Sources listed in parentheses are found in the Bibliography. If you would like to make any additions or corrections to the information posted, please e-mail me.

Macomber

Station on the Cowlitz, Chehalis and Cascade Railway, 12 miles from Chehalis. "The name of Doty's Spur station has been changed to 'Macomber' in honor of the well known family of that name who own land and live adjoining." (Chehalis Bee-Nugget, 9 Feb 1923, p. 7).

Mary's Corner

Located 10 miles southwest of Chehalis on US Hwy 12. It was named for Mary Rogers who ran a store there in the 1920s.

Mary's Corner Links:

Mauermann

This precinct is listed in the 1910 census. The Mauermanns were one of the first families to settle in the area now known as Pe Ell, so Mauermann is probably adjacent to Pe Ell. Currently, the Mauermann Voting District takes up the southwestern corner of Lewis County, surrounding PeEll (which is a separate voting district).

Mauermann Links:

Mayfield

Located 20 miles east of Winlock on the Cowlitz River. It is now the site of the City of Tacoma hydroelectric dam. The post office opened in 1890 as Ferry, named in honor of Elisha P. Ferry, Washington State's first governor. H. T. Mayfield was its first postmaster. In May, 1895, the town was renamed Mayfield in his honor (Ramsey, p. 77).

Mayfield Links:

Mays

Located 15 miles west of Chehalis on the Chehalis River, and 1 mile north of Meskill. It was once a logging camp and site of a sawmill, both owned by the Baker-May Lumber Company. The town was abandoned after the sawmill burned down. The Milwaukee Railroad Willapa Harbor Line had a station here.

Mays Links:

McCormick

Located 26 miles southwest of Chehalis (2 miles south of Pe Ell) on Rock Creek, along SR 6. It was named in 1896 for Harry W. McCormick, owner of the McCormick Lumber Co. In 1908, the company was sold and J. E. Wheeler became the new president. George D. McCormick was vice president, treasurer and manager. John Leigh was sales manager. A post office was established in May 31, 1899 and discontinued July 15, 1929. Chauncey A. Doty was the first postmaster (Ramsey, p. 113). A sawmill was built here and the population reached 700 by 1910. The sawmill closed in 1930 and today only the mill office, now a general store, is standing (Erickson, p. 49-51).

McCormick Links:

McDonald

Located near Boistfort, also known as Camp McDonald.

McGuire

McNelly

Meadows

This small community is located 5 miles north of Galvin. Ronald E. Crawford established a post office here on Sept. 3, 1875 as Meadow Brooks. The post office was discontinued July 22, 1878 (Ramsey, p. 51).

Mendota

Located 8 miles south of Bucoda, Thurston Co. Mendota was built in 1913 by B. H. Johnston as a company town for the Mendota Coal and Coke Co. The post office operated from Sept. 16, 1909 to Sept. 15, 1923. When Guy Reed Ramsey was researching his book "Postmarked in Washington," he visited the site of Mendota in 1956. He found only one resident left--Homer Johnston, son of B. H. Johnston, who lived there alone except for his dog (Ramsey, p. 133).

Mendota Links:

Menefee

Located 1.5 miles south of Winlock on SR 603. The town was named for L. B. Menefee, who constructed a sawmill in Winlock in 1889. All that is left of the town is a small cluster of houses (Erickson, p. 84).

Meridian Hill

Located about 16 miles east of Centralia, and about 6 miles east of Kopiah.

Meskill

Located 14 miles west of Chehalis (10 miles northeast of Pe Ell). It was once a railroad station and logging camp, originally named Donahue Spur in 1902 after W. J. and Thomas Donahue. It was renamed in honor of D. W. Meskill. The Meskill post office operated from Sept. 28, 1905 to May 31, 1920 (Ramsey, p. 124).

Meskill Links:

Millburg

see Lindberg.

Millburn

Located about a mile west of the present site of Adna.

Mill Creek

According to the GNIS, there are three different streams called Mill Creek in Lewis County - at Toledo, Onalaska, and Adna. Not known which settlement this Mill Creek refers to.

