Matthew H. Verhonick came to this Enumclaw farm when he was five days old. He never left. Except for a short stint with the Army Recruiting Service during World War I, Mat spent his entire life on the 80-acre farm he inherited from his father, Marcus upon his death in 1928.
Marcus was known for having built a number of barns in and around Krain. The Verhonicks numbered among the early settlers of Krain, the Slovenian word meaning “at the foot of the hills.” Before 1918, Slovenia was part of the Austrian empire so official papers often identified Slovenians as Austrians.
Mat and his wife Martha lived a simple life without electricity, telephone, or television. Their home was heated by an 1881 stove, for which Mat is seen chopping wood. Because of their austere lifestyle, the Verhonicks were the subjects of several Seattle Times stories in the late 1960s and early 1970s. They lived on monthly Social Security checks of $40, so rising property taxes almost caused them to sell the farm. During the severe gasoline crisis of 1973-74 when this photo appeared, Mat Verhonick wasn’t much phased.
His 1915 Overland motorcar with less than 10,000 miles hadn’t moved since 1954 when a shed roof collapsed on it. This is the second of a four-part series featuring 1974 photos by Josef Scaylea, which come courtesy of JoAnne Matsumura, an Issaquah historian.
