Albert Filmore
1851, Maine — February 13, 1919, Seldovia, Alaska
ALBERT FILMORE was born in Maine in 1851. His father was born in Massachusetts and mother in Nova Scotia, but there were a great many Filmores in the US who descend from that Nova Scotia line.
It has to yet to be determined how he came to be known as “Captain Filmore” by the time he came to live in Seldovia, Alaska just after the turn of the 20th century. In the 1910 US Census, he was living here as single farmer. At some point he filed on a government homestead, consisting of 160 acres of land in Sections 31 and 32, Township 8 South, Range 14 West, S. M. Alaska, which came to include a portion of the townsite of Seldovia, as well as tracts of lands later claimed by Joe Jones and Richard Morris (see story below).
Seldovia was first surveyed as a town site in 1927, when five tracts were identified that included both sides of Seldovia Slough including the little peninsula protecting the mouth of the slough, a small parcel on the shore between the slough and the ROC school (USS 371, TractC), and a tract encompassing all three ROC tracts as well as six groups of Native houses. In between Seldovia Slough and the ROC school tract federal surveyor Fred Dahlquist marked the “Fillmore Homestead,” a claim by Captain Albert Fillmore.
Why did the name suddenly become Fulmor instead of Fillmore? Many people think it was just a spelling mistake, and it may have been, but the mistake probably happened earlier in the family.
When he died on February 13, 1919, the terms of Albert Filmore’s will bequeathed the homestead tract to a cousin, Bertha Fulmor, living in Humboldt, California. His estate was probated in Alaska, and the final decree was rendered July 3, 1932.
Bertha Fulmor made final proof in the United States Land Office July 23, 1930, on 91.86 acres of the original homestead, relinquishing a claim of title to Lots 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 of Section 31, which included a portion of the townsite of Seldovia. Her title to the balance of the 160-acre homestead, comprising 91.86 acres of land, was confirmed by the United States Land Office. There’s actually an oft-cited California court case “Hayter vs. Fulmor”, that describes how Bertha tried to get W.R. Hayter, to go from California to Seldovia to sell her property in 1940. She didn’t tell him that she had relinquished claim to those lots and insisted he must sell them before selling the larger parcel. When he arrived in Seldovia and found that others claimed ownership to those lots and she still refused to alter the terms of his contract, he sued her for damages for fraud and won $2106. In 1949. Bertha Fulmor then sold much of her land to Frank Raby, who by then owned H.S. Young Mercantile Co. after he married H.S.’s widow, Winifred. In 1935 Frank gave the land for the cemetery. Men volunteered to cut trees and brush, fence the area and put up the front gate, pillars and signs.
Part of the original homestead, “Cap’s Hill” was later razed during the Urban Renewal project following the 1964 earthquake. The US Army Corps of Engineers and its contractors razed the structures in the intertidal zone and filled it with material blasted from Cap’s Hill and the Fulmore Homestead.
Susan Springer describes an incident that took place in 1909: “….. Filmore was having a party and the liquor was flowing freely Two guests, Captain Andrew Johnson and a man named Duffy, fell to arguing and then exchanged blows, Captain Johnson apparently the aggressor. Duffy pulled a knife and stabbed Johnson twice; once in the chest and once in the right shoulder. There was no physician in Seldovia so Miss Van Vranken, the sanitation nurse, was summoned. She dressed the wounds and sewed them up and was credited with saving Johnson’s life. By the time a team of Seward lawmen reached Seldovia, over a month had passed. Now it was revealed that the knife wielding guest was not Duffy, but an elderly gentleman named Mr. Markle. Because Capt. Johnson was identified as the aggressor, attacking Markle without provocation, no charges were filed in the case. This certainly differed from the original story and it was becoming evident that Seldovia needed its own law enforcement official” (p. 180-181)
Capt. Filmore was also interested in gardening. In 1902 he was quoted in the Report on the US Dept. of Agriculture’s annual report: “ I have given some of the seeds to the natives to plant and I will show them how to plant them. Some of them had very good gardens last year and this year they will have even more and better gardens as they have received more and better seeds.”
When water lines were excavated at the base of a hill above the power plant, Cap’s grave was found and reburied in about the same place. There doesn’t seem to be any kind of marker there.
Cap’s Hill being blasted during Urban Renewal Project after 1964 Earthquake