Archives West Finding Aid

In 1906, Annie Edmunds Wiestling of Seattle, WA acquired the East half of Section 26, Township 6 North, Range 28 East, in the Horse Heaven Hills of Benton County, Washington. With her husband, Frank Wiestling, she managed the land from their home in Seattle. The majority of the time, their half section was leased to the Coffin Sheep Company, which owned all of the surrounding land.

Following their deaths, the land passed to their children, Annette Wiestling Platt, Francesca Wiestling Anderson, and Dorothy Wiestling Wattleworth. By 1951, only Annette Platt maintained interest in keeping the land, and subsequently bought her sisters' shares of the property. She continued a close relationship with the Stanley H. Coffin, both business and personal, throughout his life, and continued the relationship with his son, Stanley H. Coffin II, while managing the land from her homes in Seattle and, later, Portland.

The correspondence in the collection shows that Annette Platt was always considering selling the land, looking for prospective buyers and keeping up to date on the plans to irrigate the Horse Heaven Hills, which would drastically increase the land's value. Eventually she found a buyer through the help of Stanley Coffin II, and sold the land in 1976.