Mathison Park
533 South 146th Street
5.3 Acres
This five-acre park was dedicated on September 15, 2006. Most of the land was donated by Ted Mathison in 1999. On April 16, 2003, two sisters, Eleanor Carver Nelson and Dorothy C. Carver, donated a key parcel allowing the park to connect between South 146th and 148th Streets. They gifted their property to the Burien Parks Department in memory of their grandfather, Herman Nickolas Peters, who homesteaded in Sunnydale in 1889.
Peters was born in Germany on February 21st, 1868 and came to Minneapolis when he was 14. He arrived in Seattle in 1889, just after the great fire. After buying a small paint store in Seattle, he purchased 10 acres in Sunnydale. He later bought another five aces. He lived on his homestead property until his death in 1949.
Peters operated a large chicken ranch and orchard between 5th Avenue South and 8th Avenue South, and South 148th and South 150th. He built several houses on 6th Avenue South, most of which were paved over by State Highway 518.
Peters believed in progress. In 1903 he built a grocery store (and later a service station) at the three-cornered parcel bounded by South 152nd, 8th Avenue South and Des Moines Road, which served the area until 1969. He also built a large fish pond there, fed by an artesian well. In 1904 Peters established the Sunnydale Telephone Company, financed by himself and a friend, Ebon Greene. Through an agreement with the Seattle telephone company, they connected their wires to the Georgetown branch. Peters installed phones, kept them repaired, collected monthly charges and handled all the business. His telephone poles were often used for fencing around residents’ property.
In 1905 Peters built a large cedar home, which burned down shortly before State Highway 518 was built over the site where it stood. The old Herman Peters home was a Sunnydale landmark for many years. Unfortunately it was destroyed by vandals in 1968.
By 1915 Peters convinced the Puget Sound Electric Company to bring electricity to the area. He also owned the area's first gasoline buggy, which he used on his rounds maintaining phone service. Many times, however, his daughter Hilda had to hitch up the horse and buggy and tow the car out of a mudhole. Hilda Carver, mother of Dorothy Carver and Eleanor C. Nelson, was born on September 5, 1895. She lived in the area all her life.
Herman Peters was the area’s first Justice of the Peace, as well as a notary in 1897. He donated land for and helped build Sunnydale's first church, and served on the Sunnydale School Board. He died in 1949 at the age of 80, and was buried in Riverton Crest Cemetery near his first wife, Anna Simons Peters.
In the summer of 2006 the Mathison siblings--Don, Phil, Eric, Stephen and Susan--cut the ribbon to open Burien's newest neighborhood park and playground. They grew up on the property, raised by their parents Ted and Bernadine Mathison.
Eric Mathison, a writer for the Highline Times, noted the irony in Burien Plaza Starbucks adopting the park: his mom and dad didn’t drink coffee. His late father had written that “it is highly recommended that the property remain heavily wooded (my wife Bernadine loved trees).” With “great pleasure and trepidation” he turned over to the city of Burien what had been the family home since 1944.
The Mathisons bought the five acres “in the country” from the Sunnydale Goat Dairy for $1,600 in August, 1942. Ted Mathison layed 10 or 12 cinder blocks a day, after work, in building their house. The children had many adventures on the property—climbing trees, building forts and picking fruit from their gardens. “Just because we lived on five acres on the top of a hill, I don’t want you to think we were rich snobs,” Eric said. “My dad was a Boeing middle manager. My mom took care of five kids and volunteered in the community. My parents were into voluntary simplicity before voluntary simplicity was cool.
“I want Burien officials and park patrons to know how important the place is to my family and me. The benefits we received as kids (wooded trails with views of Mt. Rainier, the airport and Puget Sound) we want to pass on to succeeding generations of children and adults.”
Phil Mathison said that his family “is thrilled at what is being done here. My parents loved the setting and trees and wanted to preserve it for the future. We moved to this property when I was 6 in 1944. We were moving way out to the country from West Seattle—and it was really in the country! There were only two other homes in the area that I remember . . .
“Dad built a temporary house which we lived in for 6 years while he built their dream home block by block. It is a great house—as good today as 55 years ago. . . . Dad and mom came to this property in the country because they love the setting and the trees. Mom could honestly be called a true tree-hugger. They had many visits through the years from people wanting to buy part of the land, some of them developers. Early on, their intention was to preserve the hill of trees for the future.
“Both of my parents came from situations where there wasn’t much money. Somehow both were able to attend Washington State College in Pullman where they met. Dad eventually became a Boeing engineer and Mom a homemaker, and could probably be called an activist. Her passions were education (she was a PTA president) and mental health. She helped start the Highline-West Seattle Mental Health Clinic and the Crisis Clinic.
“Dad could do anything! Plumbing, electrical, building, repair. If he didn’t know how to do something he would study and figure it out. He loved working at Boeing making planes. He was a true engineer. A quiet Norwegian engineer. . . .
“We walked to Sunnydale School and Highline High through the back woods. Dad survived the Boeing downturn and stayed until he was 65. He tackled many huge projects there."
Ted and Bernadine Mathison traveled, took classes and always tried to learn more. Bernadine passed away at 77, "going to meetings right to the end." Eight years later, at 89, Ted married longtime family friend Nina Mae Miller at the Mathison property. "Nina Mae said it was like moving to a park! Nina Mae was very important to this park. She knew what Dad and Mom wanted, but Dad tended to put things off. . . . When she started paying the bills and saw the property tax, the donation to Burien happened. They became caretakers and had a wonderful four years here." Ted Mathison passed away at 95 in February, 2003.
“We missed not being able to come here after 59 years of this beautiful place. We are thrilled (and so would Mom and Dad be) with what is being done . . . We know there is much more to do, but if a tree has to come down, the groaning you will hear will be MOM! Thank you for being here!!” (Remarks of Phil Mathison at Park dedication, September 15, 2006)
The first phase of the park—a playground, paved pathway, benches, picnic tables and landscaping--was completed in 2006. The second phase—a parking lot, plaza, restroom, picnic shelter, trail system and community garden—is planned for 2008. King County Youth Sports Facility provided a $50,000 grant for the playground, and Starbucks Neighborhood Parks program provided a $15,000 grant.
Mathison Park is the largest of Burien’s neighborhood parks, and the first to be developed east of First Avenue South. The north edge of Mathison Park is two blocks south of the high point in Burien (463 feet).
This project was
developed through a Heritage Special Projects Program grant funded by
4Culture and with the assistance
of the
Highline
Historical Society.
