Depression Project

The Frye Lettuce Farm

If you are from the Monroe area and have memories of the Depression, please participate in our Great Depression Project.

Seventy years ago the large commercial and residential area on the west side of Monroe known as Fryelands was the site of the 1200-acre Frye Lettuce Farm, which was the backbone of the local economy during the Depression. But it was only on June 27, 1925, that the first carload of lettuce was shipped from Snohomish County from the 310-acre J.G. Robinson Lettuce Farm, which would later become part of the Frye Lettuce Farm.

Both the Milwaukee Road and the Great Northern Railways improved their lines on the west side of Monroe for ease in shipment, and two other companies began growing lettuce in the area, Western Fruit Express, a division of Great Northern Railway, and Frye and Company, which was largely owned by Charles and Emma Frye, founders of Seattle's Frye Art Museum.

In 1929 more than 400 cars of lettuce valued at over $180,000 were shipped using ice manufactured locally. But also in 1929, Robinson declared bankrupty and Frye bought a large part of the farm with Western Fruit Express buying the rest. Frye also bought part of the Austin farm to become the largest landowner in what was then called "Lettuceton." But much of the land was still heavily forested or in peat bog thick with wild cranberry where if you walked through it the water would come over the shoe tops.

Over the next several years the land was cleared and cultivated, and by 1933, the Frye Lettuce Farm was the backbone of the local economy shipping up to 17 cars daily and employing up to one thousand workers from up and down the valley including a large contingent of Filipinos. But labor troubles, strikes and walkouts were common. Wages were as low as ten cents an hour for workdays that ranged from ten to fourteen hours. In 1930 most of the Filipinos walked out over a wage dispute. In 1932, 44 woman walked out refusing to work any longer for 12 cents and hour while the Filipino laborers received 14 cents and two lunches. Then in 1934, another walkout over wages by local laborers was dispersed by the State Patrol. The Filipinos walked out again late in 1934. They were being paid 15 cents an hour plus room and board.