HILLSDALE CEMETERY

Location: Hillsdale Cemetery is located south of California Creek and on the east side of the Blaine Road, two miles south of Blaine (one mile north of the Birch Bay– Lynden Road). This is in the west half of NW ¼, Sec 17, R 1 E, T 40 N, WM)

History: This cemetery has formerly been known as the California Creek Cemetery. According to the booklet “Pioneers of Peace, August 2-8 Diamond Jubilee Anniversary, Blaine, Washington 1884-1959”

“The Methodists built their church in 1871 on the south bank of California Creek on land that is now the California Creek Cemetery. James Rucker donated the land for the church and cemetery.”

Now known as the Hillsdale Cemetery Association, a Voluntary unincorporated Associated.

On September 1, 1926, the First M.E. Church of Blaine deeded to the trustees of Hillsdale Cemetery Association, approximately 2 acres for cemetery and church purposes.

The grantors, O.K. Middleton, J.A. Martin, Noble McClurg, Geo Kerr, W.J. Burton, C.W. Campbell and Fred W. Dahlen, as Trustees of the First M.E. Church of Blaine, for the consideration of one ($1.00) dollar, and other valuable considerations to them in hand paid, convey and quit-claim to F.W. Fosberg, Francis Holtzheimer, A.J. White, Grace Allen, Thomas Allen, Henry Logan, Otto Vogt and Grover Vogt, as Trustees of HILLSDALE CEMETERY ASSOCIATION, a voluntary unincorporated association, the following described real estate situation in Whatcom County, Washington, to-wit:

Beginning at the point on the section line between sections 17 and 18, township 40 north, range 1 east, where the same intersects the meander line on the south shore of California Creek; thence south along said section line two hundred fifty feet to a slough; thence easterly along the north bank of said slough to the intersection of said slough with the meander line along the south shore of said California Creek, thence along said meander line to the point of beginning, containing about two acres. The premises hereby conveyed are so conveyed for cemetery and church purposes.

Signatures dated this twenty-fourth day of August, A.D. 1926

Trustees of the First M.E. Church of Blaine

An article by Ed Holtzheimer in the Conquering of the Wilderness edition of the Blaine Journal newspaper of 2 March 1906 says “…and the first schoolhouse erected upon the site of the present graveyard in the spring of 1872. A Methodist church was built in close proximity in the winter of 1872-1874…” Today only the cemetery remains. The first death recorded was in 1881. This cemetery is a community project and is self-supporting.

Cemetery stones read by Mrs. Marvin (Muriel) Larson, Mrs. Walter (Nellie) Rutsatz, Mr. and Mrs. Glenn Fleming, Mrs. Albert W. (Zelda) Stout and EHC.

Comments: Information was obtained from the cemetery headstones, supplemented by mortuary records, death certificates and newspapers.