Mineral

Located on Mineral Hill Road on the east side of SR 7, 14 miles north of Morton. Also known as Mineral Creek. Its name comes from a rich surface vein of red realgear, a source of arsenic, which was mined for 22 years (Miller, 1977). In 1920, logging operations brought the population to 1,000. Today, its population is about 300 (Erickson, p. 77-78). St. Hilary Catholic Church was dedicated by Fr. Merten on land donated by the Seymour family, but the church no longer exists (La Gra, p. 66). Mineral grade school closed in 2003, and all students attend school in Morton. Mineral Lake is still a popular fishing hole and recreational area among locals.

Spencer Seymour notes a correction to the early history of Mineral as written in the "Catholic History of East Lewis County: Mary (Kelly) Ray stated that Alexander Seymour was the uncle of June Krolczyk, when in fact he was her grandfather. "William Seymour is my grandfather. Alexander is his father. The story has June as Alexander's uncle when she is actually the grandaughter. William was Henry and Joe's brother making Grandpa WIlliam June's uncle."

Mineral Links:

Montgreen

See Alta Vista.

Morton

Mossyrock

(1999 population: 565) Located 12 miles west of Morton on US Hwy 12. It was named in 1852 for the mossy crag which rises 200 ft above the east end of the Klickitat prairie. The town's main attraction is the Mossyrock Dam, operated by the City of Tacoma. According the "Oregon, Washington and Alaska Gazetteer and Business Directory, 1901-1902", Mossyrock was also known as Quelt Prairie.

Mossyrock Links:

Murnen

According to the GNIS, Murnen is located about 2 miles southwest of Doty. No further information available.

Napavine

(1999 population: 1,255) Now the fourth-largest town in the county (beating out Winlock by 30 residents). Located 7 miles SE of Chehalis along SR 603.

Napavine Links:

Nesika

Located 10 miles southeast of Riffe and one mile south of the Cowlitz River. A post office operated here from April, 1898 to April, 1932 (Ramsey, p. 108).

Newaukum

Located 3 miles south of Chehalis. Newaukum is named for the Newaukum River, whose name comes from the Indian word for "gently flowing water." Early settlers of the Newaukum Valley included the Moores and the Berniers (Hunt and Kaylor, p. 450). A post office was established as Neivaucum by Lewis Johnson, which operated from Dec. 19, 1856 to March 25, 1863 (Ramsey, p. 11). It is generally believed that Neivaucum was a misspelling of Newaukum. In the late 1850s, the Newaukum School District was established (Hunt and Kaylor, p. 451). The town itself was built by General Sprague in 1873. He wanted to build in Chehalis, but Eliza Barrett, owner of the desired parcel of land, refused to sell. He built a station, water tank, side track, and post office (established Jan. 21, 1873, discontinued Jan. 2, 1907; Ramsey, p. 31). The first postmaster was Taylor Rue. His daughter, Annie Rue, married H. C. Shorey who, with Luther Davis, built a small store in town. The Northern Pacific railway offered to build a $4,000 courthouse in Newaukum if the county agreed to make it the county seat. Voters rejected this proposal since a large, steep hill separated Newaukum from Chehalis. The county seat was then moved to Chehalis, and much of the area has since been incorporated into Chehalis (Hunt and Kaylor, p. 459).

Newaukum Links:

Newaukum Prairie

Established March 11, 1878. The exact location is not known, but undoubtedly it was a Donation Land Claim, about a mile northeast of present day Glenoma. It may have been moved 3 or 4 miles northeast about the same time the name changed to Vern on September 9, 1903. The post office was discontinued on August 31, 1911 (Ramsey p. 93).

Neivaucum

Thought to have been located on Dillenbaugh Creek at a point about 2 miles southeast of Chehalis. Established on December 19, 1856. This was a weekly mail route between Cowlitz Landing, and Skookumchuck. Discontinued on March 25, 1863 (Ramsey, p. 11).

