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Seattle Now & Then: Lutherans on the Move

Published on May 11, 2013 in Seattle Now and Then. 0 Comments

(click to enlarge photos)

THEN: Built in 1888-89 at the northeast corner of Fourth Avenue and Pine Street, the then named Norwegian-Danish Evangelical Lutheran Church marked the southeast corner of Denny Hill. Eventually the lower land to the east of the church (here behind it) would be filled, in part, with hill dirt scraped and eroded from North Seattle lots to the north and west of this corner. (Courtesy, Denny Park Lutheran Church)

NOW: Looking northeast from 4th and Pine may we imagine the somewhat Gothic qualities of Westlake Center’s front door a fitting repeat for the Lutheran church that 125 years earlier first distinguished this corner with its grand steeple?

On April 28 Denny Park Lutheran Church celebrated its 125^th Anniversary. Thru the years the parish has changed its name and affiliations a few times while building four sanctuaries on four different corners. All were sited near the business district – at the expanding northern end of it.

As an example, this, the first of the congregation’s homes, was built quickly at the northeast corner of Pine and 4^th on a lot that cost $2,000 in 1888 and was sold for $19,000 a dozen years later. The congregation then soon moved seven blocks north to Fifth and Wall and built again on a cheaper lot. These adept economics were typical of many congregations sitting with their churches on Seattle lots made increasingly valuable during those most booming years of the city’s growth.

Looking south over Third Avenue from Denny Hill ca. 1885. The first Lutheran parish in Seattle, the Swedish Lutheran Church, still bottom-left near the northeast corner of Third Avenue and Pike Street. Note territorial university on Denny Knoll and behind it and to the left the first part of Providence Hospital at the southeast corner of 5th and Spring.

Looking south over Third Avenue from Denny Hill ca. 1885. The first Lutheran parish in Seattle, the Swedish Lutheran Church, rests bottom-left near the northeast corner of Third Avenue and Pike Street. Note the territorial university on Denny Knoll and behind it and to the left the first part of Providence Hospital at the southeast corner of 5th and Spring. On the horizon some of the first growth forest still holds on Beacon Hill. [Near the bottom of this week's offering in the fourth subject up from the bottom, the same small frame church is seen ca. 1909 in a photo taken from an upper floor or roof of the Washington Hotel. The white church has dimmed considerably. The Swedes have long since moved on.]

Named the Norwegian-Danish Evangelical Lutheran Church by its 16 founding members in 1888, services were first held nearby in the Swedish Lutheran Church and when ready in the basement of this their own first sanctuary. To build such a stately tower must have required the charitable labor of at least a few skilled Scandinavian carpenters. By 1890 there were twenty churches within six blocks of these Lutherans at 4^th and Pine, and seven of these twenty were identified by their attachment to Sweden, Norway, and/or Denmark. And the Scandinavian migration to Puget Sound picked-up in the 1890s when thousands more moved here, for nearly everything was like the old country: the fish, the trees, the dirt, the snow-capped peaks but without a state religion.

The second sanctuary also on the doomed Denny Hill.

The Lutheran’s second sanctuary also on the doomed Denny Hill.

Leaving this southeast slope of Denny Hill in 1904, the new parish – with less tower but more pews – was still located on the doomed Denny Hill. Then five years later the second sanctuary was razed with the hill and these Lutherans were forced to build sanctuary number three. Erected at Boren and Virginia, it was the congregation’s home from 1912 to 1939 when they moved again, this time to Eighth and John. The parish then changed its name to Denny Park Lutheran Church identifying with the “green pastures” of its neighbor, the city’s oldest public park.

News of Norwegian Lutheran’s 50th Anniversary printed on the religion page for the Nov. 26, 1938 Seattle Times.

WEB EXTRAS

Anything to add, Paul? Mostly photos Jean, although we will start with another feature, one that looks east on Pine Street from near 2nd Avenue in the early 1890s. It includes our Lutherans at the northeast corner of 4th and Pine, the Methodist Protestants at the southeast corner of 3rd and Pine. The feature first appeared in Pacific on March 2, 1986, and is almost entirely about the Methodists – bless them.

Looking east on Pine, ca. 1892, from near Second Avenue.

