Mushroom Corner is a neighborhood within Thurston County, Washington, United States located in Lacey and the Lacey Urban Growth Area. The community takes its name from the long history of growing mushrooms in the area - most recently, the Ostrom Mushroom Farm which bought a farm from Green Giant in the 1967 and moved their business to the area. Source. Interestingly, the intersection has been known as "Mushroom Corner" for as far back as 1937, where it can be seen clearly labeled as such on the official USGS Topological survey maps of the region. One such map. I'm digging into this a little to see what the true origin of the name is, since it seems to be misattributed to Ostrom's pretty much everywhere. Maybe I'll write an article with what I find for one of the local community papers!
EDIT: I reached out to the city of Lacey and the Curator of the Lacey Museum provided a much more in depth history -
William Riley Ritchie, Sr. (1876-1970) started the mushroom farm in 1933 with the name Ritchie Mushroom farm. (Although one newspaper article says that it was called Olympia Mushroom Farm, it wasn’t named that until later.) There was a bunch of contentious wrangling with the stockholders, leading to the sale of it in 1937 to Grocery Products Manufacturing aka Grocery Store Products. It operated until 1940 and then laid dormant until 1945.
The mushroom farm was purchased by Michigan Mushroom Co. in 1945 and was locally known as Olympia Mushroom Farms. Green Giant bought out Michigan Mushroom in April 1961. Ostrom’s purchased the farm in September 1967 from Green Giant.
They also provided this archive of old newspaper articles. historic mushroom farm articles
Ostrom's operated here until 2018 when they moved their business to the Yakima area. While the loss of local jobs and industry was a disappointment to some, this was met with joy from the homeowners in the area, as the mass of manure needed to grow mushrooms gave the area a distinctive aroma. News article. News clip with a brief history of Ostrom's in Lacey
Between 2018 and 2023 the farm sat abandoned, but in the summer of 2023 a 12-year-old girl who attended the neighboring Nisqually Middle School snuck into the abandoned mushroom farm with two other students and started a 2-alarm fire in the main building, smoking out the city and causing a big stir. News article.
Shortly afterwards it was announced the farm was sold to a developer for a new housing development. Locals remain split on this plan - while the abandoned facilities remain an eyesore and a magnet for itinerant individuals, nearly 200 new single family homes will almost certainly cause a major impact to traffic and road conditions. Article on the development plans.
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This cache was 3d printed by the generous folks at the Tumwater Timberland Library, who provide limited prints to the public for free. It was painted and assembled by yours truly.
To access this cache, you'll probably want to park at the RAC. Soon the new parking lot will be open so the access should be a little easier. There's also many bus stops nearby to provide easy access.
Although wooded this spot sees some traffic, so although tucked away, it may go missing. Let me know if so and I'll wander over and replace as needed!
FTF Dananna369!