Nulls Crossing

Located east of Centralia on land purchased by Zaddock Null. In the early 1900s, Nulls Crossing school was part of School District No. 212, which also included Kopiah and Seminary Hill schools.

Onalaska

Located 9 miles east of Napavine on SR 508. The area where Onalaska is now located was first settled by several families in the 1880s and 1890s, and was originally known as Granite. Onalaska was founded in 1914 by the Carlisle Lumber Co, which built the largest sawmill in the county. There is some confusion over the source of its name. One source says its name came from Oonalaska, in the Aleutian Islands, Alaska. Another source says the Carlisle Lumber Co. named it after Onalaska, Wisconsin (Nix, p. 38). The mill was forced to close in 1938 as a result of the Great Depression, and the town of 1,000 dwindled to only a few hundred residents today (Erickson, p. 80).

Onalaska Links:

Osborn

Located near Swofford, four miles east of Mossyrock. Wilbur J. Osborne founded this town and established the first post office on July 20, 1886. The PO was discontinued April 10, 1896 (Ramsey, p. 67).

Osborn Links:

Oxley

According to the USGS Geographic Names Information System, Oxley is located at the midpoint of an area bounded by Chehalis to the north, Interstate 5 to the west, Napavine to the south, and Jackson Highway to the east. In 1924, it was a station on the Cowlitz, Chehalis and Cascade Railway, 5 miles from Chehalis.

Packwood

There are actually two Packwoods within close proximity. Packwood I is located 35 miles east of Morton along US Hwy 12, deep in the heart of Gifford Pinchot National Forest. Packwood II, originally known as Sulphur Springs from 1890-1910, and as Lewis from 1910-1930, is located 3 miles southwest of Packwood I. Both are named in honor of William Packwood, a volunteer in the Indian Wars of 1855-56 and discoverer of bituminous and anthracite coal in the region (Ramsey, p. 91).

Packwood Links:

Parcuvia

A voting precinct in Lewis County, located east of Interstate-5 and Centralia/Chehalis, and bounded in part by I-5, Jackson Highway, Coal Creek Road, and Dillenbaugh Creek. First appeared as an enumeration district in the 1930 census. The Washington State Training School for Boys (now Green Hill School) was located here.

Parcuvia Links:

Pe Ell

(1999 population: 685) Located 24 miles southwest of Chehalis along SR 6, near the Pacific County border. Among the families who settled in the region in the 1850s and 1860s were the Burbees, Eastmans, Chapmans, Gates, Fosters, Lemons, and Mauermanns (Hunt and Kaylor, p. 449). As legend has it, the name Pe Ell came from the attempts of local Indians to pronounce the name of Pierre Charles, an early French Canadian settler. It began as a farming community before 1890, but quickly became a logging town with the establishment of the Northern Pacific line to South Bend, Pacific County in 1892 and the opening of the Yeoman Lumber Co. mill in 1894. At its peak in the early 1920s nearly 2,000 people lived in Pe Ell. The Yeoman Mill burned down in 1926, and surrounding mills closed down in rapid succession by the mid-1930s (Erickson, p. 49-50).

Pe Ell Links:

Peters

Pomona

See Adna.

Phillips

Pleasant Hill

Located northeast of Curtis and southwest of Adna. Families in Pleasant Hill were enumerated as part of Adna in the 1920 and 1930 censuses.

Pleasant Hill Links:

Prescott

The Prescott precinct appears in all censuses from 1900 - 1930. From the 1930 census, homes were enumerated along Winlock-Toledo Rd and Winlock-Vader Rd., suggesting that Prescott was located near Winlock. The present-day voting precinct of Prescott is bounded by Interstate 5 on the east, Evaline on the northwest, and Winlock on the southwest.

