The City of Ocean Shores is located on the northwest side of Grays Harbor on a 6,000-acre peninsula stretching 6 miles long and 2 miles wide. First inhabited by Native tribes of the Washington Pacific Coast alongside visiting tribes of the Chehalis Valley, the area is rich in wildlife, flora, and fauna. The site was given the name Point Brown Peninsula by Lieutenant Joseph Whidbey to honor Rear Admiral Brown, an officer aboard the Daedalus during George Vancouver's 1792 expedition. In the nineteenth century, the land was purchased for grazing cattle. A century later, in 1960, it was sold to a group of Seattle developers for a beach resort. The developers went bankrupt, but residents rallied to incorporate Ocean Shores as a city on November 3, 1970.
Pre-Contact Life
"The Indian People" is the title of Chapter Two in Edwin Van Syckle’s book The River Pioneers, Early Days on Grays Harbor, in which he imagines the beginning of Grays Harbor: "emerging from the eons, it displayed evidence of much geologic commotion and cataclysm, the more visible dating back some fifteen million years." Mile-thick glaciers of the ice ages came and retreated at least three times, the most recent estimated to be 10,000 years ago. "In the wake of the ice, the land grew warm and rich with vegetation, including one of the greatest timber stands on earth. Fish returned to the streams, and wildlife to the valleys. The sea became populated with all manner of aquatic life. Then finally, came man and woman" (The River Pioneers ...).
Van Syckle points to the Ozette "digs" as evidence of how long Indians were living on the Pacific Northwest coast before being "discovered" by white people. Ozette is 163 miles north of Ocean Shores, located in one of the most remote areas of Olympic National Park. The remains of the Ozette village were found at the westernmost point of the northern Washington coast, closer than any other village to the migration routes of fur seals and whales. It became the principal sea-mammal hunting village south of Alaska. Consequently, the site attracted archeologists as early as 1947. Radiocarbon dating eventually gave the oldest deposits an age of 1,600 years, perhaps even 2,000 years for deeper deposits. A winter storm in 1969-1970 exposed hundreds of perfectly preserved wooden artifacts from six buried longhouses, an encore of a mudslide that buried the village around 1750.
The Ozette of historic times, even prehistoric, "lived in a bountiful environment that provided them with a rich and dependable food supply," writes Richard D. Daugherty, who is listed as the Director of the Ozette Archaeological Expedition in an undated document from the National Park Service. "These resources enabled them to live in large, permanent villages, with houses 35 feet wide and nearly 70 feet long,” continues Daugherty, who led an 11-year effort that recovered more than 55,000 artifacts, now collected in the Makah Cultural & Research Center’s museum at Neah Bay.
Closer to Ocean Shores, the Quinault settlement at Oyehut was on the crossover trail from the open beach to the north shore of present-day Grays Harbor. (Today, Oyehut is included in North Beach School District 64, established in 1924. It comprises two elementary schools, one middle school, and a high school.) The Quinault take their name from the Quinalt River, and their largest settlement is at the river's mouth, 27 miles north of present-day Ocean Shores. This is where the village of Tahola grew, with different names, and today is the home of the Quinault Indian Nation. From the tribe's website, we read about its connection to the Ozette people: "Our ancestors lived on a major physical and cultural dividing line. Beaches to the south are wide and sandy, while to the north, they are rugged and cliff-lined. We shared in the cultures of the people to the south as well as those to the north" ("About Us").
Quinault villages were located all along the lower river. At the time of the white man’s coming, they counted 38 villages, though not all were occupied full-time. "The average number of houses in a 'village' was around four, with the population depending upon the fishing activity in a particular location" (The River Pioneers ..., 56). Sustained by the land and waters, plus trade with neighboring tribes, the Quinalt lived a bountiful life marked by massive salmon runs, abundant sea mammals, and thick, verdant forests home to a wide variety of wildlife. The Habitat Wing of the Ocean Shores Interpretive Center shows us this variety up close with artistic and interpretive flair.
