Dockton is an
unincorporated community
An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...
in
King County, Washington
King County is a County (United States), county located in the U.S. state of Washington (state), Washington. The population was 2,269,675 in the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List of counties in Washington, most populo ...
. It is located on
Maury Island, along
Quartermaster Harbor. Although once an industrial center, Dockton today is a primarily residential area, with many commuters taking the ferry to nearby
Tacoma.
History
Dockton, one of the first major settlements on the now-conjoined
Vashon and Maury Islands, was an important shipbuilding center in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The Puget Sound Dry Dock Company ship yard and drydock there from 1892 to 1909 was the largest on the
West Coast of the United States
The West Coast of the United States, also known as the Pacific Coast and the Western Seaboard, is the coastline along which the Western United States meets the North Pacific Ocean. The term typically refers to the Contiguous United States, contig ...
.
[Vashon Island History: Dockton]
Vashon-Maury Island Heritage Museum. Accessed online 16 September 2009. The drydock was long and wide.
After its closure, the Stuckey and Martinolich yards continued shipbuilding and repair at Dockton. Over the years a number of vessels were also built at the
shipyard of John Martinolich, at Dockton on Maury Island. These included the propeller steamers
''Vashon'' (1905),
''Verona'' (1910),
''Nisqually'' (later renamed ''Astorian'') and
''Calista'', both built in 1911, ''
Florence J.'' (1914), ''
F.G. Reeves'', (1916),
''Vashona'' (later renamed ''Sightseer'') (1921), and the ferry
''Whidby'' (1923).
Launchings did not always go well. ''Florence J''. rolled over and sank on the first launching attempt.
The last commercial boat built at Dockton was the ''Janet G'' in 1929.
In the early 1910s there was a salmon
cannery at Dockton,
Puget Sound
Puget Sound ( ; ) is a complex estuary, estuarine system of interconnected Marine habitat, marine waterways and basins located on the northwest coast of the U.S. state of Washington (state), Washington. As a part of the Salish Sea, the sound ...
fisheries peaked in 1914, but after that catches began to decline, and the cannery was closed by the end of the decade. Dockton gradually transformed into the residential community it is today.
As Dockton faded as an industrial center, its situation as a residential center was improved when
King County bridged the portage between Maury Island and larger Vashon Island in 1918.
The two islands were later connected by an artificial
isthmus
An isthmus (; : isthmuses or isthmi) is a narrow piece of land connecting two larger areas across an expanse of water by which they are otherwise separated. A tombolo is an isthmus that consists of a spit or bar, and a strait is the sea count ...
.
The Dockton Store, including a
post office
A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letter (message), letters and parcel (package), parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post o ...
, opened in 1920. It was the center of the community until it closed in the 1980s. The building remains,
and is listed as a King County landmark. It is the only well preserved early 20th century commercial building on Maury Island.
[Heather MacIntosh]
King County Landmarks: Dockton General Store and Post Office (1908, 1922), Dockton, Maury Island
HistoryLink; date reads January 01, 1900, so effectively undated. Accessed online 16 September 2009.
Other surviving remnants of Dockton's past are shipyard pilings, old piers and net houses, and the homes of the managers and foremen from the industrial days, known collectively as "Piano Row".
Notes
{{authority control
Unincorporated communities in King County, Washington
Unincorporated communities in Washington (state)