Last week’s column detailed how Enumclaw’s streets and avenues were named. The town’s commercial sector is anchored by Cole Street, whose original spelling was Coal. The logic was if extended 4.5 miles northeast, that Coal Street would intersect Coal Creek which drains north into Fish Lake. Having it named Coal Street also appealed to downtown merchants who saw business opportunities selling goods to the nearby coal mining towns of Black Diamond, Franklin, Carbonado, and Wilkeson. The spelling didn’t stick and was changed to Cole in the early 1900s.
Coal Creek originally flowed into the Veazie Valley but was said to have been diverted in the early 1900s by farmers who tired of the periodic flooding of their fields. An embankment was constructed just west of where Coal Creek flows under the Veazie-Cumberland Road to ensure the creek would flow northward into a set of water-table potholes now called Fish Lake.
This photo looks north along Cole Street from its intersection with Initial Avenue and dates to the mid-1950s, judging by the vintage of cars and license plates. The first prominent building on the right was J.C. Penny Company, which at the time operated over 1,600 stores nationwide. While started by James Cash Penney in 1904, the company’s most lasting legacy might have been its 1940 hiring of Sam Walton as a management trainee. Walton later founded a store called Walmart, which grew to become the world’s largest retail company.
Next door to Penny’s was Fred and Hilda Hinkle’s Ice Cream and Sandwich Shop in the historic Trommald Building, which then housed Mity Nice Bakery operated by James and Ella Cunningham who in turn purchased the building in 1952. Next was Jensen and Company whose advertisement in the 1944 city director read, “Always the first in quality, the latest in style, and the lowest in price!” On the corner of Cole and Griffin was Sunrise Pharmacy operated by Joe Anderson and Al Palmquist, both Enumclaw boys, and graduates of the U.W. School of Pharmacy. Further down the east side on the next block at the northeast corner of Cole and Myrtle was the Avalon Theater whose marquee reached high into the air.
On the west side of Cole Street was Laux Hardware, next door to Erickson Electric operated by Art and Minnie Erickson. Further north a café operated adjacent to Payless Food Stores managed by Duane Hinshaw, who in the early 1960s opened one of the first Honda motorcycle dealerships in the nation, Hinshaw Honda. On the southwest corner of Cole and Griffin was Wyllys’ Rexall drug store. Across the street on the northwest corner stood Steve’s Shoe Store operated by Steve Polenas, an Albanian emigrant to America whose store endured for 60 years. The stately building was constructed in 1923 to house Enumclaw National Bank, which failed in 1932 but was absorbed by its rival, the First National Bank of Enumclaw who agreed to assume all debt and liabilities, saving countless local businesses and citizens from potential financial ruin. The name, Enumclaw National Bank remains chiseled into the upper façade facing Cole Street.