METHODIST PROTESTANTS at 3^rd and PINE, ca. 1892

(First appeared in Pacific, March 2, 1986)

The first two churches in Seattle were both Methodist. One was Methodist Episcopalian and the other Methodist Protestant. Long before any Methodists settled in Seattle, their denomination split over how much power to give bishops.

In 1865, when the Methodist Protestants of Seattle built their church, the primary difference between it and the earlier Methodist Episcopal sanctuary was not doctrine but color. The first church was white and the new MP sanctuary was painted brown. From then on they were known simply as the white and brown churches.

Here the “Brown Church” has lightened up, with the third “permanent” home for the congregation. The original brown colored church at the northwest corner of Second Avenue and Madison Street was replaced in 1883 with an enlarged sanctuary. Its new stone veneer skin, however, did not save it from the “Great Fire” of 1889. This is the parish that the congregation, after worshiping for a year in tents, built in 1890 at the southeast corner of Pine Street and Third Avenue.

Clark Davis became pastor in 1885. He bought the lot and built this church for about $40,000. Next door he raised a comfortable parsonage for himself, his wife Cleo and their two sons. The Gothic Revival sanctuary could seat 1,000 and often did. Clark was ambitious and in 1896, after resigning his pastorate, he went for and won the jobs of registrar at the University of Washington and secretary to its Board of Regents.

Regrade work on Pine Street looking northeast into the front “hump” of Denny Hill with the hotel still on top. Note the tower for the fire station far right.

The Pine Street Regrade (1903-06) lowered this comer 10 feet and converted the church basement into its first floor. With regrades on Third Avenue and Denny Hill coming at them, the parishioners sold their comer for $100,000 and moved in 1906 to a new stone church on Capitol Hill. As soon as the Methodists moved out, the Third Avenue Theater moved in.

Dated 1904, the stereo looks south on Third Avenue from the Washington Hotel (built as the Denny Hotel). Note the fire station at the northeast corner of Pine and Third across Pine from the Methodists. Note also the one-block long counterbalance trolley either climbing the hill from Pine to the hotel’s front portico or the opposite.

Pine Street Regrade looking west from 4th Avenue ca. 1906. The Lutherans are behind the photographer off-frame to the right. The north facade of the Methodist-Protestant church stands on the left.

Pine Street Regrade looking west from 4th Avenue ca. 1906. Fire Station No. 2 is on the left. The Lutherans are behind the photographer off-frame to the right. The north facade of the Methodist-Protestant church stands on the left.

A detail from the 1890s Sanborn real estate map includes the Norwegian Danish parish, the Methodists, the fire station and North School, one of the earliest of school structures and pictured below.

A detail from the 1890s Sanborn real estate map includes the Norwegian Danish parish, the Methodists, the Fire Station No. 2 and next to the station the Pine Street School, one of the earliest of the community’s school structures and pictured below.

The Pine Street School, aka North School, on the north side of Pine between Third and Fourth Avenues.

With the steeple of the new Norwegian Danish Lutheran sanctuary on the left, and construction still on the Methodist Protestant Church, on the right, this F. Jay Haynes photo looks southeast from Denny Hill to First Hill. Note the greenbelt of the university campus at the scene's center. The green reaches north as far as Union Street, the border there of the original campus.

With the steeple of the new Norwegian Danish Lutheran sanctuary on the left, and construction still in progress on the Methodist Protestant Church, on the right, this F. Jay Haynes photo looks southeast from Denny Hill to First Hill. Note the greenbelt of the university campus at the scene’s center. The green reaches north as far as Union Street, the border there of the original campus.

The Lutherans here hold the bottom-center of another recording of First Hill, or part of it, from Denny Hill. The barren or exposed patch is at one of hill’s steepest points, the intersection of University Street and 9th Avenue. Today Horizon House sits to the left of that patch and above it.

Looking northwest from First Hill back towards Denny Hill with the Washington Hotel (first named the Denny Hotel) on top and a hazy Magnolia peninsula above it. Such a pan is, of course, well appointed with landmarks, and these include the Norwegian Danish Lutherans at 4th and Pine, although sans steeple. The spire has been removed. The Methodist Protestants are more easily found – the Gothic south facade is fairly obvious below the hotel and to the left. To find the Lutherans go to the right about 1/5th the width of the pan – or the one block between Third and Fourth Aves. on Pine St. Near the bottom of this feature is a triad of looks north on 4th from Pike that also shows the top-less Lutherans – a detail of them – as the temporary home for an undertaker. (A Reminder: DOUBLE-CLICK this pan for the full enlargement – at least it takes two clicks on my MAC to see it all.)

