In the early 1930s, Bill Bergstrom and Irving Lassen founded Bergstrom’s Sporting Goods store (in the Simenson Jeweler Building) on Fourth Avenue, where the Spider Monkey tattoo parlor is now. Here, Bergstrom and Lassen show off a brace of fish caught with tackle from their store. Irving Lassen is the dapper gentleman at the left. He later founded Lassen Electric (now in the Star Laundry building, see also Lassen House) and, at his death, endowed the Lassen Foundation for the benefit of the people of Thurston County.
Vibert Jeffers photograph, 1938, Susan Parish Collection, Southwest Regional Archives, AR20090812-ph005367
Text © Deborah Ross and The Olympian