Discoveries
American fur trader Robert Gray (1755-1806), on his second voyage to the Northwest coast from New England, entered a sheltered waterway on May 7, 1792, and named it Bullfinch Harbor to honor one of the owners of his ship, the Columbia Rediviva.
On his first voyage to the Northwest Coast, Gray had experienced a strong outflow at the latitude of 46 degrees, and he wanted to follow up on the possibility of discovering a great river. His first attempt was postponed due to unfavorable winds, so Gray sailed north toward Cape Flattery, where he encountered the British Captain George Vancouver (1758-1798) on the Discovery. Vancouver sent a boat to Gray with Peter Puget (1765-1822) and a colleague to gather Gray’s observations. Gray reported his experience with the outflow down the coast. Vancouver dismissed Gray's claim and turned north for further explorations, while Gray returned to his quest, sailing south. On May 7, 1792, he entered in his log: "May 7, 1792 a.m. – Being within six miles of land, saw an entrance, in the same, which had a very good appearance of a harbor; lowered away the jolly-boat, and went in search of an anchoring place, the ship standing to and fro, with a strong weather current" (The River Pioneers ..., 30). From the masthead, they could see a passage between two sand bars, then this entry: "Many canoes came alongside. At 5 p.m. came to five fathoms water, sandy bottom, in safe harbor, well sheltered from the sea by long sound bars and spirits. Our latitude observed this day was 46° 58 minutes" (The River Pioneers ..., 30).
Gray had found his great river, the Chehalis, a name European explorers gave to the river and its people. The Chehalis people were more populous and widely distributed than the Quinaults. Their principal village was located on Chehalis Point, the site of present-day Westport at the south end of Grays Harbor. Both indigenous populations are "canoe Indians," as distinguished from those who depend on horses. We imagine both populations greeting Gray's arrival in their distinctive canoes, carved from large logs, many long enough to carry a crew of 40 people, and surrounding Gray’s three-masted sailing vessel, the Columbia, as recorded in the log.
Gray’s crew were familiar with the Makah Indians of the Ozette area but not the Chehalis and Quinault. However, the language barrier did not prevent a brisk trade with the Indians for otter, beaver skins, and salmon. Yet, difficulty in communication may have contributed to a tragedy on the night of May 8, when the Columbia’s crew fired a cannon on an approaching canoe, destroying it and likely killing its occupants. Despite this, Indians returned in the morning to continue trading. Gray, on the other hand, was eager to continue his explorations, "and he departed the harbor after three days" (Oldham).
Two days later, Gray discovered another, more significant river than the Chehalis and named it the Columbia after his ship. As it turns out, Gray’s name for the large safe harbor, Bullfinch, didn’t take. His crew referred to it as Gray’s Harbor, as did later explorers. In October 1792, Vancouver’s British expedition surveyed the harbor, labeling it Gray’s Harbor on his charts. "In 1915, the county name was changed from Chehalis (after the river flowing into the harbor) to Grays Harbor County when the apostrophe was dropped" (Ott).
Settlers, Trappers, Traders
Within 30 years, white settlers, trappers, and trades began moving into the Grays Harbor area. Dan Van Mechelen, Chairman of the Quinault Allottees Association from 1970 to 1986, writes: "They came into areas that offered the most potential for homes and profit. This included farm lands, fir timber, and fishing areas. Settlers began to fan out in all directions from Forts Vancouver and Astoria into the lands of the Chinook, Cowlitz, and Chehalis Indians" ("History of the Quinauilt ..."). Van Syckle adds: "The great bulk of Indian lands were seized, surveyed, and thrown open to white settlement." Indian fishing and hunting grounds were preempted, with no compensation given or offered (The River Pioneers ..., 64).
