The Beginnings of Sullishak

“The history of what became Sullishak, as best I can recall it. I was in the military service when our story begins.” — Wes Sullivan

Editor’s Note by Dave Sullivan: Wes Sullivan was a B-17 copilot in World War II who flew a full 35-mission tour of over France and Germany. So, yes, he was a true hero … and an even better role model as a father.

The Beginnings

My Aunt Vera and Uncle Jewell Lantz decided they wanted a beach cabin, so they bought three lots from George Betts in the Lincoln Beach subdivision. Betts was a rascally character who ran a small store at the entrance road to the subdivision on Highway 101. He'd formed his subdivision shortly after the paved highway was put in along that section of the Coast in the mid-1920s. By the time the Lantz's made their purchase, there were already 15 houses in the subdivision.

The lots were about 25 X 80 feet each. Vera and Jewell’s lots sat at the end of the road to the beach, perfectly positioned for an ocean view.

View from the Lantz lots in the mid-1940s.

My mother, Orma E. Sullivan, lived with her mother, Emma Beary, in Portland. Orma never had a house of her own since her divorce from my father when I was about 10 years old. Mother decided to buy adjacent to the Lantz's on the south. She bought four lots. Although the view from her property didn't have a straight shot down the road, it still qualified as ocean view land.

My grandmother Emma died while I was overseas, but as the picture attests, she got to the beach to see the land her daughters had purchased, and she spent one afternoon helping to clear away brush.

Emma Beary (Orma Sullivan's mother) stands on the future Sullishak site during WWII. The scruffy-looking stand of trees at the back of the property line shows a “natural” forest condition for the coast—that area had never been logged.

One of the first trips Elsie and I took after I returned from the service and established residence at Salem was to the Coast to examine the property my mother had purchased. It was so soon after the war that the warning signs were still in place on the highway approaching the Coast alerting drivers that blackout conditions prevailed all along the coastal section.

Looking north we see the log cabin at 4025 Mina Avenue along with an undisturbed Sullishak site in 1945. This log cabin was affectionately known as the Lincoln Beach Lodge by the neighboring community and is said to have served as the clubhouse and gathering area for an early campground. An elderly neighbor spoke of dances, church services and board games here in her youth. The upstairs bedrooms were dormitories for men and women workers and the downstairs was cookhouse and gathering space. When the Great Depression hit, nobody could afford to pay to go camping and the owners of the lodge simply walked away.

The property was thickly covered with salal and other shrubbery. I remember that we walked north to the end of Mina Avenue, only a few hundred feet, and out to a crude shelter made of shiplap lumber where the coastal guards stood watch during the war.

This was in the fall of 1945. It would be a year and a half before we would begin constructing the cabin.

From the archive

Ownership — the land, lot by lot, from the Siletz to today
Orma Sullivan — who bought the four lots
Wes's History — the same memoir, as the old website had it
Cabin History — the dated timeline, starting in 1942
The Lot Next Door — 4030 Mina, one of Orma's four lots, still empty