Brian Donelson, an online salesperson at our Redmond, WA branch, has a long family history of living here in the Pacific Northwest. Brian takes pride of the fact that his relatives were some of the earliest settlers in the Bothell area.

Swedish immigrants Augusta and Andrew Beckstrom arrived in Bothell via rowboat in early 1883, with two small children on board. Andrew originally had thoughts of settling down in downtown Seattle, but after seeing the city, he decided it was too busy a place, so they decided to settle in Bothell, an area northeast of Seattle. John, their third born, was the first recorded birth in Bothell, on July 4th 1883 (an interesting note, they had 2 sons born on July 4th, John, and Brian's grandfather Carl).

Andrew and Augusta immediately started a dairy business and began building a cabin. As time went on their dairy business grew as well as their family, ending up with a large herd of dairy stock and 16 children!

Eventually they built a farmhouse for the entire family to live in, but for many years, along with the 16 children this cabin was all they had!

Now located in the Bothell Landing in downtown Bothell, this home has been disassembled and moved four times.

Brian currently lives on property homesteaded by John Beckstrom, who started his own diary business.

Who knows what the future may bring. Brian has three young adult children and perhaps one of them may continue the tradition of living on the homesteaded property!