Sylvester's Window 1856, Meet the Neighbors
IT'S 1856 ... MEET THE NEIGHBORS ' 6. CLARA POTTLE SYLVESTER (Sept 24. 1832 Searsmont, ME - after May 1 917 San Diego. CA?) Clara Pottle was born and raised in Maine, near the sea. She met Edmund Sylvester in 1854, while he was on a return trip to his childhood home of Deer Isle, Maine. Clara married Edmund, and embarked on the long journey west to start a new life with him in the small frontier town he founded, called Olympia. The couple traveled by steamship from New York to the Isthmus of Panama, where they crossed by land to the Pacific Coast, boarded another ship to San Francisco, and finally arrived in Olympia on October 1 3, 1 854. It is likely they landed at Giddings new wharf which extended 300 feet from the end of Main Street. Clara and Edmund lived in temporary quarters until 1856, when the grand Italianate-style Sylvester Home was built. This home, which boasted a third story tower, overlooked a rugged, stump-filled "town square." It would be Olympia's showplace for many years. Clara made sure it was also a place that hosted events and welcomed people. The Sylvesters shared the home with their only child, May. When asked to fill out a questionaire later in her life, Clara listed her religion as "liberal." Liberal thinking with regards to women's rights, was something Clara felt strongly about. Even though her husband did not approve, Clara offered her home for the first meeting of the Woman's Club, a group considered quite radical in 1883.
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