Looking northeast at Denny Hill from First Hill. The Norwegian Danish Lutherans at the northeast corner of 4th and Pine appear here, from the rear, on the left. These Lutherans are sometimes mistaken for Baptists – the Swedish Baptists – that are nearby at the northeast corner of Olive and 5th Ave., and with their own slender steeple. They – or it – appear here on the far right. North on 4th or up the hill from the Lutherans much of the hill is yet to be developed with the row houses that are included in the next photo below.

These row houses on the west side of Fourth Ave. south of Stewart Street nearly match another row build earlier on 2nd Avenue south of Stewart. Like the hill they were short-lived, razed with the hill. (Courtesy Louise Lovely)

These row houses on the west side of Fourth Ave., south of Stewart Street nearly match another row built earlier on 2nd Avenue also south of Stewart. Like the hotel they were short-lived, razed with the hill. (Courtesy Louise Lovely)

A few years before the Lutherans, looking south on 4th Ave. from between Stewart and Virginia Streets ca. 1886. This steep ascent is still evident in the two subjects that follow, which look thru the same blocks in the opposite direction, north from Pike Street, and about 20 years later.

Looking north up both the new Westlake Ave, at the center, and the old 4th Ave. still climbing Denny Hill on the left. The cross-street is Pike. Here, as in the recording that follows, the front of the Norwegian-Danish Lutheran parish can be seen to the left of the flatiron Plaza Hotel on the left. [We have visited this intersection, and Westlake too, many times and readers may wish to do a key word search for either or both.]

NEXT we will ZOOM-IN on another look up 4th Ave from about the same time as the above classic. Both are from the Webster and Stevens Collection kept at the Museum of History and Industry.

Click TWICE to ENLARGE or wait for the increased sizes of the next two subjects. The old spire-less Lutherans to the rear of the Plaza Hotel, across Pine Street, are home here and briefly, for brother Joseph P. and Ambrose A. Collins Undertaking Parlor. You can read some of their signs painted to the side of the still not so old church.

Click TWICE to ENLARGE or wait for the increased sizes of the next two subjects. The old spire-less Lutherans to the rear of the Plaza Hotel, and across Pine Street, are briefly home here for brothers Joseph P. and Ambrose A. Collins’ Undertaking Parlor. You can read some of their signs painted to the side of the still not so old church.

The COLLINS BROS sign is seen, in part, right of center. Further up and north on 4th Ave, a three story apartment building – or rooming house – with open balconies facing 4th Ave. sits at the northeast corner of 4th Ave. and Steward Street. This structure appears as well in the subject printed first below this one.

The shadow of Denny Hotel (aka Washington Hotel) darkens the bottom-right corner of this A. Curtis shot that looks east from Denny Hill to Capitol Hill. The structure noted in the 4th Ave. subject printed above this, appears here center-bottom at the northeast corner of 4th and Stewart. Four blocks to the west on Stewart, the bright white west facade of the Swedish Lutheran Church (Gesthemane Lutheran) shines from the southeast corner of 8th and Stewart. The climb east from 7th Ave. is considerably steeper than it is now and since Stewart was regrade through this block and its neighboring blocks too. At the bottom-right corner, Olive Way originates at 4th Ave. The steepless first home of St. Marks Episcopal is squeezed onto this flatiron block with the parsonage behind it. The slender steeple of the Swedish Baptist Church ascends above the Episopalians. It sits are the northeast corner of Olive and 5th and so will be cut-through/eliminated with the creation Westlake Ave. in 1906.