On February 25, 1855, Isaac I. Stevens (1818-1862), Governor of Washington Territory and territorial Superintendent of Indian Affairs, following instructions from the U.S. Commissioner of Indian Affairs, called a treaty council to meet at a campground prepared on the south bank of the Chehalis, near today’s town of Cosmopolis, which celebrates its moment in history with an historical marker and a painted mural of the meeting on its water tower. There were 370 Indians present who arrived in 40 canoes. Each band or village brought a bundle of sticks, with one stick for each Indian left at home, involving 1,143 Indians either attending the council or at home. "These were all the Indians left of those tribes from the thousands who had lived before the whites came" ("History of the Quinault ...").
The proposed reservation was in the country of the Quileute, Hoh, Quinault, and Queets tribes, land supposed to be ceded or given up by the Indians at this treaty council. The area chosen was unsuitable for farming and contained very little old-growth fir. "It was considered a 'cedar swamp' with little economic value to whites" ("History of the Quinault ..."). The Indian chiefs would not sign the treaty, which Stevens tore up in anger. His attempt to get the Indians to cede their lands failed, resulting in a rowdy break-up of the council after a week of futile negotiations.
In January 1856, the Treaty of Olympia was signed by the Quileutes and Quinaults, establishing today’s 10,000-acre reservation around Taholah. In exchange, the tribes gave up title to the remaining lands north of Grays Harbor up to the land of the Makah. It was not until July 8, 1864, that the "Secretary of the Interior J. P. Usher created the Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis Reservation, located at the confluence of the Black and Chehalis rivers in southwestern Washington Territory" (Ott).
Point Brown Peninsula
Point Brown, as it’s called, is a peninsula reaching 6 miles long from north to south and 2 miles wide east to west. It is the north cape at the entrance to Grays Harbor, named in 1792 by Lieutenant Joseph Whidbey (1757-1833) after Rear Admiral Brown, who was aboard the Daedalus during Vancouver's expedition. Toward the end of the nineteenth century, the peninsula was renamed to honor A. O. Damon, from Olympia. Damon had financed the peninsula's first homesteader, Matthew McGee, who had a cattle ranch at the south end of Duck Lake in the 1860s.
Damon sent Tim Dwyer to help run the ranch, but Dwyer didn’t get along with McGee; their quarreling escalated over the years, and in 1878, Dwyer lost control and attacked McGee, shooting off two of his fingers and leaving bullets in his right shoulder and upper chest. Left for dead, McGee survived, only to face eviction. Damon foreclosed on the home that McGee had built and moved his family into the structure of empty rooms. McGee, then living with some hunters in the area, burst into the barn of his former ranch one Sunday morning and fired a shotgun blast into Damon’s face. Damon survived; he eventually opened a general store and freight depot near Oyehut with his son. This may be when the name Damon Point was established; though never official, it has survived to coexist with the historic name of a Rear Admiral in the British Navy.
Damon’s grandson Ralph Minard (d. 1968) continued the family’s cattle business, taking over the ranch in 1929 with his wife and sister. The Great Depression brought out-of-workers who found the peninsula a sanctuary. "Families of squatters built shanties and plank roads for their Model T Fords out of lumber that washed up on the beach, and settled in camps in what is now the middle of Ocean Shores" (The Exiting Growth Years ...). Minard would move cattle from the southern tip of the peninsula to pasture on the northern end near Oyehut and run off squatters along the way. In one year, Minard claimed he lost 22 head of cattle.
The North Jetty
Decades later, with talk of World War II in the air, Grays Harbor was discussed as being vulnerable to a Japanese invasion. Barbed wire was strung along the beach, pillbox lookouts were built, and the Army Corp of Engineers finished rebuilding the old North Jetty, dating back to 1916, to help stabilize the harbor mouth. Every year, 6 inches to 2 feet of sand would build up on the north side of the jetty. "Within a few years, the sand dunes had spread out from the thick marsh into the ocean, and the question arose: Who owned this new land?" (On the Harbor, 141).