Prescott Links:

Randle

Located 17 miles east of Morton on US Hwy 12. The town was founded in 1886 and named for James Randle, of the Randle Lumber Co. (Tacoma Public Library). Additional information on the namesake of Randle was provided by Whitney McMahan: "My Randles family's name is spelled Randall in that census. You see, James Lawson Randles was also my great great grandfather. Randle was named for him after petitioning Congress for a Post Office. The powers to be dropped the "s" from his name. While James Randles always signed his name with the "s" his children dropped the "s" after his death. He is buried in Centralia and his head stone says James Lawson Randles. I also have a state certified copy of General Election Returns for November 2, 1886. J L Randell (once again spelled wrong) was elected the first Justice of the Peace and he won all 12 votes. Before migrating west from Sevier County Tenn. he held public office as Coroner in London County, Tenn., Register of Deeds in Sevier County, Tenn., four years, and Deputy County Clerk in Sevier County for four years. I also have his original discharge papers from the civil war. While reading the discriptions of Lewis County Towns I found a few errors. Randle is 17 miles east of Morton and my family has no information that there was ever a Randle Lumber Co. We do not believe it to be so. James Lawson Randles was a Farmer and a Merchant and a Politician. He also owned the Randles Hotel in Centralia."

Randle Links:

Rankin

Located 1 mile southwest of Onalaska. Joseph Rankin established a post office here on Oct. 10, 1882 and named it for his family. Other postmasters were James Russell and Theodore B. Flint. The PO was discontinued Dec. 3, 1895 (Ramsey, p. 57).

Rankin Links:

Reliance

This post office was established south of Alder, below the Pierce-Lewis County border, and operated from August 28, 1913 to September 30, 1914 (Ramsey, p. 138).

Reynolds

Located on Rock Creek near Walville and the Pacific County border (3 miles southwest of Pe Ell). The town was built around a sawmill and named for J. W. Reynolds. When the timber supply was exhausted the town was abandoned; nothing is left of the town site except for a cleared tract of land. A post office operated from Nov. 2, 1900 to May 31, 1904, but served only a few families (Ramsey, p. 117). Ches Packer sent the following message to correct a discrepancy on the Lewis County Map: "On the map shown I found a small discrepancy in the location of the settlement called Reynolds. It was quite small and had a post office for only a few years. On the map it is shown as existing between McCormick and Pe Ell. Its actual location was on the other side (west of) McCormick, between McCormick and Walville. Pe Ell and McCormick were about 2 to 2.5 miles apart. McCormick and Walville were about 1.5 to 2 miles apart so the area involved is quite limited. Reynolds was located on a small fairly level area just to the north of the railroad line which is now a hiking trail and which lies adjacent to Highway 6. I recall a few old collapsing buildings there when I was a boy in the 1930's. The location was just east of the bridge that crosses over Rock Creek and the trail. The settlement was confined pretty well to the area between the railway (now trail) and Rock Creek since there is a steep rock cliff on the south side of the highway and building there would have been too difficult."

Reynolds Links:

Rhine

Located 3.5 miles southwest of Randle. A post office operated here from June 24, 1908 to Feb. 28, 1921 (Ramsey, p. 131).

Riffe

Located on the Cowlitz River 8 miles southwest of Morton. The town originally called Baugh but was renamed in honor of Floyd L. Riffe, founder of the Primitive Baptist Church in 1890 and the town's first postmaster in 1897. The post office was closed on May 31, 1966 and Riffe was abandoned when the Mossyrock Dam was built and is now flooded by Riffe Lake (Ramsey, p. 109). In the late 1980s, during a severe summer drought, Riffe Lake grew so shallow that the town was again visible, for the first time since the dam was built.

Riffe Links:

Riley

The post office operated from March 13, 1905 to Aug. 31, 1907 and the only postmaster was the town's namesake, Robert E. Riley (Ramsey, p. 123).

Rock Creek

See Walville.

Roosevelt

Located 4-5 miles northeast of Silver Creek. The town was named in honor of Theodore Rooselvelt when he was campaigning for US Presidency. The post office operated here from Oct. 1, 1900 to Dec. 31, 1901 (Ramsey, p. 114).

