The Collins Building is important as one of the few authentic links to Everett's industrial past. In part because of the frequency of fires in the lumber and shingle business, few examples of industrial warehouses remain.

Coupled with the everchanging nature of port property, the Collins Building has become valuable because of its uniqueness. What was once commonplace is now rare.

General History
Everett's history is that of an industrial boomtown. It sprang to life in 1892 on word that J.J. Hill was to bring the main line of the Great Northern Railroad over the cascade Mountains and down into Everett, which sat at the mouth of the Snohomish River at Port Gardner Bay. Tapping into the seemingly endless supply of raw materials found in this new frontier, Eastern and Midwestern capitalists came to build and invest in shipyards, smelters, ironwork and mining. But it was lumber: the industries of saw mills, shingles, pulp and paper that was to make Everett Prosperous. Migrating laborers followed opportunity and by 1910, Everett's population had grown to 32,000,up from 8000 in 1900.

By 1910, there were 95 manufacturing plants, most of them built on the Snohomish river or Port Gardner Bay (Bayside), and most of them lumber-related. The railroads, moving freight and passengers, wrapped the peninsula and were built on land, but on Bayside, west of the rail lines, industrial buildings rested on a conglomeration of pilings and piers. Rail spurs, roods and walkways connected the mainland to the  docks, warehouses and mills. Sawdust burners belched cinders and glowed orange by night.
Smoke stacks were vertical landmarks, earning Everett its distinction as the City of Smokestacks. Log booms floated everywhere, corralled and tied to piers, waiting to be fed into saw blades and turned into exportable products.

Everett's lumber industry rode an economic roller coaster at the mercy of supply and demand, triggered by external factors such as the earthquake and fires of San Francisco (1906), the opening of the Panama Canal (1914), and World War I. Local factors also played a role, such as labor strikes, social turmoil, and mill fires, which over time burned nearly every mill to the ground.

The Hulbert Family Connection
The Hulbert family - father Ansel, mother Lucinda, and two year old William Marion - came from Kansas to Washington in 1875 and became ranchers outside of Snohomish. Ansel eventually moved into the logging business and became one of the first members of the forest  commission. He also began acquiring
real estate in Everett.

Ansel and his son William Marion Hulbert entered into partnership and their lumber business grew, but without a mil of their own. The 1900 Polk Directory lists Ansel as a resident or Everett. The 1901/02 Polk lists the Hulbert Lumber Company in the American national Bank Building on Hewitt and Colby Ave. William Marion is listed in the Polk as president-secretary. Ansel died in 1906. In 1916, son William Hulbert bought the controlling interest in the Fred K. Baker Lumber Co. on Bayside, eventually expanding and and reorganizing into the 31 acre mill that was a landmark at Norton Avenue, Foot of Tenthl (Norton Avenue was renamed West Marine View Drive in 1982.) William Marion Hulbert Died in 1919, and his son, William Glen Hulbert, took over the business, running it until his retirement in 1956, when his son William, Jr. took the helm until his death in 1986.
His children dissolved the corporation in 1988.

Uses of the Collins Building
What is now called the Collins Building at 1210 W. Marine View Drive is first noted in the City's Polk directories in 1925 as the North Coast casket Co. Oral history from 38-year old Betty Resseguie states that North Coast Casket was built by Hulbert Lumber just south  of their mill in order to use up scrap and end material from the mill. Fred Marion Hulbert (William Glen's brother) managed North Coast Casket until 1932.

The building housed variously named casket businesses from 1925 until 1996. It became known as the Collins Building probably because the Collins casket Company was it's largest and longest-running business: 1932 to 1996. Changes in ownership and company names are noted throughout the building's history, but its main use was casket manufacturing.

North Coast Casket originally made only casket shells. A tram ran from the Hulbert Mills to North Coast, supplying lumber to the casket shop. The finishing work (interiors and linings) was initially done offsite, probably at Sound Casket on Baker St. in Riverside.

North Coast Casket changed names and owners in 1944 to become Cascade Casket Co., still making only shells. Cascade was operated by Edwin C. Dams (previously a shipping manager at North coast) and Theo Johnson. This was a small  operation having perhaps only a dozen employees.

Meanwhile, in 1932, Collins Casket Company was  formed by Rasmus M. Collins, former  superintendent of North Coast Casket. Collins Casket performed the finishing work for casket interiors. This business was on the second floor
of the Collins Building. The third floor was storage of moldings and trim material.

The children of Rasmus M. Collins - Rasmus C., Johanna and Russell - ran Collins Casket thru the `1950's. In 1962, there was a brief merger between Sound Casket and Collins Casket.

Hulbert Lumber bought Cascade Casket from eddie Dams when he retired and later, around 1976, the Collins Casket Co was liquidated as well and bought by Hulbert Lumber. Most recently, Michael Keys bought the Collins Casket business and ran it until 1996, when the business was closed permanently. In 1991, the Hulbert family sold the property and building to the Port of Everett.

Serendipity?
It can be argued that there is an element of luck that the Collins Building is still with us. Fire played an enormous role in what did and did not remain on Everett's industrial waterfront during those boom days.

Take August 3, 1956, for example. A four-alarm fire started in the planer mill at Hulbert Lumber, destroying that building, a large storage building and eight kilns which were loaded with lumber. The heat from the fire was so intense that the nearby railroad tracks buckled, the sprinklers at the mill burst and the office of the adjoining Jamison Lumber was consumed by flames in less than five minutes. Other waterfront businesses were threatened. Flames shot high enough into the air that even residences on the bluff were in peril. It took four hours to contain the blaze. Half of Hulbert Lumber was destroyed, but the Collins Building was spared.