Read the second half of the first chapter in The Seattle Times’ Sunday magazine:

“Love At Low Tide: We’re Still Digging Those Delicious Razor Clams,” The Seattle Times (Pacific Magazine).  http://www.seattletimes.com/pacific-nw-magazine/love-at-low-tide-were-still-digging-those-delicious-razor-clams/

or read this short excerpt about Ocean Shores’ Stolen Razor Clam Sculpture.

A hundred-mile drive north of Long Beach, WA is the city of Ocean Shores. Like Long Beach it is a classic razor-clamming destination. It too has a razor clam festival and at one time an iconic razor clam sculpture as well. Ocean Shores sprang into existence in 1960 as a planned community offering the recreational fruits of the region: fishing, hunting, golfing, beachcombing and of course razor clamming. The developers bought a cattle ranch perched by the ocean and Grays Harbor, then platted it into 12,000 tightly packed lots, scraping and dredging the sand, salt marsh, forest and accreted tideland in a way that could never be allowed today.

In the mid-1960s, model and coastal resident Teri Lee Mcdougall posed next to a wood razor clam sculpture, an icon of Ocean Shores. Not long thereafter the sculpture was stolen and never returned. Courtesy Aberdeen Museum of History.

Ocean Shores lots sold quickly thanks to aggressive marketing that sold a vision of paradise for ordinary working class folks. An eight-foot-tall razor clam sculpture stood in front of the Executive Villa sales office carved from a hunk of wood. It was well-proportioned and faithfully captured the razor clam’s shape and appearance including even growth rings on the shell. New property owners would sometimes pose for pictures clutching title papers…

One dark night in December 1971 Ocean Shore’s massive razor clam sculpture disappeared. A city crew, suitably lubricated for the holiday season, used heavy equipment to nab the sculpture and bury it somewhere nearby, or so the leading speculation goes. Maybe the pranksters wanted to return the clam to its rightful home in the sand. The local newspaper joked that a future archeologist might uncover the clam and wonder, “ ‘what did these people worship – razor clams?’ And he won’t be far off.”

Everybody expected the sculpture to be returned quickly, but it never was. As late as 2009, forty years on, a city councilman expressed hope it would come back so it could be placed at the center of soon-to-be-built roundabout. But it has not reappeared. No one has ever confessed. The whodunit remains unsolved.

By the 1970s developers were feuding, financial shenanigans caused scandals and out-of-state investors moved in. More fragile land was platted, and Ocean Shores grew with seaside motels, eateries and a convention center, and razor clamming continued apace.