The shadow of Denny Hotel (aka Washington Hotel) darkens the bottom-left corner of this A. Curtis shot that looks east from Denny Hill to Capitol Hill. The structure noted in the 4th Ave. subject printed above this scene, appears here center-bottom at the northeast corner of 4th and Stewart. Five blocks to the west on Stewart, the bright white west facade of the Swedish Lutheran Church (Gethsemane Lutheran) shines from the southeast corner of 9th and Stewart. The climb east from 8th Ave. (home for Greyhound) is considerably steeper than it is now. Stewart was regraded through this block and its neighboring blocks too. At the bottom-right corner, Olive Way originates at 4th Ave. The steepel-less first home of St. Marks Episcopal is squeezed onto this flatiron block with the parsonage to this side of it. The slender steeple of the Swedish Baptist Church ascends above the Episcopalians. It sits at the northeast corner of Olive and 5th and so will be cut-through/eliminated with the creation Westlake Ave. in 1906. Work on the Seattle High School (Broadway Hi.) is reaching its top stories in 1900-1901, on the right horizon.

To earlier views looking east from the top of Denny Hill - for comparing to Curtis' ca. 1901 subject above it. Notes the Swedish Baptists at 5th and Olive appear in both, as does Seattle Electric on the south side of Olive and as far as Pine Street. They ran the trollies.

To earlier views looking east from the top of Denny Hill – included for comparisons to Curtis’ ca. 1901 subject above it. Note that the Swedish Baptists at 5th and Olive appear in both, as does Seattle Electric on the south side of Olive and as far as Pine Street. They ran the trollies.

The razing of the Methodist Protestant church ca. 1909. The congregation has moved to its new home on Capitol Hill’s 16th Ave. This church at the southeast corner of Pine and 3rd was last used by the 3rd Ave. Theatre, which was forced from its stage(s) at the northeast corner of Madison and Third with the 1906-7 regrade of Third Ave. Although the same regrade reached this intersection it did not destroy the church. Instead a new main floor at the old basement level was added, and that change is witnessed here by the brighter coloring of the hall’s west and south facades at the sidewalk/street level. The brightness is dappled by what are certainly also colorful advertising broadsides. Above the church/theatre the top floors are being added to architect Van Siclen’s Seaboard Building at the northeast corner of Pike and 4th Ave. St. James Cathedral, still with its dome, is on the horizon. St. James was dedicated in 1907. The King County Courthouse is also on the horizon, but far right at 7th and Terrace.

The flatiron Plaza Hotel is left-of-center, and to this side of it at the northeast corner of 4th and Pine is the new masonry structure that took the place of the Lutheran's church. This dates from ca. 1909 near the end of the Denny Regrade, or that part of it that smoothed the old hill neighborhood as far east as Fifth Avenue.

The flatiron Plaza Hotel is left-of-center, and to this side of it at the northeast corner of 4th and Pine is the new masonry structure that replaced the Lutheran’s church and the Collins brothers’ funeral home. This dates from ca. 1909 near the end of the Denny Regrade, or that part of it that smoothed the old hill neighborhood as far east as Fifth Avenue.

The same intersection of Pine and 4th – right-of-center – as that shown at street-level in the subject above this one. This was photographed from an upper floor (or roof) of the New Washington Hotel at 2nd and Stewart.

A parade heads south on 4th in the block between Olive Way and Pine Street on May 30, 1953. The Lutheran corner is – or was – on the far right. Behind it the Hotel Ritz was home for the Carpenters Union. Beyond that the Mayflower Hotel and the Times Square Building sit respectively on the south and north sides of Olive Way and still do. Note the once popular Great Northern goat sign down the way. Closer at mid-block is the once popular Ben Paris.

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A few more photos will be added tomorrow after breakfast. For now it is “climb the stairway to nighty-bears.”

Seattle Now & Then: Echo Lake Landmark

Published on May 4, 2013 in Seattle Now and Then. 0 Comments

(click to enlarge photos)

THEN: Three Echo Lake proprietors are signed in this ca. 1938 tax photo. On the right is Scotty’s hanging invitation to his Paradise. Eddie Erickson’s sign to his Echo Lake Camp appears, in part, far left. Between them is Aurora’s enduring landmark, Melby’s Echo Lake Tavern. (Courtesy Washington State Archive, Puget Sound Region.)

NOW: At 19508 Aurora Ave., Melby’s Tavern survives as Woody’s. It has kept the distinguished roofline but neither the many-paned windows nor any reminder of the lake.

If for your next road trip north to Everett across our rolling “North Plateau” you should choose Aurora – and we recommend it – keep an eye out for this by now cherished landmark. You will find it a few blocks south of the county line. If you pay attention, the two-story flatiron Echo Lake Tavern, will seem to be pointing it’s narrowest end at you just above and west of its namesake lake.

