That's My World -- Seattle the City

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I've shared different aspects of Seattle, where I have lived for the past several years, such as Pike's Market, the Seattle Public Library, and the Space Needle, but today I will share Seattle itself, some of it's history and some of the magnificent sights in this lovely city.


The City at Night

Seattle, the great capital of the Pacific Northwest, has had a tumultuous past, often by placing itself on the road to ruin by relying on a single industry and then rebounding gracefully with a typical Seattle resilience.


TIMBER! The Logging Industry and the Origins of Seattle
In the fall of 1851, two intrepid brothers, Arthur and David Denny, (and a handful of others who had migrated west during the Gold Rush), landed at Alki Point on the western edge of Elliot Bay. After spending a miserable winter they migrated to the eastern shores where they established the small settlement that would become Seattle—a name derived from the joint Chief of the two native tribes that inhabited the region.


The Seattle Water Front

The first major industry to grace the emerald shores of Elliot Bay was logging. From the time of the first colonial activities in 1851, the timber trade proved to be the primary source of growth in this small northwestern town. The combination of the safe bay and the proximity of lush and dense millennia-old coniferous forests made Seattle the perfect location and in 1852 Henry Yesler began construction on the first steam-powered mill in the Pacific Northwest.


The Library

Seattle quickly boomed, driven by the timber demands of an emerging shipbuilding industry in the area and massive San Francisco building projects kept money flowing into the town. Traditionally it was believed that the strip of land that Yesler was given by the settlers (and which is now occupied by Yesler Way) was the first "Skid Row" in America, named for the logs that were dragged down the hill to Yesler's mill. The abundance of alcohol, gambling and prostitution located around this center of the logging industry gave "Skid Row" its modern connotation. True or not, the tale as been part of Seattle myth for nearly a century.


Safeco Field

FIRE! The Great 1889 Seattle Fire
The abundance of timber, however, would prove disastrous for the fledgling town. On June 6th, 1889 a Seattle fire broke out. Since nearly every building was constructed of affordable, but flammable timber, the fire quickly spread, engulfing nearly the entire downtown including most of the wharves and crippling the port.


The Seattle Art Museum

While the fire was catastrophic, Seattle weathered the disaster and emerged stronger than before. The city was rebuilt in brick and stone and the massive rebuilding effort stimulated the economy providing thousands of new jobs and ensuring that the economic downturn which had affected much of the country in the last decade of the 19th century would not be felt as strongly in the Emerald City.


Seattle, the underground city.

The Seattle Underground is a network of underground passageways and basements in downtown Seattle, Washington, United States that was ground level at the city's origin in the mid-1800s. After the streets were elevated, these spaces eventually fell into disuse, but have become a tourist attraction in recent decades.

My son took me and my daughter on this tour and it was fascinating -- and a little spooky, but fun!


Sunset on Puget Sound

The Klondike Gold Rush
In August of 1896, gold was discovered in the Klondike region of Canada and the following year the steamship Portland docked in Seattle's reconstructed harbor with a famed "ton of gold" in its cargo hold. Seattle's temperate climate and location made it the obvious transportation and supply center for those heading to the frozen north in search of fortune.

While the cold climate and harsh conditions of the Klondike and Alaska ensured migrations were not nearly as extensive as they were to Oregon and California during its 1849 counterpart, the Klondike Gold Rush brought thousands of people to Seattle and flooded Seattle with reconstruction money.