POULSBO — With each scrape and sand and brushstroke July 12 and 13, new life slowly emerged from the old building at 19010 Front St.

The 1909 building was originally the home of Liberty Bay Bank. In the ensuing years, it was the home of the North Kitsap Herald, a motorcycle dealership and, for 17 years, Gifts of Promise.

Now, as earth tones and deep blues replaced aged whites, grays and yellows, volunteers slowly transformed the 106-year-old structure into the Poulsbo Maritime Heritage Museum.

A soft opening is scheduled for Aug. 8, Poulsbo Historical Society president Jim Shields said.

The museum is significant on several counts. One, it revitalizes a heritage building. Two, it gives the historical society, which operates the Poulsbo Historical Museum in City Hall, a presence on Front Street. The Chamber of Commerce, which has offices on Highway 305, will share some space in the museum, giving it a downtown presence as well.

Three, it complements downtown’s evolution into a cultural district, a center of art galleries and live entertainment and culinary experiences. Four, it contributes to a revitalized landscape; behind the museum is the old city hall, which will be demolished for apartments and retail space.

Volunteers were busy-busy this week and there wasn’t room to spare, not for blueprints, anyway. “Here we are, working on the top of a trash can lid,” building designer Tom Henderson said as he looked for a place to show the design for the signage – it will resemble the transom of a Poulsbo boat. “We could move over to my executive tailgate,” David Shields quipped.

According to the designs (and the nocturnal blue paint Judy Driscoll, her granddaughter Elise Driscoll, and Sherry White were rolling onto the interior walls), the museum will be a beauty.

Chain link fencing will be replaced. Fencing along Front Street will be moved back to create an outdoor display area. The front of the building may feature a maritime-themed mural. (By the way, if you turn around you have a nice view of the bay, which seems fitting).

Inside, there will be themed maritime-related displays of artifacts and images: Early logging, codfish schooners, the oyster cannery, a replica of a net shed. The Suquamish Tribe is contributing an exhibit.

Nearby, there will be a large image from 1890 of Adolph Hostmark and family in a canoe in Liberty Bay, and a large archival image of Suquamish people in a canoe; they will be displayed with their bows facing each other in a manner representing the melding of two cultures — each dependent upon the bounty of the sea, and transportation upon the sea, for their livelihood.

The museum will also have an ADA-accessible restroom available for public use, courtesy of contributions from the Historic Downtown Poulsbo Association.

The museum project has generated a lot of public interest since it was approved by the historical society’s board in May, Driscoll said. “We’ve been really surprised.”

“Our maritime heritage cannot be ignored”

The maritime heritage museum site is a short walk from the waterfront, the Port of Poulsbo Marina and one of the last tidal grids in the Puget Sound region. Longship Marine, a destination marine supply store and exchange, is across the street. It will provide a main street presence for the historical society and the Chamber of Commerce, which will rent some space in the museum.

Like bookends, the maritime heritage museum will reside on the north end of downtown, the Poulsbo Marine Science Center the other end.

At the historical society meeting in May, in the City Hall council chambers, Jim Shields presented a slideshow that showed how life here has always been centered on the sea:

For millennia, Suquamish people fished and clammed here, and reserved in the 1855 treaty the right to continue to do so.

During the settlement era, timber companies set up floating logging camps on what was then Dogfish Bay, Shields said. The earliest residents of Poulsbo built a float in 1886 so a steamer could land here. The first docks were built in 1890. The University of Washington planted oyster beds here for commercial use in 1900. At the site of what is now Liberty Bay Marina, Shields’ grandfather established the Pacific Coast Codfish Company in 1911; here, salted cod brought in the holds of the company’s schooners from Alaska was canned and shipped until 1958.

For almost a century, most jobs to be had were centered on the sea: canning, fishing or logging.

“Our maritime heritage cannot be ignored,” Shields said.

In 2010, Shields and other members of the society set out to preserve that heritage. They restored a Pacific Coast Codfish Co. dory donated by the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle. Later, they restored a Poulsbo boat, designed and built by Ronald Young, who designed and built the boats from around 1930 through the ’60s in a downtown basement. The boats cruised at up to 7 knots, were relatively affordable, and were easy to trailer.

In 2012, the historical society voted to establish a maritime collection, and the collection quickly outgrew storage and display space.

Henderson said the former bank building is a good place for that collection; made of concrete, there is a lower fire risk.

Tom Driscoll checks a spot in an overhang while Jim Shields gets ready to finish painting a wall, July 13, at the soon-to-be Poulsbo Maritime Heritage Museum. Photo: Richard Walker / Herald