Grand, honorary pioneers lead 127th Sequim Irrigation Festival

Grand Pioneer Bonnie (Wheeler) Hagberg

Editor’s note: Bonnie Hagberg passed away in February after this interview was conducted.

Born and raised in Sequim to Neva Cays Wheeler and Bill Wheeler, Bonnie is a third-generation pioneer. She has always been proud of her heritage and is very honored to be selected as a Grand Pioneer.

She grew up with her two brothers and 16 Cays cousins with reasons to gather often for birthdays, picnics at the Dungeness River and holidays. The family loved a good softball game and sometimes the adults would play too, Bonnie said, and after dark they’d play kick the can or a hiding game.

She grew up on a dairy farm on Ward Road, next to what is the Olympic Game Farm today with only five families on the road at the time — the Wards, Martins, Wheelers, Seamens and Beebes.

Bonnie belonged to 4-H and showed animals at the Clallam County Fair and State Fair. For the Irrigation Festival, she participated with the drill team and carried the banner as a cheerleader for the high school band.

Her fondest memories are cheerleading for five years from junior high through high school.

Grand Pioneer Bonnie (Wheeler) Hagberg

Grand Pioneer Bonnie (Wheeler) Hagberg

“Whether we were getting together to practice or make pom poms or paint posters, it was a fun time,” she said. “Riding the pep bus, going to away games or baking purple and gold cupcakes for the team. These are all fond memories.”

Bonnie graduated from Sequim High School in 1957 and went to Central Washington University where she met her husband Jerry Hagberg. They later married in 1960 and both received their teaching degrees in 1963.

With the addition of two babies, Terri and Eric, the family moved to Kirkland where Jerry taught special education in the Lake Washington School District.

Bonnie taught for two years, substituted for four years and retired to be “mom” until her children were older. Then she started her 18-year career at Boeing as a production illustrator and worked on the 747, B-2 bomber, and the 777.

She and Jerry retired in 1995 and moved back to Sequim where Bonnie said, “it felt good to be back home.”

They already owned a barn built by her uncle Ray Cays so they decided to renovate it.

“There were many sentimental memories attached to the place so it seemed the right thing to do,” Bonnie said.

They began that June and with the help of a couple of cousins, they managed to put together comfortable living quarters in the barn by November. Overall, it took about five years to complete.

“It was a labor of love and a lot of fun,” she said. “Probably the best time of our years together.”

Jerry passed away last June; he and Bonnie were married for 62 years. Bonnie has five grandchildren and five great-grandchildren. She enjoys playing cards, jigsaw puzzles and activities at the Sequim Prairie Grange.

Grand Pioneer Donald Stone

Donald says he was surprised to learn of the impending honor of being named a Grand Pioneer.

While he was born in Sequim in 1933, his family moved to Arizona in September 1943 just after he started the fifth grade. He became a permanent resident again in 2015.

He bestows the Grand Pioneer honor to his four grandparents and seven of his eight great-grandparents buried in the Pacific Northwest.

His grandparents — Stanley B and Mary (Priest) Stone; and Charles and Jessie (MacGillinary) Beebe, are buried in Mt. Angeles Cemetery.

His great-grandparents — Nathaniel Stacy and Althea (Bosworth) Stone; and George and Jennie (McDonald) Priest are buried in Sequim View Cemetery.

Donald’s great-grandfather William A.H. Beebe is buried in Forks Cemetery, and his wife Ella (Hannum) Beebe is buried in Kansas.

Grand Pioneer Donald Stone. Photo by Keith Ross/Keith's Frame of Mind

His Great-grandparents Malcolm Donald MacGillinary and Margaret McGillinary are buried in southern B.C. Canada near Abbottsford.

“These people were true pioneers, coming here in the 1880s and 1890s to build a new life for themselves and future families,” Donald said.

Donald’s family later moved to the Central Valley of California where he graduated from Dos Palos High School in 1951.

After the move from Sequim, his parents Ralph Stacy and Vi (Beebe) Stone, brother Ross and him came to visit family and friends.

“I frequently helped my grandparents with haying and other chores on their farms,” Donald said. “Sequim always felt like home.”

He attended Stanford University for two years before transferring to and graduating from California State University Fresno in 1956 with a degree in accounting.

