few. Three weeks before the WSDOT announcement, the restaurant advertised a "2 for 1" dinner coupon as "Our way of saying thanks for 18 Wonderful Years" ("2 for 1"). On May 3, 1981, it closed for the last time, and a public auction was held later that month for its equipment, furniture, and fixtures, with "no minimum" and "no reserve" ("537 Commercial Equipment & Fixtures"). In other words, Cohn would have to be satisfied with whatever he could get; what he would be left with was a large, unique building, stripped bare, and he had to figure out what do with it.
The End
Even before the closure and auction, Cohn, who was one of the owners of Pier 51, was looking for a site to which he could move and reopen the Polynesia. He was stymied at every turn. Wrote The Seattle Times, "'Have restaurant, will travel.' That's Dave Cohn's slogan for April, and he's downright desperate" ("Condemned Piers …"). He had hoped to move it to West Seattle, but zoning on the site he chose would not allow it. Then he went after Pier 89, which was being sold after the New England Fish Company went bankrupt, but another investor bought the site before him. Piers 60 and 61, also part of the bankruptcy sale, were too expensive and needed too much rebuilding to be feasible. He asked the Port of Seattle if he could move the restaurant to Pier 91; the answer was an emphatic "no." The south end of Lake Union was considered, but there was no site available with adequate parking.
Cohn was distraught, telling the Times, "I'm just sick. I'd go anyplace … We've been kicked out of our own property by the state. We've been paying $200,000 annually in taxes and provided jobs and a lively tourist spot and nobody will help us relocate … no one seems to care" ("Condemned Piers …"). But he had to move it or lose it, and he estimated the cost of relocating the building to storage would exceed $100,000.
In January 1982 Cohn announced plans to move the structure from the pier, with the hope that it would be in storage temporarily while he continued looking for a site. It would be prepared for removal by House Movers Inc. of Bremerton, which would reinforce the building with steel I-beams. A Manson Construction Company floating derrick would then lift the entire building onto its 250-foot, 400-ton barge for transfer to an industrial site Cohn rented on the Duwamish West Waterway. He hoped it would only stay in storage for about three months. He was wrong.
But there was one last fleeting hope. In March 1982, it was announced that plans were in the works to move the building to a site on South Lake Union after all, across from the old City Light Steam Plant. The Manson derrick would lift the restaurant over the Ballard Locks while the barge was towed through. Consolidated Restaurants needed a variance from the city, and it was estimated that the total cost of relocating and re-equipping the restaurant would be in the neighborhood of $750,000. Jim Aitken, vice president of the company, told a Seattle Post-Intelligencer reporter in early June that if the city turned down the variance, the Polynesian might be moved to Commencement Bay in Tacoma.
There was no reported follow-up about the Lake Union plan. Perhaps the city refused the variance, or perhaps the costs grew prohibitive. The Commencement Bay idea was also abandoned. The last appearance of the restaurant in the local press came on June 27, 1982, in the form of a display advertisement in The Seattle Times offering "the former Polynesia Restaurant" for sale and noting "Building shell available. Can be moved to another waterfront location" ("FOR SALE").
Well, almost the last appearance. Every Friday through September 24, 1982, the "Places to Go, Things to Do" section of the P-I ran an announcement under the "Restaurant" category that had not been true since May of 1981:
"POLYNESIA – Pier 51. Primarily Chinese food. Good view of ferry traffic. 624-6995."
The restaurant building didn't sell, perhaps because the statement that it could "be moved to another waterfront location" had already been disproved by Cohn's futile efforts to do just that. Consolidated Restaurants finally gave up. In an event that wasn't reported, on a date that wasn't recorded, the Polynesia Restaurant, carved beams and all, was put to the torch on the West Waterway to provide fire-fighting practice to a local fire department.
