Person:Leonard Zanol (1)

part of the Orondo Project

Waterville Empire Press 10 Aug 1922 ACCIDENT AT ORONDO - a rather serious accident occurred at Orondo last Friday evening. Francis Alexander, driving a Ford coupe, was passing the Orondo store when a man started across the road, then started back, and again started across, and was struck by the car throwing him out of the road. He was a young man 22 years old, by the name of Zanol. He was rushed to Wenatchee where a medical examination proved that outside of a few bruises, he was not injured. The bumper on the car no doubt saved him from being run over by throwing him to one side [I am guessing by his age that this might have been Leonard Zanol?] [Confirmation that this article refers to Leonard Zanol, entered here by his son Bill Zanol, from family oral history. Leonard later suffered from bone spurs on his spine, attributed to this accident.]

Bill Zanol adds the following: Leonard and his four siblings spoke several languages in their youth on the family homestead in Brewster. Their mother (Louise Thomas Dalvit Zanol, born in Rouen, France) spoke only French, and their father (Raimondo Zanol, aka Raymondo, born in Capriana, Italy) spoke a Trentino Italian dialect, German, and English. The Zanol children created their own family dialect by mixing all of these tongues with some Native American vocabulary they learned from classmates at the summer cathecism school they attended at St. Mary's Catholic mission on the Omak Reservation. The family moved from Brewster to Wenatchee after the death of mother Louise in 1920, and later to Orondo. Leonard married Margaret Whitbeck in 1922. Together they purchased a five-acre pear/apple orchard in Orondo from the Brunkel (sp?) family in approx. 1924. Additional acreage was cleared in 1946 and 1948 and 1952, expanding that orchard to 20 acres. In 1947, they purchased another five acres of orchard in part of the Fisher homestead orchard tract, later adding two more blocks of five acres each: lots 1, 2, and 3 in Block 2, comprising 15 acres in total. Zanol brand peaches from these orchards became well known for the quality of their pack and well-regarded in the Seattle wholesale fruit business, and Associated Grocers would even advertise them by name. In 1964, Leonard retired from orcharding and sold the farm to his son, Bill. Leonard lived with his wife Margaret in the house he built in 1940 on his orchard, until his death in 1975.

1.   Cemetery Record - Orondo Cemetery.