PHOTO BY MEGHAN ERKKINEN

LONG-TIME FIFE RESIDENT ELMER “BILL” KELLEY TURNED 100 MARCH 5. Kelley drilled some of the city’s first wells and operated a gas station along Pacific Highway. He and a friend founded Fife Sand and Gravel in 1958.

Long-time Fife resident turns 100 years old

By Meghan Erkkinen

Elmer “Bill” Kelley remembers a Fife that was only farmland, filled with vegetables and berries. He remembers the city before Interstate 5 came in, and before the Port of Tacoma became an economic engine. He remembers driving to Tacoma at night with no lights during World War II blackouts.

Kelley, one of Fife’s oldest residents, got a little bit older March 5.

At his birthday celebration at the Linden Grove Health Care Center in Puyallup, where he now resides, Kelley points to the tablecloth, which reads, “Aged to Perfection.”

“That’s me,” he says with a smile, only a minute after sneaking a taste of frosting from his cake.

Even at 100 years old, Kelley has a sense of humor.

“It’s better than being 101,” he said of his age.

Kelley was born in Tacoma on March 5, 1908, and was the fourth of five siblings. According to his son, Mike, Bill Kelley always claims he would have been older if only his father hadn’t been so bashful.

Kelley met his wife, Alma, in the early 1930s. They married in 1932, and a couple years later, they moved to Fife and bought a house along Highway 99.

“It was just so many acres of garden,” he said. “Everything there was farms.”

Kelley worked for Northern Pacific Railroad as a service foreman during World War II. After his retirement from the railroad in 1952, he operated Kelley’s Shell service station, next to the Red Pig Café. In 1952, he and his friend, Clete Vining, purchased 30 acres of land along what is now Freeman Road and founded Fife Sand and Gravel.

He spent a lot of time drilling and repairing wells for the residents of Fife – some of the city’s first wells were drilled by Kelley.

“There probably aren’t too many old-timers in Fife that didn’t have a well driven by him,” said his daughter Linda Senger.

And whether it was drilling wells or helping his daughter build a miniature covered wagon for a school project, Kelley loved working on projects.

“He was real handy doing things like that,” said Sharon Watkins, his daughter. “He was always on call for the people of Fife to fix their wells.”

Kelley also enjoyed building and repairing equipment. He made a tractor to plow his garden and a trailer, in which he traveled with his family on a vacation to California.

“He was successful at just about everything he did,” said Kelley’s son Mike, a former Fife mayor, who took over his father’s business in 1973. “He was always around when needed. He helped just about anybody out.”

And he worked hard.

“I can remember he was still pushing gravel around when he was 90 with his bulldozer,” Senger said. “He always was a hard worker. Work was like his middle name.”

More than anything else, though, Kelley’s friends and family attest to his wit and his charm.

“He still has a sense of humor. He still likes to tell his stories and his little jokes,” Watkins said.

Michelle Sayre, the activity director at Linden Grove, has known Kelley for about two and a half years. While she said he spends much of his time by himself, reading or playing solitaire, he can also be the life of the party.

“He’s a hoot. He always has the funniest things to say,” Sayre said. “He always asks for moonshine whenever we ask him what kind of juice he wants.”

Kelley’s lifelong friends and neighbors, Ellen and Joe Gotchy, have fond memories.

“He’d always come over on Christmas to see what the kids got,” Ellen Gotchy said. “I think he enjoyed it as much as the kids did.”

Joe Gotchy was 19 years behind Kelley in school.

“He’s a real swell guy,” Joe Gotchy said. “He’s as honest as the day is long.”

After Kelley’s wife died in 1992, he moved to Mill Ridge Village in Milton. About two years ago, he moved to Linden Grove.

Kelley has three children, eight grandchildren, 11 great-grandchildren and one foster granddaughter.

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