Sequim Irrigation Festival

Irene Zeman Danforth, youngest of five daughters, was born in 1924 to James and Amelia Zeman on the family farm overlooking Sequim Bay. Her sisters are Alpha, Gertrude, Helen Mersedes and Pearl. The three eldest girls were already mature women having families of their own when Irene was born. Her sisters nicknamed her “Little Reenie”.

Happy memories are of growing up on the 40 acre farm her parents cleared themselves. Farm life included dairy cows, gardens and her job “to feed the chickens”. She would explore the beach and loved when her nieces and nephews visited because they were all the same age. She remembers her father pruning and grafting trees, which still bear fruit today. He tanned hides and made some of the family shoes, as well as taxidermy. She has fond memories of her mother’s baked beans and her sewing the sails for the boat her dad built. Irene loved all the animals. She and her mother would walk through the woods to visit her mother’s parents up in the Palo Alto area. Evenings would include reading, story telling or her father playing his accordion.

Irene was 14 when her mother passed leaving her father to raise her. She says Pop “could do anything”. He was a fisherman, farmer, and a pretty good cook too. Irene had a special attachment and affection with her father. He taught her to be independent and thoughtful of her feelings.

Irene graduated from Sequim High School. She loved going to dances and met her future husband, Dan Danforth, at a USO dance at the Fairview Grange. He was in the Coast Guard and stationed at the Dungeness Lighthouse.

Irene and Dan were married in 1945. Her father gave them the little house up the road that she and her dad moved to when they left the farm. She and Dan fixed it up and remodeled it as their family grew. They lived in that house for over 60 years, raising their 4 children there, Sandy, Larry, Vickie and Christine. She has 8 grandchildren and 3 great grandchildren.

Irene enjoys her flowers, especially daisies, gardening and singing. She used her artistic imagination to create needed household items as well as making costumes for church plays, Halloween and for herself. Noted for her great cooking, her children would run home from the school bus when they saw their mother having a tea party with her sisters, because it meant she was probably serving her delicious cream puffs. Irene and Dan enjoyed the outdoors and taking their family on many picnics and camping trips.

Dan and Irene celebrated their 50^th Wedding Anniversary at the Fairview Grange where they met. When Dan retired they were able to travel to Hawaii and Europe. Irene really enjoyed the trip to Czechoslovakia, the home of her father’s family, Joseph and Mary Mashek Zeman.

Irene feels honored to be recognized as a pioneer because she is proud of her heritage and her father’s dedication to his family.