Donald joined the U.S. Air Force with an ROTC commission, married Pat Graham in 1958, started work in the Agri-business world in California culminating in retirement after 40 years in Salinas, Calif.

The couple has three boys and five grandchildren.

“The trips continued to Sequim, always bringing a new child with us when we could, at least to the last weekend in June for the Stone Family Reunion,” Donald said.

“This year will be the 116th reunion. “I want to thank the Pioneer committee for the honor to represent the Stone family, it is a privilege.”

Honorary Pioneer Rodger Petroff

Rodger says he’s happy to be in Sequim where his parents moved in 1944 and he’s remained most of his life.

He was born in November 1940 in Port Angeles and prior to Sequim, his family was living in the Ozette Hoko area; his mother’s family were early homesteaders at Lake Ozette before there was a road to it, too.

His parents sought a better school and weather in Sequim, and with war spies reported, they made the move east in 1944 to North Blue Mountain Road, now named Lewis Road.

He remembers squadrons of World War II airplanes flying over in formation, and the hopes and dreams the GIs had just after the war. “What great men!” he thought.

In Sequim, Rodger soon enrolled in Sequim Elementary School and Agnew Friends Sunday School and Church. His classmates remembered him as a shy, young man who didn’t talk much.

Honorary Pioneer Roger Petroff. Photo by Keith Ross/Keith's Frame of Mind

He graduated from Sequim High School in 1959 and immediately went to work for Lannoye Motors, the Plymouth and DeSoto dealership in Port Angeles, as an apprentice mechanic.

In 1963, he was drafted into the U.S. Army and stationed in Anchorage, Alaska. Rodger later married Lila Roup, the daughter of a Sequim dairy farmer in 1965 and he began working for the Port Angeles School District in 1971. He retired 34 years later and was instrumental in getting crossing arms mounted on the front of Washington’s school buses.

Rodger and Lila have one son, one daughter, three grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

He is a member of the Story People of Clallam County, enjoys vintage tractor shows, he’s volunteered for Holden Village near Lake Chelan, and he’s hiked more than half of the Olympic Peninsula’s trails. If you stepped into Sequim Seventh-day Adventist Church during worship, you’d likely see Rodger telling a story to the children.

Except for his time in the Army and early childhood, Rodger has lived most of his life in the Sequim School District area.

Honorary Pioneer Shirley (Govan) Lehman

While not born in Sequim, Shirley has strong ties to the area. Her father Hugh Govan did much of the roadwork around the Hood Canal and raised cattle on his ranch in the U.S. Highway 101 just west of the Dungeness River.

She was born in Olympia to Hugh and Julia Govan, and she’s the great granddaughter of Susan Weir Evans whose parents John and Jane settled in 1863 where the Olympic Game Farm now operates.

Shirley graduated from Olympia High School in 1953 and went to Washington State University.

She met her husband Charles “Chuck” Lehman, a third generation pioneer family member, at a Sequim VFW New Year’s Eve party and the couple later married on June 28, 1958.

They had three children, Randy, Rick and Melinda. Shirley was active with their school and sports activities. In 1960, the couple expanded Chuck’s grandparents’ business Sequim Meat Company to add Lehman’s Thriftway Market. It later became Lehman’s Mark and Pak, and then Lehman’s Grocery before selling and closing in 2002.

Murals of community members were placed along Washington Street at the market and after years sitting in a barn were redistributed and placed around town for the community to enjoy.

Through Shirley and others’ efforts, they were instrumental in keeping the murals and allowing them to be used again by the community.

Honorary Pioneer Shirley Govan Lehman. Photo by Keith Ross/Keith's Frame of Mind

Another mural has been created at Creamery Square that depicts Shirley quilting. She’s an avid quilter and charter member of the Sunbonnet Sue Quilt Club.

Shirley’s family had big parties at the grocery store during the festival’s Grand Parade and they’d often watch from a room along Washington Street.

She’s extremely happy being named an honorary pioneer and is enjoying it immensely.

Shirley retired to The Lodge in 2012 after living on Prairie Street for more than 40 years and later on Duke Drive. Her son Randy passed away in 2010 and her husband Chuck in 2014.

She has two grandchildren.