They keep a business office on Mount Baker Highway, and enjoy their family that reaches through more than a dozen great-grandchildren. They spend part of the year in Arizona, where Jerry still builds roads. “Most people come here to golf,” he said. “I go to work. I wasn’t looking for a job, but they found me.” Bakerview/Irongate provides a huge benefit to Whatcom County, Lurline said. “Companies have started there, creating employment for local families. Established businesses moved there to expand. It’s given small business owners opportunity to locate with infrastructure, utilities, roads, and close to Bellingham. It’s given our area an opportunity to grow. If the property were acquired today, I’m not sure it would happen (the same way).”
Dan Griffin builds a staircase at A-1 Welding in Irongate.
REGULATORY BUMPS IN THE ROAD Stricter governmental regulatory involvement makes it harder, in Jerry Hammer’s view. “It was so easy back then. Government worked with us, instead of fighting us,” he said. “In later years, you had to jump tall buildings in a single bound. It wasn’t that way back then; it was a pleasure to work with them. “Things could be easier today if people cooperated, with less monkey business regulating everything.” The area’s diverse industrial activity includes cabinet making, bathtub manufacturing, warehousing, makers of stainless steel appliances for commercial kitchens, equipment repair, and a maker of float coats and other survival gear that contracts with national defense. There’s also businesses of coffee roasting and drivethroughs, growing and distributing and selling of recreational marijuana, printing, scientific testing, automotive repair, sales, and tire and battery companies, lumber, building, construction, and much more – from large (home of the Whatcom Transit Authority, Whatcom Humane Society kennels, UPS, etc.) to quite small. “It’s an excellent place for small business,” Lurline Hammer said. “In the late-‘70s to mid-80s, there was no other place to go. Howard (Hammer) had that vision, and so did the others, to create a place for companies that didn’t fit into zoning.” Jerry Hammer said, “It was a lot of fun. We are proud to have been a big part of making it happen.”
“Things could be easier today if people cooperated, with less monkey business regulating everything.” — Jerry Hammer, early developer
Peggy J. Hinton, owner of Strider Construction, in her office in Strider Industrial Park.
Location, size, and boundaries? When anyone around Whatcom County says Irongate, they mean one of three entities: Irongate Industrial Park, Bakerview Industrial Park, or Irongate Neighborhood. Irongate Neighborhood was created in 2010, after various annexations (including the 640-acre Bakerview-Hannegan area in 1998), increased the size of north-end neighborhoods. Irongate Neighborhood comprises 900 acres, mostly zoned industrial, with a small slice of creek and pond zoned
as open public land. It lies east of Interstate 5 and north of Sunset Drive. The other two entities, created decades ago and developed over time, are contained within Irongate Neighborhood. Their names are interchangeable and often overlap. Generally, Bakerview Industrial Park refers to the eastern portion, and Irongate Industrial Park to the western. — Cheryl Stritzel Mccarthy WHATCOMBUSINESSALLIANCE.COM | 27