The Grand Monarch

Published 9:00 am Saturday, March 9, 2002

Imagine having a kitchen stove that’s 68 years old and still going strong and looking great.

It is symbolic of most things built back in 1934, when manufacturers were interested in making a product with durability and long life, not with built-in obsolescence.

This stove proudly bears the name of Monarch, and it was an object of great interest and conversation when it arrived new on South Whidbey. Mildred Anderson of Langley, who lives in the Anderson homestead on Anderson Road, is still the proud owner.

She spends much of her time during the day in her warm comfortable kitchen either baking cookies, watching the birds at the window feeder, visiting with friends, or remembering. Glancing fondly towards her Monarch, she said, “I’ve used that stove since 1938 when Al and I were married and I moved into this house. I love that stove. I’ve used it every day for a very long time and I just hope I can continue to have it to use as long as I need it.”

The new Monarch was the talk of the town in Langley because it was not only beautiful, it was (and still is) different than most stoves. It is a combination stove — both wood and electric. On one side of the stove is a firebox with four heavy iron cooking plates over it. Next to them are four electric burner plates. The electric burners are the older types with curly wires in a spiral formation.

In the center of the stove is the oven, underneath the burners and next to the fire box. It can be heated with wood or by electricity. In 1934, this Monarch was tops in stove technology, but there weren’t many of them made.

“It has been a perfect stove for rural South Whidbey and for me,” Mildred said, “especially back when the winters were much colder and the power went out frequently, sometimes for over a week or more.”

The Andersons were farmers, as were most of the early residents of South Whidbey who bought land and built homes as settlers. Now, only a few trees from their large apple orchard still stand, and the barn and most of the outbuildings are gone. But the Monarch stove sits in the same corner of the kitchen where it was first placed, with the stovepipe going into the chimney that’s been there since the house was built in 1907.

The Anderson kitchen was the social gathering spot in and around Langley and South Whidbey for years, and Mildred was the consummate cookie baker and hostess.

“I don’t know how many years it was that I baked about 250 cookies a week, plus many pies,” Mildred said. “I’d make 10 or 12 pies at a time.”

She has lost count of the endless pots of coffee that were brewed on the stove, but she remembers the get-togethers with a broad smile.

“There would be 25 or 30 people, I would guess, during the morning and into the afternoon. One car would no sooner leave than another would drive up. It was a wonderful time, we had so much fun.”

Nowadays, it is the UPS driver who makes a point of stopping whenever he’s in the neighborhood, which seems to be frequently. At one time, all the road crews and power repair crews out working would take a mid-morning break at the Andersons. If they didn’t show up, Mildred would take them the cookies, pie, and hot coffee.

Old friends still come by almost daily of a morning for coffee and a few homemade cookies or a piece of pie. They see to it that the wood box always has a supply of split wood for the stove, and reminisce with Mildred about the past.

The Langley Woodmen cemetery is the next property up the road from the Andersons, and Mildred has many amusing stories about it. It has been there as long as she has.

“My husband Al and I dug more than one grave,” Mildred said. “There was one time when the man hired to be the grave digger was sick and so Al and I were asked to do it. We hurried over there in the morning to start digging for a noon burial. It was really hard work, what with the tree roots and, of course, always the rocks. We just had our shovels, no backhoes or anything like that. We managed to get it done just as the hearse and other cars started coming up the hill. We made a quick getaway back to our house and collapsed.”

Al and Mildred for a number of years operated the “Big Penny” grocery store in Langley, situated where Good Cheer is now.

“We were in competition with Vic Primavera at the Star Store and he didn’t like it much, but we stayed friends,” Mildred said. “It took a lot of my cookies to keep our customers happy. “

After the Andersons sold their store, Primavera asked Mildred to work at the Star Store.

“I worked there for many years, and for quite a few years I baked for him,” she said. “Customers expected it when they came in—to be able to have a cup of coffee and a bite of sweets. They usually had come quite a distance walking or driving an old car or truck over bad roads. Of course, we know the weather isn’t good a lot of the year either.”

Recently the electrical units in the Monarch’s oven burned out and the hunt began to find replacements. After much searching by Mildred’s daughter, Linda, the company who had bought out the name of Monarch years ago was discovered to be in business on the East Coast. They still had some of the parts for the old stoves.

Mildred laughed as she recounted the arrival of the parts.

“You should have seen the UPS man, he was so excited to be bringing the package, and he insisted on staying to see if they were the right units and would work. He was here for a quite a while and ate a lot of cookies.”

However, according to Mildred, the new electrical units are not the same. Though they fit, they get much hotter than the original ones.

“I have learned to set the oven at 275 degrees when I need 350 degrees so everything doesn’t burn, ” she said a bit impatiently. Meanwhile, she still uses the wood heat for much of her cooking plus warming the kitchen and house on chilly winter days.

“This stove has always been such a joy to cook on, day after day, meal after meal,” she said. “I’ve taken good care of it and kept it real clean. It is a hard stove to clean. My husband Al would always notice when I’d cleaned it and compliment me on it. I don’t have as much company now as I once did, but I wouldn’t know how to get along without my stove.”