Ruth

Located about 1.5 miles northwest of Curtis on Boistfort Road (where it meets SR 6). It was a station on the Milwaukee line, and for a while, was the departure point for lumber milled by sawmills in Klaber, Curtis and surrounding areas. An article in the January 1927 issue of "Milwaukee Magazine" describes the naming of Ruth as follows: "This station was named for Ruth Donahoe, daughter of the Hon. Francis Donahoe, pioneer resident of Lewis County and purchasing agent for the right of way for the railroad west of Chehalis. She drove the family car when taking officials over the proposed route and at the end of an unusually hard trip, C. A. Goodnow, vice-president, complimented her on her driving and named the townsite they had reached for her. She is now Mrs. Ruth Dorr of Portland, Oregon. Francis Donahoe was a leading factor in the development of this section of the country. He was elected state senator and a delegate to several national conventions. While a member of the state legislature he introduced and secured passage of the Donahoe Road Law under which many counties in the state have built miles of roads." (p. 7).

Saint Urban

St. Urban's Catholic Church is located 4.5 miles south of Napavine, Washington on Military Road. The church was built in 1891 and is still an active parish today. St. Urban's cemetary dates back to 1901. It is believed that during the early 1900s the parish had about 50 families. Mass is held once a month on the third Saturday. (Submitted by John Planinshek).

St. Urban Links

Salal

See Dryad.

Salkum

Located 18 miles west of Morton on US Hwy 12. The name comes from the Indian word for boiling, in reference to the "boiling" Mill Creek (Nix, p. 38). It was originally settled by William Hammil and his wife, and was once the site of two sawmills until the timber supply was depleted (Nix, p. 38). The original site of the town was 2 miles south of its present location. The post office was established by Jacob Beusch at the old site on Oct. 10, 1882, and moved to its new location on May 5, 1890 (Ramsey, p. 57).

Salkum Links:

Salmon Creek

Salmon Creek (the watercourse) is located southeast of Toledo, near the Lewis-Cowlitz Co. Border (see section F5 of the Lewis Co. Road Atlas), so this precinct was probably a community located near the creek.

Salmon Creek Links:

Salzer

Located directly southeast of Centralia, at the south end of Salzer Creek. Named for Joseph and Anna Marie Salzer. (Tacoma Public Library). (See section E4 of the Lewis Co. Road Atlas.)

Salzer Links:

Sharon

Located 5 miles east of Forest. A post office operated here from May 31, 1899 to Sept. 30, 1903 (Ramsey, p. 113).

Sharon Links:

Shoestring

"Shoestring is about 5 or 6 miles east of Onalaska on Hwy 508. Not a town, (wide place in the road) though when I was a kid, there was a store right there on the hwy. We went to the community church there, which is right across the road from the cemetery. Those who live in Shoestring are in the Onalaska School District. Named after a wild flower (Delphinium)." (From John Blair). See also Alpha.

Shoestring Links:

Siler

Located east of Vance and named for Judson S. Siler. Rufus T. Siler, was postmaster at Vance in 1886 and 1896. Guy Ramsey wrote that Judson and Rufus were brothers, but they were in fact cousins, as clarified by Jenna Cain: "Rufus was the son of David Weimar Siler and Martha Jane Osborne. Judson S. Siler was the son of Thomas Siler, a brother of David Weimar. A quite comprehensive history of the Siler family is in the Chehalis Bee-Nugget August 8, 1930, under the heading of SILER FAMILY HAS A REUNION AT RANDLE SUNDAY. Rufus was married to Josephine Landes, who was a sister of my maternal grandmother."

Silver Brook

The US Geological Survey's Geographic Name Server (GNIS) lists Silver Brook as a "populated place" near Randle. No further information available.

Silver Creek

Located 15 miles west of Morton and one mile north of the Mayfield Dam on Hwy 12. John Tucker founded the town on April 28, 1868. It once had a large dance hall and was the site of popular dances, attended by many of the families in the Tilton and Cowlitz River Valleys (La Gra, p. 10).

Silver Creek Links:

Skookumchuck

Located between the Lewis Co.-Thurston Co. border and Centralia. Skookumchuck was the site of the first post office in Lewis County, established Oct. 10, 1857 by Charles Van Wormen. The post office was moved to Centerville (later renamed Centralia) in 1877 (Middlesworth, p. 38).

