Eugene Augustus Prince (1930 July 31 – 2007 October 13) was a Whitman County wheat farmer who ran his family farm his whole life. In 1974 he married Patricia Mae “Patsy” Kuehner (1933-2019). Outside of farming season, he began working as a bill clerk in Olympia in 1959 before seeking office and being elected to the state House in 1980, and then to the state Senate in 1992 after 12 years in office. He resigned from that seat in 1995 and served in appointed state roles until 2005.
Prince’s lifetime farm, located just east of Sunset, WA, had been acquired by his great-grandfather Nathaniel Josiah Prince (1820-1883) in 1880, and it was declared a Washington Centennial Farm (owned by the same family for over 100 years) in 1980. The farm was sold by the family in 2015, though as one of Burdette’s nephews retained some of the land, part of it remains a Centennial Farm as of 2026.
Circa 1950-1954, Eugene Prince’s father, Burdett Herron Prince (1905-1994), transferred the Sunset area farm to his sons and acquired land in Idaho, running southwest from Lake Waha to the Snake River. Over 11,000 acres of that land, the Prince Ranch, was sold to the state circa 1977-1979.
The collection primarily consists of legal and financial records and other documents relating to the Prince farm, owned by that family since being acquired by Nathaniel Prince in 1880, located east of Sunset, WA. It also includes records from the Prince Ranch, owned by Burdett Prince circa 1950 to the late 1970s.
Included in the collection are records relating to Eugene Prince, who farmed the land his whole life and also served as a Washington state legislator from 1980-1995 (Series 1). The lives of his parents, Burdett H. Prince (1905-1994) and Lula M. Henning (1908-1986), and grandparents, Henry A. Prince (1868-1909)and Martha “Mattie” Herron (1875-1964), are also documented (Series 2).
The collection is effectively broken into two series. In each series the materials have been broken out by subject, and those are foldered alphabetically.
This collection is open and available for research use.
Copyright restrictions may apply.
[Item description]
Eugene Prince Family Papers, 1875-2015 (Cage 984)
Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections, Washington State University Libraries, Pullman, WA.
Most of the historical items in this collection came from a trunk owned by Mattie Heerron.
This collection was received from Suzanne Hansen of Henderson, NV on September 1, 2026, and it was processed that month without an accession number. Suzanne is the daughter of Eugene Prince.
University Archivist Mark O’English processed this collection in September of 2026.
A better-quality copy of the History of Sunset (WA) School District 126, 1976
This collection is indexed under the following headings in the online catalog. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons, or places should search the catalog using these headings.