Jonathan L. Stout, the founder of Seaview, lived from 1820 until circa 1895.

My friend Faye Beaver (1884-1988) was proud of her forebears. She spoke highly of her great-grandparents, Philip and Margaret Gearhart, who came to Oregon in 1848, settled in the Clatsop Plains area, and took out land claims. These encompassed the entirety of today’s town of Gearhart, which was named after them.

Faye was also proud of her grandfather, Jonathan L. Stout, who homesteaded on 153.5 acres north of Ilwaco, platted it in 1881, and named it Seaview. There he built Stout’s Seaview House and promoted his resort to vacationers from the Portland area. And Faye was especially proud of her father Charles Beaver, who built the Shelburne Hotel and of her mother Inez Eugenia Stout Beaver, who ran the hotel while her contractor husband concentrated on the development of Seaview. But, in all the years I knew her, I never heard Faye mention her paternal grandmother, Annie Elizabeth Gearhart Stout.

Annie was born Oct. 23, 1840 in Henry County, Iowa. She came to Oregon in 1848 with her parents, the Gearharts. In February 1860 she married Jonathan Stout and presumably assisted him as he built Stout’s Seaview House. Things were going well for the couple until January 1887, when Jonathan abruptly filed for divorce and gave us a firsthand, personal look at Annie Stout:

She “…has treated plaintiff in so cruel a manner and has inflicted upon him such personal indignities as to render his life burdensome. That the defendant is of a violent temper and has frequently for years and within the last year passed in fits of anger and without cause, grossly insulted plaintiff and defendant when they were alone and in the presence of other people.”

Annie failed to answer Jonathan’s complaint and did not show up for the divorce hearing. She was found to be in default and the judge ruled that all of the allegations were true. But Annie was a force to be reckoned with. She was all about property rights and building fences and keeping people off of her land. Those she couldn’t fend off with her trusty shotgun, she took to court, making herself quite unpopular among the movers and shakers on the North Beach Peninsula, as our sand spit was (and is) officially known.

According to Michael Lemeshko in his book, “The Cantankerous Farmer vs. The Ilwaco Railway & Navigation Company and the rest of his neighbors on the Long Beach Peninsula,” Annie had a fiery temper, was quick to take offense, and the record shows she was capable of using physical force, as documented by her ex-husband Jonathan, and by Julia Ethel Briscoe’s account of Stout shooting at the Briscoes when they tried to cross her land.

At one point, Judge John Briscoe accused Stout of running a bawdy house and called her a prostitute. She sued him for defamation of character but lost on a technicality. In another court case, L.A. Loomis said that Annie had solicited him to go with her to commit the crime of adultery and went on to say that that she was plying her trade and vocation as a prostitute on the streets of Ilwaco.

No matter what one believes about Annie Stout, it is safe to say she did not bring out the best in her neighbors on the peninsula. And, whether or not their allegations were true, it is clear that Annie was a woman to be reckoned with.

I wonder if her granddaughter, the late Faye Beaver, knew about all her shenanigans. Knowing Faye and her independent spirit, I think she would have taken Annie’s side in some of the controversies that apparently raged back in the 1880s. And I certainly wish that Faye and Mike Lemeshko’s paths had crossed… But, when you come right down to it, isn’t that a big part of what history is (or isn’t) all about? Missed opportunities?