The Tavern on Jan 7, 1970 and another tax photo courtesy of the Washington State Archive.

A Seattle Times clip on Echo Lake opportunities from May 31, 1905

In the summer of 1905 construction on the Seattle-Everett approached what artful promoters called the Echo Lake Garden Tracks. For “$500 dollars, $50 dollars down and $10 a month” five acres parcels were plugged as “suitable for chicken duck and goose ranches.” Herman Butzke opened the Echo Lake Bathing Beach instead. Butzke had been admired as a singing bartender at Seattle’s famed “Billy the Mug” saloon. He was also a picture-framer, and finally before opening his resort, a plumber at the nearby Firlands Sanatorium. His first customers at the lake were nurses who paid a nickel to use his shelters for changing.

Herman Butzke’s Oct. 3, 1930 obit in the Seattle Times.

Click the Firland text below TWICE to enlarge.

The Firland feature first appeared in Pacific on Nov. 18, 1990.

This landmark tavern came later. After a new route for Aurora was graded here in the mid 1920s, Echo Lake resident Theodore Millan built the two-story roadhouse in 1928 on its triangular lot squeezed between the new Aurora and the old Echo Lake Pl. N. Here the latter leads to the canoes, tents and new beds of Scotty’s short-lived Paradise. With the uncorking of prohibition in late 1933, Millan rented his flatiron to Carl and Jane Melby, for their Tavern.

Vicki Stiles, the helpful and scholarly Executive Director of the Shoreline Historical Museum (nearby at 18501 Linden Ave. N.), had heard rumors that the florist Carl Melby had more than liked his booze during prohibition as well. The sleuthing Stiles discovered that Melby had been arrested at least three times transporting mostly illegal Canadian liquor. (We follow below with several Seattle Times clips on Melby’s career.) One night at Sunset beach near Anacortes he was chased into the Strait of Juan de Fuca up to his neck, collared and pulled ashore. In 1942 the then 56-year-old tavern owner was finally felled and also near Anacortes. While fishing off Sinclair Island, he was leveled by a heart attack. Considering Carl’s inclinations his death may have been mellowed by liquor – legal bonded liquor.

Seattle Times, Dec. 27, 1924 – “illegal search”?

Seattle Times, Jan 15, 1928

Seattle Times, Jan. 29, 1928.

Seattle Times March 1, 1928

Seattle Times, May 14, 1928

Seattle Times, March-13-1932

Seattle Times, March 21, 1932

Carl Melby hooks his mortality. Seattle Times Dec. 8, 1942

Twenty-one years before his death notice Carl gets his first "personal notice" in Seattle Times for April 7, 1921.

Twenty-one years before his death notice Carl gets his first “personal notice” in The Seattle Times for April 7, 1921.

Three years after his passing Melby’s popularity endures with his namesake tavern, which is busted for selling beer to minors. Seattle Times Oct. 8, 1945

Four members of the Aurora Commercial Club posing – twice. No date.

WEB EXTRAS

Anything to add, Paul? Yes, and starting with more Aurora by returning with the “Edge Patch” below to the extended feature we ran here on March 16 last, which was, I think, shortly before we started having consistent inconsistency from both our blog’s server and it program. So touch Signal Gas immediately below and repeat a variety of what are mostly early speedway views on Aurora.

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A Seattle Everett Interurban trestle at the north end of Echo Lake (Courtesy, Washington State Museum, Tacoma)

The "repeat" used in the 1985 Pacific reflecting on her studies at the U.W. then, perhaps on Northwest History. This crude copy was pulled from the Times clipping.

The “repeat” used in the 1985 Pacific. Genevieve McCoy reflecting on her studies at the U.W.. This crude copy was pulled from the Times clipping.

ECHO LAKE

(First appears in Pacific, July 7, 1985)

Almost half a century ago, it took a little over an hour to go from Seattle to Everett on the Interurban. The electric cars reached 60 mph on the straight stretches – an adventure still remembered by many. The Interurban stopped at North Park, Pershing, Foy, Richmond Highlands, A1derwood, Ronald – names still familiar. It also delivered passengers to several lakeside stations as well – including Martha, Silver, Ballinger, Bitter and Echo lakes. The name “Bitter” was misleading, however, because that lake was the spot for the decidedly sweet excitement of P1ayland, for many years the region’s largest amusement park. But few remember Echo Lake as it appears in this week’s historical setting.