In August 1956, the Office of the Lands Commissioner was notified that the State Parks Commission favored turning the new land on Point Brown into a state park. The State Game Department and Republican State Sen. Harry Elway of Hoquiam supported public ownership. However, a 1928 statute said that Minard would get first option on the land if it were sold because he owned the adjacent area upland. There was no requirement that the tidelands be sold, but an assistant to Attorney General Don Eastvold (1920-1999) met with an assistant to the land commissioner and an attorney for Minard. In November 1956, a contract was signed to sell the tidelands to Minard, the cattle rancher. "The sale price was $12,682 for six and a half miles of ocean frontage or about $10 an acre, well below the going price of similar land" (On the Harbor, 141).
Technically, the sale was permitted, even though it was done without a public bid and against the advice of two state agencies and a legislator. And there was nothing illegal when Eastvold, three years out of public office, formed a real estate company with several partners and bought the same land, plus more acreage, from Minard in 1960 for $1 million. The state land commissioner, Democrat Bert Cole, summed up the deal when he spoke out in October 1960: "It’s legal, but it stinks" (On the Harbor, 141).
"Where the Sun Almost Always Shines"
Eastvold and real estate partner Moksha Smith (1917-2009) joined with William MacPherson (1920-1988) and Elmer Huhta (1905-1984) to develop the peninsula. MacPherson, from a Seattle realtor business founded in 1928, took on sales. Huhta was a chiropractor, one-time legislator, and legendary Hoquiam High School basketball coach. Huhta claimed it was his idea 30 years previously to develop the northern shore of Grays Harbor. The partners formed Ocean Shores Estates Inc. in January 1960. "On Jan. 22, they signed an agreement to buy his [Minard] ranch over ten years with a $40,000 down payment" (On the Harbor, 141). "As enthusiasm grew, every interested person helped bring in new stockholders because regular financing could not be obtained to put in roads, building construction, and other necessary development projects" (The Exciting Growth Years ..., 10).
The 6,000-acre peninsula was divided into 12,000 small lots, and over dinner, the founders drew up plans for canals, golf courses, and marinas. Perhaps at the same dinner, they came up with the slogan "Where the Sun Almost Always Shines." According to Margaret Rasmussen's 1974 history of Ocean Shores, "The first plans for O/S were drawn up on the table of Skip and Bess Marshall, in nearby Illahee, by Bill MacPherson, Glen Corning, and Ted Adams" (The Exciting Growth Years ..., 11).
MacPherson Realty began selling lots in March 1960, three months after signing the agreement, parking a 12-by-60-foot trailer in the dunes, and word-of-mouth advertising was enough to create lines of people queuing outside the trailer to buy lots. Eight-thousand square-foot lots sold for less than $600, sight unseen. Down payments were minimal with long-term contracts. Plus, the agent rang a loud bell in the trailer, celebrating every sale. The first section sold out by the end of the first day.
Most of the buyers were not local, aside from a few county officials who signed on as investors, as "most of Grays Harbor County figured that the sea would eventually reclaim the newly created land" (On the Harbor, 144). Consequently, developers began targeting people from outside the area, even flying them into Hoquiam to get a look. At the same time, word of mouth would often make the sale without a buyer ever seeing the place. With sales greater than expected, Eastvold moved to work onsite as the general manager, and around the same time, Bill MacPherson relocated from Seattle. "The rivalry between two men wanting to be the King of Ocean Shores began," recalled Myrtle Adams, assistant sales manager for MacPherson Realty at Ocean Shores, along with her husband, Ted, the Director of Sales.
In 1962, living in Ocean Shores, Eastvold divorced his wife Elva, mother of their six children, and married Ginny Simms (1913-1994), a renowned big-band singer from Los Angeles who gave her name to a new nightclub and restaurant, adding celebrity cachet to Ocean Shores. Guests were flown in from Hollywood for opening night. The Ginny Simms Restaurant & Club by the Sea was the second building to be built in the resort community, following the Executive Villa. The restaurant "received national honors for an interior night picture of the 'Starlight Room' from the Institute of Interior Decorating. Don Eastvold, Ginny Simms, Ted, and Myrtle Adams received the award at the Essex House Hotel in New York City in November 1961" (The Exciting Growth Years ..., 24).
