Bay View, Washington
About Edna
Edna Breazeale (1895–1987) was a retired English teacher in the late 1970s when she stopped the commercial and residential development of Padilla Bay and the land she and her family had lived on since 1902. She then sparked the birth of the Padilla Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve by gifting her Skagit County family farm to the state. She received the State Environmental Excellence Award in 1981.
A girl from a small farming family in the small community of Bay View, Washington, she became a pioneer in environmentalism who had a passion for the land and education. Edna’s students at Seattle's Roosevelt High School included former Governor Dan Evans and politician Wing Luke. She wasn't afraid to call in some student favors to aid her fight to save a patch of nature and an ecologically crucial site for future generations.
Today, thousands of people visit Padilla Bay and the Breazeale Interpretive Center every year. Edna and Padilla Bay feature in local history and travel references. You can even watch former Washington Secretary of State Ralph Munro sing her praises. But her story is told through only a small pamphlet and a few online mentions.
I felt she deserved more.
​
I’m uniquely well positioned to tell this story. As a member of the Breazeale family, I knew and loved Edna.
Anna, Fred, Marcellus, and Edna Breazeale, circa 1910
Edna Breazeale, circa 1980
About the Book
You'll witness Edna’s evolution from farm girl to big-city teacher to local legend—an early-twentieth-century single woman who went to college, had a career, bought a home, traveled alone, and made a mark on thousands of lives, including the three young girls she influenced as both an environmentalist and a quietly staunch feminist they knew as Auntie Edna.
Edna never loses the girl she is at heart. That inner girl is the force behind her environmental actions. And with every scene set in the same month and same location over 108 years, we see how the land—which is a vital character itself—remains the same.
We are temporary inhabitants of this land, which outlives us. But how we spend our time here has long-lasting impact on those who come after us. How Edna learned this lesson and put it into action is the crux of this book—and an increasingly urgent message.
I’ve been a writer and editor for over thirty years. This manuscript draws upon family stories, interviews, and letters. It’s also a work of imagination, plausible conjecture, research, and my own girlhood spent on Puget Sound. My goal: craft a book that preserves Edna’s story and encourages readers to reflect on the people who inspire them and how much one person can do when they act on what they believe.