Search

Heritage Tours:

Search for a tour by category:

Search site:

string(50) "https://revisitwa.org/wp-content/themes/revisitwa/"

Woodland

The town, situated on a low, wide plain, was a bustling center of the surrounding farming, dairying, and poultry community in the 1940s, and had a vegetable cannery and a receiving, shipping, and feed station of the Washington Co-op Egg and Poultry Association. A large bulb farm near the town once cultivated and harvested daffodil, tulip, narcissus, and iris bulbs for shipment to eastern and foreign markets.

A large percentage of the local population were of Finnish descent, and traces of the old-world culture arid speech remained discernible through the 1940s. The first Finnish settlers came here in 1901.

Images

Ca. 1950 view of Hwy 99 at Woodland.

Source: Washington State Historical Society

Ca. 1950 view of smelt fishing along the Lewis River, near Woodland.

Source: Washington State Historical Society

Points of Interest Points of Interest icon

Hulda Klager Lilac Gardens

Woodland is home of the Hulda Klager Lilac Gardens. Hulda Klagler was a prominent experimental gardener, who used her own farm as her laboratory. She was particularly noted for her hybridization of over 250 varieties of lilacs. Her “Lilac Day” festivals in May drew 8,000 visitors in the 1940’s from all over the world. Her gardens were devastated by floods in 1948, but fans and local garden clubs provided new stock and planting material to restore the gardens. She died in 1961 at the age of 97.

Planter’s Days

Woodland is also known for Planter’s Days, the oldest continuous community festival in the Pacific Northwest.

Louis N. and Nellie Plamondon House

This large one-story Shingle-style home was built in 1912 for Louie and Nellie Plamondon. He was a prominent banker and businessman in Woodland, and served one-term as mayor.