Longview (WA)

(My theme is places I have visited or lived)

Lake Sacajawea Park, Longview, WA
(This is in the center of town, just off of downtown)

From 2003 until 2008 I worked in the mortgage field in Vancouver, WA. Our company had a policy that no new mortgage loan officer would attend a signing at Escrow without myself or my partner. We wanted to be there in case any problems developed. We hope by our experienced presence we could keep a loan from going "south."

In late 2004 one of our new loan officers had a signing at Chicago Title Company in Longview. We had lived in Washington since 1989, both in the Seattle-Tacoma area and the Vancouver-Portland area. We had never been to Longview. It lies 7 miles west off of Interstate 5. We traveled up and down the I5 corridor but never got off exit 36 to Longview.

I accompanied our new loan officer to Longview for the signing and when we drove through the city I immediately fell in love with it. The majority of Longview has beautiful tree lined streets, the gorgeous Lake Sacajawea Park, and an old town ambiance. I told my loan officer that I was going to move to Longview. I went home and told my wife we were going to move to Longview. She and I took a drive through the city and she agreed.

So, February 5th, 2005 we moved lock, stock, and barrel to Longview. We lived there for ten (10) years. We just moved back to Vancouver in April of 2015.

Longview is a city in Cowlitz County, Washington, United States. It is the principal city of the "Longview, Washington Metropolitan Statistical Area", which encompasses all of Cowlitz County. Longview's population was 36,648 at the time of the 2010 census and is the largest city in Cowlitz County. The city is located in southwestern Washington, at the junction of the Cowlitz and Columbia rivers. Longview shares a border with Kelso to the east, which is the county seat.

The Cowlitz Indian Tribe, a federally recognized tribe of Cowlitz people, is headquartered in Longview.^[5]

The Long-Bell Lumber Company, led by Robert A. Long, made the decision in 1918 to buy a great expanse of timberland in Cowlitz County. A total of 14,000 workers were needed to run the two large mills as well as lumber camps that were planned. The number of workers needed was more than a lumber town, or the nearest town, could provide. Long planned and built a complete city in 1921 that could support a population of up to 50,000 and provide labor for the mills as well as attracting other industries. Several buildings in the city were built from Long's private funds.^[6]