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Building History

Architect Ellsworth Storey (1879-1960) designed this rustic clubhouse with half-timbering for the local lumbermen's association who wanted a place to fraternize during the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition. It also showcased lumber products for the group. After the AYPE, the Hoo-Hoo Club became a rustic faculty club, serving in this capacity for fifty years. Portions of the old club--some paneling, oriental rugs, and fireplace andirons-- were transferred to the new club. A few furniture pieces originally made for the Hoo Hoo House have been preserved by the School of Environmental and Forest Sciences at the University of Washington.

The lumberman's service organization for whom this clubhouse was built was also known as the "International Concatenated Order of Hoo-Hoo, Incorporated." The Hoo Hoos began in the South, its first chapter organized in 1892 by members of the Arkansas Yellow Pine Manufacturer's Association in Gurdon, AR. Begun by lumbermen, it spread into the Pacific Northwest in the later 1890s and early 1900s, as the nation focused its industrial might on cutting the region's great timber reserves. The use of the word "concatenated" suggested the closeness and relatedness of members and was also a pun, including the word "cat," the symbol of the club. Like many fraternal organizations of the period, the Hoo Hoos offered their members benefits of joining a collective, such as insurance and burial cost coverage, but this group appears to have a light-hearted, mischievous side not always shared with other, more secretive and serious fraternal groups. Many of the Hoo Hoo leadership titles were derived from Lewis Carroll's fanciful "The Hunting of the Snark." Fraternal organizations had tremendous popularity during the 19th century and early 20th in the US, serving various functions; some began as charities, mutual benefit societies, professional networking groups, and others served as simply outlets for fun and comradery. The Hoos Hoos specialized in high jinx.

Building Notes

Demolition

The House of Hoo Hoo was razed in 1959, to make way for a new faculty club designed by Paul Hayden Kirk and Victor Steinbrueck on its site the following year.

PCAD id: 3653