Nevertheless, Eastvold and Simms departed Ocean Shores – once promoted as the "Palm Springs of the Northwest" – for the real Palm Springs in California. Simms removed her name from her supper club, which was renamed the Ocean Shores Inn and served as home base for the annual Undiscovery Day, celebrating Vancouver's failure to notice Grays Harbor in 1792. Smith and MacPherson were leading separate factions over who would run the resort development, and Eastvold decided to get out. "I took the money from Ocean Shores and invested it in Palm Springs," he is reported as saying, "We’ve been there since" (On the Harbor, 146). Both he and Simms would die in Palm Springs, but not before returning to promote gambling at Ocean Shores in the mid-1970s.
By 1961 in Ocean Shores, "There were over 100 motel units, 3 eating places, a 2,000 ft. private airstrip, a six-hole golf course between Point Brown Avenue and O/S Boulevard, and other facilities" (The Exciting Growth Years ..., 21).
Bill MacPherson and his brother Murdock took over the Seattle real estate business upon their father’s death. Bill was working full-time promoting Ocean Shores with a public relations crew, but, disappointed with the results, turned to Bob Ward (1922-2014). "Bob made Ocean Shores! It was nothing but a sand spit until Bill MacPherson brought him down there to help market real estate," wrote Seattle columnist Emmett Watson after Ward, Watson's longtime friend, died in 1990 (On the Harbor, 148).
Ward moved to Ocean Shores in 1962 and began with a newspaper that became the Ocean Observer, which continues to be published monthly. He became a local legend, promoting the place with a sense of humor. The February Fog Festival grew into a three-day gala featuring dune-buggy rides, surf races, and even a live crab relay in 1972. His Undiscovery Day attracted the national media, including Walter Cronkite. Years later, Ward related to Watson how the holiday came about: "I struck on April 27, 1792, where I determined, after a few seconds of research, when Capt. George Vancouver sailed past what is now Ocean Shores on the HMS Discovery. A bunch of us went out on the beach at midnight on April 27 ... and we yelled out to sea several times, 'Hey, George!' Then we went back to the bar" (On the Harbor, 151).
Jail Time for Smith
In the mid-1960s, Moksha Smith’s new company, Wendell West Inc., was riding high promoting the Pat Boone Celebrity Classic Golf Tournament at Ocean Shores. In its four-year life, the tournament resulted in the silent adoption of recording artist Pat Boone (b. 1934) as a guardian angel of Ocean Shores with the installation of the "Gates Of Ocean Shores" at the entrance to the city for the inaugural tournament in 1966, when Boone arrived by private plane. In several snapshot histories, Boone is listed as the founder of Ocean Shores. Actually, Boone joined as an investor and property owner in 1967. His final tournament was in 1970, when the tournament joined the LPGA organization with Wendell West Inc.'s sponsorship. The West and Boone collaboration continued on a similar beach-resort project in Australia named after Boone’s property in Ocean Shores. West owned the land in Australia, and land in New Mexico and Arizona. Still, in Washington, he was taken to court in 1969, the same year Ocean Shores, Australia, was established.
Meanwhile, Ward’s efforts took a serious turn when the real estate developers went bankrupt at the beginning of 1970. Through his newspaper, the Ocean Observer, which was mailed to everyone who owned land in Ocean Shores, "Ward revealed that the developers had been filling in sunken areas in the south end of town with up to eight feet of dirt from vacant lots Wendel West Inc. had already sold" (On the Harbor, 151). According to one report, the developers had $68 million in liabilities and just $40 million in assets. The company filed for bankruptcy, and more than 60 lawsuits were filed against it, alleging fraud, among other things. "Moksha Smith ended up spending time in prison" (On the Harbor, 151).
