Clear Creek/Dyes Inlet history

In 1841, Captain Wilkes sailed through a narrow channel from Puget Sound into a large bay roughly dividing the geographical area eventually to be Kitsap county in half. He named the bay Dyes Inlet, after his ship taxidermist. But, long before Capt. Wilkes and Mr. Dyes, the Suquamish Indians named the bay Sa'qad (tsock-od) .In 1886, legend has it that shortly after moving tothis area, Mrs. Hannah Schold, one of the first non-natives to settle in Clear Creek/Silverdale area, looked at the stream outside her home after a nasty storm and remarked with surprise how clear the stream was. Hannah named the stream running through the fertile valley Clear Creek. But, long before Mrs. Schold, the Suquamish Indians named the stream Sa'qad.

The name Sa’qad was the native Suquamish word used to refer to the area the barn/Interpretive center sits on. The word, meaning ‘to spear it’ was used to refer to the mouth of the creek, the estuary, and the very north end of Dyes Inlet.

In 1950 Kirk Best built the little barn at the mouth of Clear Creek, from recycled materials--surplus from nearby army barracks and barn boards and poles from an even older barn on the property at the head of Dyes Inlet. The barn sat sentinel on the estuary named by the Best family as Tides End, while Harriet and Kirk raised their family and kept their farm until selling to Carlton and Betty Smith in 1960. The Smith family lived on the property raising their family, for 30 years before donating the barn and surrounding property to the Kitsap Land Trust (now the Great Peninsula Conservancy), thus preserving the estuary, the barn and providing impetus to the start of the Clear Creek Trail system. Two generations of Silverdale youth have fond memories of playing in and around the Best, and then later Smith, barn.

In 1995, after years of disuse and neglect the Clear Creek Task Force began the long process and tremendous task of restoring and renovating the nearly 50 year old barn into a small environmental/historical/native heritage interpretive center.

With tens of thousands of dollars in in-kind materials, professional services and donated labor, after seven years later the Clear Creek/Sa’qad Interpretive Center stands ready to receive visitors, families, students, young and old. (more to follow)