When Barry Martin first met Edith Macefield in 2006, neither would have predicted the close bond they would develop or the hours they’d end up spending together. They were a very unusual pair.
Barry was the foreman of the construction that was rising around Edith’s modest cottage in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood. Edith was the woman who became renowned for turning down a million-dollar offer from the developer that was building the project.
When the project began, Barry thought it would be a good idea to introduce himself to the elderly woman who refused to move. After all, Barry was building within four feet of her home.
“She was going to be a real close neighbor and I’ve learned over time that you want to keep your neighbors happy,” he said.
Edith had a reputation for being surly. She was also kind of a mystery. Earlier in her life, she was a writer. She claimed to have been a spy for Great Britain during World War II, and she said she played the saxophone with Benny Goodman. She said he was her cousin.
By the time she crossed paths with Barry, she was in her 80s. Barry and the construction workers would keep an eye on her. He says she would always feed the birds outside, here on the sidewalk.
“But if by 10 o’clock, there wasn't birdseed on the pavement I’d go knock on the door and yell through the mail slot just to make sure she’s not down on the floor and needed some help. Most of the time she’d yell back at me to leave her alone and go away. It’s like, 'Okay, just checking on ya.'"
One day, Edith started to let her guard down. She asked Barry to take her to her hair appointment.
“She didn’t feel comfortable driving that day and all this time I told her if she needed anything I’d help her so I had to say yes. And so I had a meeting that day but rescheduled the meeting so that I could take her to get her hair done and then I drove her over to Ballard and dropped her off, gave the hairdresser my phone number and she called me when she was about done and then I went back over and picked her up.”
After that, Edith started asking Barry to take her to her doctor’s appointments.
“You know, it started out as little, simple things,” said Barry.
Pretty soon, he was making her breakfast, lunch and dinner. He did her laundry. He scheduled her doctor’s appointments.
As they got to know each other, Edith and Barry found they had a lot on common. They were both no-nonsense and stubborn. But in many ways, they were also incredibly different.
“She read a lot of books; she did a lot of writing — short stories, some that she got published, children’s short stories," he remembers. "I myself never really finished a book, and she spoke six or seven different languages.”
As the development grew up around Edith’s small house, the new Seattle overshadowing the old, Barry’s commitment to Edith grew deeper. Edith didn’t want to end up in a nursing home. Barry promised her that under his watch, that wouldn’t happen.
Edith was 86 years old when she died at home in June of 2008. She had no family and left everything to Barry, including her little cottage shadowed on three sides by the large development. Barry eventually sold the house to the developer for $310,000.
Barry says the money helped him and his wife weather the Great Recession. Some of it went to paying his kids’ college loans.
“Edith was gone, but she was still taking care of me,” says Barry.
When asked if he loved Edith, Barry said, “I think so. Yeah, I mean, you don’t take care of somebody day in and day out and feed ‘em and help ‘em get dressed and do everything for them and not have those feelings for them.”
Barry has two framed pictures of Edith in his home. In one, taken a few years before she and Barry met, she is sitting with a cat. That photo is in Barry’s kitchen. The other photo is a portrait of Edith from when she was in her 20s. That one is in the den.
When Barry was going through Edith’s things after she died, he found an album signed by Benny Goodman. Barry said it read, “To my cousin Edith.”
