Originally published in the Maple Valley Historical Society Bugle, February 1999
By Barbara Nilson
A favorite gathering spot for pioneers, the Gibbon/Mezzavilla store, will soon be rescued by the Maple Valley Historical Society. Plans are to move it to the site of the Fire Engine Museum and the planned Heritage Center near the Maple Valley Community Center.
The building, erected in 1891, is in a fragile, deteriorating condition having sat in Mezzavilla’s field since 1959. It’s going to take a lot of money and elbow grease to restore it to the condition when it was the center of Maple Valley activities.
A recent transfer of the land previously leased to the historical society by King County to the City of Maple Valley has made moving the building possible. Until January, only one building could be erected on the site.
It was imperative that the city obtain the land as Rob Robertson, the new owner of the field where the store is located, wanted the building moved by April 1 of this year.
The Maple Valley Coalition Services has agreed to spearhead the restoration as one of their community projects, said Mona Pickering, historical society president. Police Chief Reid Johnson will be leading the effort.
Store opened in 1890
The historic store was opened in 1890 by a Mrs. McDonald, and sold the following year to Wiliam D. Gibbon and Axel Hanson. Gibbon operated the store at its original site until 1907 when it was moved to a spot on the Maple Valley Highway where the Maple Valley Market is located today.
The move was necessary because the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul railroad’s new line was running directly through the kitchen of their house located next door to the store.
In 1929, “Papa Joe” Mezzavilla, who had immigrated from Italy, became manager of the store then owned by the Maple Valley Grange. He had been a barber in Seattle, Ronald, Taylor, and Maple Valley, so he moved his barber chair into the store and continued his trade.
He and his family occupied the small apartment attached to the store and when he was barbering, his wife Teresa waited on customers. After managing the store for seven years, he purchased the business from the Grange and in 1938 he bought the building from the Diamond Stage Company.
The Grange store was referred to as a “general store” handling everything: hay, oil, gas, lampwicks, nails, nuts, food, or anything else one might need in a rural community.
It was a constant remodel job with new counters, new shelves, and the first “warm room locker plant” in the state of Washington.
In the booklet Maple Valley Family Recollections III it says, “Finally, no more could be done to the old store building. In 1952, one half of the brick building that exists today was open for business. The old store still remained as a gas and hardware store. But now a 66- by 100-foot second building was on the north side of it, which was the grocery store. The second half of the store was completed in 1959 and the old building was moved into the field by the (then) Mezzavilla home, where it remains today.”
“Papa Joe” deeded the store building to the Maple Valley Historical Society. Over the years there was talk of moving and restoring it but roadblocks such as money and availability of land stood in the way.
City money supports society
The City of Maple Valley earmarked $10,000 in their 1999 budget for the historical society projects which will help defray the cost of moving the building to the site on the corner of Witte Road and S.E. 248th Street.
According to Gibbon’s granddaughter, Dorothy (Gibbon) Church, the Historical Society Museum already has a number of items from the store such as scales, a counter, and a coffee grinder. She said, “Grandpa even used the grinder for grain to make chicken feed.”
Gibbon store remembered
Excerpts from Madeleine Gesell’s account of the store in The Historical Sketch of the Greater Maple Valley Area recalled: The interior was an old-fashioned place with a big pot-bellied stove in the middle around which a few wooden easy chairs were clustered as well as the usual spittoons. The men chatted by the stove while the women shopped and exchanged recipes.
Yard goods, rickrack, lace, and buttons were sold on one counter across from a shelf containing a few canned goods. On the floor stood barrels holding the butter in brine to keep it sweet, and barrels of dill pickles. Flour, sugar, and other staples were sold in 100-pound lots. Sticks of penny candies stood on the counter. In the back of the room were small tools while chicken and dry cow feed were kept in another room.
MVHS president Mona Pickering asks that anyone with items from the store or from that era who wish to donate them to the “store museum” please contact her at 425-432-3470 and leave a message. Especially important is a pot-bellied stove which was the centerpiece of the store.
In 1954, I was 7 years old when my father was paralyzed in a sawmill accident in Cashmere, Washington. He was sent for surgery to a hospital in Seattle. My mom moved all 6 of us to be near him. She found the old store building in Maple Valley empty and for rent for $25 per month. We lived in the the small rear apartment. My brother and I slept in army surplus sleeping bags on the counters in the front store area. I think we lived there for about a year. My Dad’s surgery was successful (amazingly he was able to walk again) and we bought a small house in Renton. I have many memories of Maple Valley. I was bussed to Ravensdale for 2nd grade as there was no school in Maple Valley. One good memory is of the landlord showing up one day and commenting that it was cold inside the small apartment. My mom told him that she had no money for fuel oil. He left, and an hour or so later, the oil truck showed up and filled the tank. We had heat again thanks to the landlord. It was a kindness that my mother never forgot.
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Touching story. My nephew David Church pointed out that actually the apartment was attached on the south end towards the Grange Hall. It may have been made from the extension that was added in 1923 for a Post Office. There was access into the store from there.
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My mom and her family (the Paris family) lived in the Gibbon House for years when she was a child. I remember her telling me how they had moved the house from another part of town to where it was behind the Maple Valley market now. My mom Lisa Paris, has many fond childhood memories of that house, and shared a room with her twins in a bedroom on the upper floor.
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