Skookumchuck Links:

Sopenah

See Little Falls.

Spencer

In 1924, Spencer was a station on the Cowlitz, Chehalis and Cascade Railway, 3 miles from Chehalis.

Spruce

Located 5 miles southwest of Salkum. In 1898, the population of Spruce numbered about 125. The post office operated from May 17, 1898 to March 5, 1900. The first and only postmaster was Miss Catherine Spencer, who also operated a general store. She married James S. Carpenter on Sept. 5, 1906 (Ramsey, p. 109).

Spruce Links:

Sticklin

Stillwater

This precinct is listed in the 1910 census, but no further information is available. According to an article in the January 1927 issue of "Milwaukee Magazine", it was named for Stillwater, Minnesota.

Stillwater Links:

Sulphur Creek

This enumeration district was located near Ferry and Mayfield districts.

Sulphur Creek Links:

Sulphur Springs

Established on June 30, 1890. Located near present-day Packwood. A mineral spring of this name was across the Cowlitz River from the mouth of Johnson Creek. For several years, the mail was carried by donation labor. The mail was very light and was carried on a saddlehorn (Ramsey, p. 91).

Sulphur Springs Links:

Summit

Swofford

Located 10 miles southwest of Morton and named for Thomas R. Swofford in 1887. A post office was established in 1890, and Thomas Swofford served as the first postmaster. The post office was discontinued April 29, 1922 (Ramsey, p. 75). The City of Tacoma bought the town for its Cowlitz River project.

Swofford Links:

Syverson

Named for Harry Syverson, the first manager of Hill Logging Co. For a brief time, it was a station on the South Bend line of the Northern Pacific Railway. See Carl Staeger's article about the South Bend line. Rich Detering adds the following: "I'm old enough to remember the remnants of the old sawmill in Adna on the South Bend line. Littell is only a little more than than a mile to the east and about one third of that stretch, next to Littell, is a swamp. So the Syverson "station" couldn't be more than 1/2 mile from Adna. I would think that talking the railroad company into adding another station between two existing stations separated by a little more than a mile would take some really fast talking! Then getting it named after yourself, what a guy!"

Tasunshun

See Fords Prairie.

Temple

Temple was also known as the Davis Lake settlement. It was settled by Henry Clay Temple and his family in the mid-1880s. They began the Lake Creek Shingle mill in the late 1880s. No post office was ever established, although opportunity to have one was presented in 1890 (La Gra, p. 21).

Temple Links:

Tilden

Located on Bear Canyon Road, 23 miles west of Morton along SR 508 (between Cinebar and Alpha). The post office was established on July 13, 1882 by Mrs. Richard (Sarah) Parnell (La Gra, p. 1).

Tilden Links:

Tilton

See also Alpha, Bremer.

Tilton Links:

Toledo

(1999 population: 690) Located 15 miles south of Chehalis on SR 503. Founded in 1837, its original names were Plomondoe's Landing, Cowlitz Landing, and Warbassport. A post office here operated as Cowlitz from April 29, 1854 to Nov. 30, 1880, when it was renamed Toledo (Ramsey, p. 9). The name Toledo comes from the pioneer side wheel steamer.

Toledo Links:

Union

This precinct is listed in the 1910 and 1930 censuses. According to the Lewis County Public Works dept., the Union Precinct is located in the Chehalis Valley area, with the Newaukum forming the western boundary, Sturdevant Road forming part of the northern boundary, and Jackson Highway forming part of the southeastern boundary. I have no further information on this locale.

Union Links:

Vader

(1999 population: 490) Located 20 miles southwest of Chehalis on SR 506, on Olequa Creek. The town was originally called Sopenah, but the first post office was established as Little Falls on June 24, 1874, by Paul C. Craft. The town was renamed for a German settler by the name of Vader in April, 1913 (Ramsey, p. 44). To the best of my knowledge, this is the only town in Lewis County in which a name-change was passed into law by the Washington Territorial Legislature.