Incorporation and Growth
Ocean Shores resident George Harris – who referred to himself as the "Friendly Used Lot Dealer" in newspaper ads – campaigned for residents to approve an incorporation measure for the community. In 1969, a still-solvent Wendell West Inc. pledged to continue maintaining city services, and nearly 85 percent of voters rejected incorporation. In the meantime, Continental Mortgage Investors formed the Ocean Shores Development Corporation as a new development company to succeed Ocean Shores Estates. But a year later, after developers stopped paying $5,000 a month for a police force, a similar incorporation measure passed by a 2-1 margin among 438 voters. Ocean Shores, which began as '6,000 acres and an idea' just 10 years earlier, was suddenly on its way to becoming an actual city. Five council members, including Robert Ward, the popular and successful press agent, were selected.
On November 18, 1970, a caravan of residents drove to Olympia to receive certificates of election from the County Board of Commissioners to legalize the newly incorporated city. Secretary of State A. Ludlow Kramer presented the documents, stating, "This is to certify that as a result of a special election held in concert with the state general election on November 3, 1970, the community of Ocean Shores became an incorporated non-charter code city under the council-manage form of government" (The Exciting Growth Years ..., 65). Some 600 people, including original investors and stockholders, attended a party celebrating incorporation. At the same time, tourism took a hit with the news of the bankruptcy, many thinking that the community was in financial straits. On the contrary, the city collected taxes from 12,000 landowners, but only those who had built homes and lived in town could vote on assessments or choose city council members. With a population under 1,000, Ocean Shores earned the moniker "the richest little city in the United States" (On the Harbor, 146).
Yet, the city had no industry except tourism, and it wasn’t on the way anywhere; there were coastal towns with more sun and more things to do – Ocean Shores was foundering. By the time Eastvold and his wife, Simms, returned in 1975, the Bank of California and Seattle First National Bank were selling the near-worthless lots at any price just to clear the books. In September 1975, Eastvold and Simms began splitting their time between Palm Springs and Ocean Shores. The couple sold three brands of factory-built homes, and Eastvold joined up with his former partner, Smith – now out of prison – to bring back vacant lots at rock-bottom prices. Eastvold also joined the drive to put a gambling initiative on the ballot, which had already failed once. Ocean Shores’ promotional tagline changed to "Lake Tahoe by the Sea." Eastvold told a reporter, "I want to participate in giving this place I gave birth to the right public image" (On the Harbor, 147).
Treating the natural wonder of its ocean beach as a backdrop for casinos was not what the voters wanted for their new town. Backers tried four times to get a gambling option on the ballot without success; however, Eastvold and Simms were able to sell their lots thanks to the publicity it generated. For the last time, the couple departed for Palm Springs.
An Uncertain Future
In 1980, a newsprint circular was published titled "Happy Tenth Birthday, Ocean Shores, Twenty Years a Community." The eight-page publication celebrated the 10th anniversary of incorporation as a city. The lead story, "MacPherson Remembers Great Times, Fun Times," is written in the first person, Bill MacPherson recounting the very beginning of Ocean Shores Estates, and goes on to name investors, stockholders, companies, and the people who made it happen. Another story, titled "Beach Hilarity," was about pressman Bob Ward and included a photo of a group holding an oversized banner reading "Hey George," with the people waving, celebrating Undiscovery Day
Eastvold died in December 1999 as Ocean Shores reached a population of 3,270 – up nearly a thousand in just a decade and still the fastest-growing city in Grays Harbor County. The city’s population was 6,715 at the 2020 census, and was projected to grow to 7,549 residents in 2023 estimates.
For years, however, Ocean Shores has been in a race against nature as erosion from the Pacific Ocean threatens to destroy homes and infrastructure. According to resident Marshall Read, a city leader, Ocean Shores in 2024 was "15-20 years behind what has occurred out at Washaway Beach,” a nearby community consumed by erosion (Donovan). In the end, might the naysayers from 1960, who figured the sea would eventually reclaim the newly created land, have the last word?
