Before
the existance of Ocean City and Ocean Shores, the entire stretch
of beach from Copalis Rock to Damon Point (Ocean Shores) was known
as Copalis Beach.
First
settled in the 1880's, Copalis (now Copalis Beach) became famed
as the "home of the razor clam". In the late 1940's,
commercial diggers harvested more than a million pounds from Copalis
Beach. Tourists dug thousands of pounds more. Several
canneries made Copalis their home including the Sea Beach Clam
Cannery Packing Works. The first cannery was established
in 1906 by Halferty - it and all the others are long gone.
Charlie
McIntyre, a sea otter hunter, was one of the first settlers. He
built a shack on top of Copalis Rock where it was easy to spot
and shoot sea otters from this vantage point. Once shot,
the sea otters floated in on the next high tide.
Summer
resorts became important due to the economic boost they created. One
of the most widely known was Menath's Campgrounds formerly located
where Sunrise Resorts now resides. The first campground
was established in 1913 by the Housier family. It was situated
on the same property where the Green Lantern Tavern now sits. It
housed clam diggers who worked in the canneries.
One
of Copalis Beach's long-standing icons was the Tourist Garage operated
by Sam Cameron beginning in 1935. The majority of his
business was hauling cars off the beach with his tow truck. Another
important business was the Copalis Mercantile (aka Johnson's Mercantile). At
one time it had gas pumps out front and sold everything from food
to hardware and tourist souvenirs. Some of which are on display
in the museum. Some of the other businesses formerly operating
in Copalis Beach were Thompson's Resort, Marj's Tavern, Westby's
Blue Ocean Tourist Apartments, Paulson's Grocery and Cabin Camp
and Dillon's Cottages.
Copalis
Beach has been the scene of many shipwrecks. The Charles
E. Falk ran aground near Copalis Rock in 1909. Plans were
to salvage the entire ship and turn it into a hotel. On
Thanksgiving Day 1927, the Japanese freighter, S.S. Tenpaisan Maru
ran aground just north of Copalis Beach. There was no loss
of life and most of the crew was rescued by a cable anchored to
the beach.
In
1987, a partial shipwreck was discovered at the Copalis River. It
was thought that this was the remains of the steamer General Warren
that went aground near the Columbia River in 1852. It was
also thought that this was part of the Charles E. Falk. Before
any real determination could be made, the shipwreck disappeared. It
has resurfaced in a different location along the river a few times
since then, the most recent in 2002-2003.
On
August 21, 1890, the first post office in Copalis was opened in
the trading post belonging to Ben & Josephine Grigsby. Josephine
was the postmaster off and on until they moved to Hoquiam in 1905. In
1923, a small store was opened at the present site of the Green
Lantern Tavern. The post office was moved to this store. About
1940, the post office moved into Johnson's Mercantile. In
1989 to the present time, the Copalis Beach post office sits just
just east of Johnson's Mercantile on the former site of the Copalis
School.