Vader Links:

Vance

Located 20 miles southeast of Morton (or 1.5 miles south of Randle) on the Cowlitz River. In 1885 it was named for U.S. Senator Zebulon Baird Vance. A post office operated from 1886 to 1927, with Rufus T. Siler as the first postmaster (Ramsey, p. 63) (see also "SILER FAMILY HAS A REUNION AT RANDLE SUNDAY").

Vance Links:

Veness

Located 1 mile south of Winlock, near the site of the Menefee station. George W. Veness was the first postmaster, establishing the post office on June 3, 1908. He was a brother of J. A. Veness, who owned a sawmill in Winlock and operated Veness as a company town. The PO was discontinued July 31, 1912 (Ramsey, p. 130).

Veness Links:

Vern

Established as Verndale on July 26, 1890. The location was 24 miles East of Mossyrock in Rainy Creek Valley. The same horse was used six days a week to make the round trip from Sulphur Springs to Randle and back. It should be noted that there was not yet a place called Randle so it is assumed that volunteers made contact with a carrier near or at the site which later became Randle. Sulphur Springs was renamed Lewis on November 4, 1910. Lewis was renamed Packwood on April 1, 1930 (Ramsey p. 91, p. 134).

Verndale

See Glenoma.

Wabash

Located one mile north of Centralia. The Northern Pacific railway named it in 1908 after the Wabash River, which forms the boundary between Indiana and Illinois.

Walville

Located 4 miles southwest of Pe Ell along SR 6, on the Pacific County border. It was founded in 1898 by two lumbermen from Michigan--Walworth and Neville. It was originally called Rock Creek and was the site of the Rock Creek Lumber Co. The Walville Mill was unique in employing Japanese workers (74 in 1909). The mill closed in 1930 and the town is now abandoned (Erickson, p. 52).

Walville Links:

Watkins

This town is not listed in Guy Ramsey's book, but on Cram's 1909 WA map it appears along the current SR 7, between Mineral and Morton.

Webster

Located 3 miles east of Onalaska. A post office operated here from Feb. 10, 1900 to Nov. 15, 1905 (Ramsey, p. 113). See "The History of Onalaska" for more information.

Webster Links:

Wildwood

Located 10 miles south of Curtis on Buchanan Creek. The area was first settled by Thomas Chapman Naylor and his wife, Catherine Alexander Chapman, in 1881. They established the post office on Aug. 24, 1889 and served as postmasters for a number of years. The post office closed on Aug. 15, 1930. The peak population appeared to be 30 residents in 1907 (Ramsey, p. 73).

Wildwood Links:

Wilson

Located 9 miles south of Mayfield. Reuben Koons established the post office here, which operated from July 11, 1891 to Dec. 15, 1924 (Ramsey, p. 96).

Wilson Links:

Windom

Located 10 miles east of Toledo. A post office operated here from June 19, 1891 to June 30, 1909, but the town site is now a single farm (Ramsey, p. 94).

Windom Links:

Winlock

(1999 population: 1,225) The fifth-largest town in Lewis County is located 19 miles SW of Chehalis on SR 603. It was originally named Grand Prairie when the first post office was established on July 25, 1861 (Ramsey, p. 20). C. C. Pagget re-named it Winlock in 1874, in honor of Senator Winlock W. Miller, a close friend of Isaac I. Stevens, first governor of Washington (Nix, p. 39). Winlock was incorporated in 1883. It is now a small farming community but was once the site of the first big inland railroad sawmill in the Pacific Northwest. The Ainslie Lumber Co. operated a sawmill, store, and hotel 4 miles south of Winlock from 1884 to 1893 (Erickson, p. 83).

Winlock Links:

Winston

Located 0.5 miles southwest of Mayfield on Winston Creek and named for T. R. Winston, who settled there in 1875. Other early settlers of the region included James Phillips, Charles Bishop, the Yates, the Dillenbaughs, the Garrisons, and the Hendricks (Hunt and Kaylor, p. 450).

Winston Links:

Go to Lewis County Towns, Adna - Logan