When discussing San Juan Island, it’s important to make sure you’re not missing an ‘s’ at the end. You see, the San Juan Islands are part of the San Juan Archipelago, located in the northwest corner of the continental U.S. There are more than 450 islands in the chain, but only fifteen are accessible by ferry. Of these, nine are part of British Columbia, and six are part of the state of Washington. Of those six, San Juan Island is the second-largest and the most-populated. It has an area of 55.053 square miles and recorded a population of 6,822 at the 2000 census.Friday Harbor is the only incorporated town on the island. It was named after Joseph Poalie Friday, a Hawaiian sheep farmer who worked for the Hudson Bay Company in Cowlitz County from 1841 to 1860, and then moved to the island. In the early 20th century, the harbor was a regular stop for the Puget Sound Mosquito Fleet of steamships. These ships carried goods such as apples, pears, strawberries, chickens, salmon and more back to the mainland, but this trade diminished starting around the time of the Great Depression and continuing through World War II. In the 1960s, a tourism and retirement industry started, and the harbor remains the center of San Juan Island to this day. Read the rest of this entry »