Arthur Yelverton Seely
Personal
Gender: Male
Date of Birth: 1860
Date of Death: February 3, 1944
Birth Place: Port Medway, Nova Scotia
Death Place: Blaine, WA
Arthur Yelverton Seely
OLD-TIME BLAINE RESIDENT AND BUILDER PASSES
Arthur Y. Seeley, a resident of Blaine for the past fifty-four years passed away in a Bellingham hospital last Thursday night after an illness of but a few days. Funeral services were held from the McKinney Chapel Monday afternoon with Rev. Geo. Fisher officiating. Cremation followed.
Arthur Yelverton Seely was born at Port Medway, Nova Scotia, in 1860, and came to Blaine in 1892 where he joined his brother in the grocery business, having a store on Martin street at that time. Later he built the brick block where Goff’s dry goods store now stands, and conducted a dry goods and grocery business there for many years, selling out to P.F. Fuller.
He then went into the canning machinery business, manufacturing various machines, notably the can lacquering machine which was used in practically all canneries in this country and in many other parts of the world. Machines have been shipped to over thirty different counties in the past years.
Two other machines which Mr. Seely developed and which are used among canners and packers, are a can washing machine and an automatic weighing machine.
He has always had a great faith in the future of Blaine, often declaring that we have one of the most beautiful natural harbors in the world right here, and he always hoped industry would return to Blaine and make it the busy town it used to be. In past years Mr. Seely was interested with his brother in the crab canning business and various other activities. He built the Drayton hotel that, in its heyday, was one of the most used hotels north of Seattle, having a very fine restaurant in connection with the hotel.
Of late he had been trying to repair and re-furnish the apartments in his brick building on H street, believing that business in that line was picking up.
His familiar figure on the street and in the stores will be missed by many. He leaves to mourn his passing, his wife, Rose, to whom he was married November 21, 1928, and a son Gilbert, aged 15 years.
Published in the Blaine Journal, February 1944
Seeley/Seely as published
[Son of SGS # 3652 – Arthur Yelverton; Edwin Collins (# 3652); Caleb (#1650); Ebenezer, Ebenezer, Ebenezer, Jonas; Obadiah]