Bitter Lake station beside Playland

The Giant Whirl at Playland

Playland's miniture train with the Giant Whirl beyond

Playland’s miniature train with the Giant Whirl beyond

Construction began on the Interurban in 1902, in Ballard. By 1905 it reached 14 miles out to Lake Ballinger, just beyond Echo Lake. The line prospered, at first not so much from paying customers as by hauling lumber and its byproducts and accessories. It’s a fair speculation that Fred Sander, the Interurban’s builder, hired Asahel Curtis to photograph this morning view of the new-looking pile trestle that spanned the swampy northeast comer of Echo Lake.

The Interurban at Alderwood Manor.

Sander soon sold out the streetcar company to Stone and Webster. By 1910 they completed the line to Everett and replaced Sander’s little passenger cars (like the one posing in the photo) with 10 long and plush air-conditioned common carriers. In 1912 the company also buried its Echo Lake wood trestle beneath a landfill.

The next year, 1913, Herman Butzke, his wife and daughter, Florence, moved into a two-room cabin they built at the southwest comer - or opposite shore from the Curtis photo – of Echo Lake. They were the third family to move to the lake, and Florence Butzke Erickson still lives there. [In 1985]

The Everett Interurban about to take on a bundle of newspapers at the Seattle terminal for both buses and trolleys. (Courtesy Warren Wing)

During the summer of 1917, nurses and doctors from the new and nearby Firland Sanatorium periodically escaped from their care for tubercular patients to swim in the clear waters of Echo Lake. With their help, Butzke built a few lakeside dressing rooms, and thereby began the half-century of the Echo Lake Bathing Beach. (It closed in 1966 for the construction of condos.)

The Seattle-Everett Interurban did not last so long, but When it did quit, it was one of the last of the nation’s rapid-transit systems to surrender to the new taste in transport: the car. The modern pathway for the auto was the Pacific Coast Highway – or, in town, Aurora Avenue. It, like the Interurban, also passed by Echo Lake, and in the late 1920s when it was being built, property lots about the lake were being pushed as the “highlight of Plateau Norte, the most beautiful and attractive homesite addition ever offered … A heavily traveled highway such as the new Seattle-Everett 100-foot boulevard is like a gold-bearing stream.”

The Everett Interurban crossing the Pacific Coast Highway aka Aurora Ave near N. 157th Street (unless I am fooled.) Courtesy Warren Wing

An alternative: the bus to Everett.

Within 30 years, this gold-bearing stream would be stripped of its glitter and give way to the freeway. Now [1985] Interstate 5 is in its third decade and looking, perhaps, for the relief of rapid transit. Much of the old Everett Interurban right-of-way is still intact: a grassy strip of power poles and little parks. It seems to be waiting for the Interurban.

A Standard Oil station near Echo Lake – another tax photo from the late 1930s. (Courtesy, Washington State Archive.)

Somewhere on the road to Everett from Seattle in 1913.

Seattle Now & Then: Hole off of Holgate

Published on April 27, 2013 in Seattle Now and Then. 0 Comments

(click to enlarge photos)

THEN: The work of filling the tidelands south of King Street began in 1853 with the chips from Yesler’s sawmill. Here in the neighborhood of 9th Ave. S. (Airport Way) and Holgate Street, the tideland reclaiming and street regrading continue 70 years later in 1923. (Courtesy, Municipal Archive)

NOW: Jean Sherrard stands snug to the freeway overpass on Holgate Street, named for the Seattle pioneer John C. Holgate who might have appreciated such a convenient ascent to his claim on Beacon Hill.

The “revelator” here is the hole on the right. From the guardrail on Holgate Street we get a somewhat rare look down into the old tideflats, or nearly so. A lot has already been dumped in that hole, but far from enough to yet fill it. In Jean’s “now” it is as high as Holgate and sturdy enough to support trucks. Buildings now stand on concrete foundations and not on driven pilings like those supporting, at the 1923 scene’s center, the 45 steam-heated rooms of the Holgate Hotel, and the Alaska Stables, far right.

Asahel Curtis (the more famous Edward’s younger brother) dated this negative May 22, 1923. It is one of Curtis’ many recordings of what was named the “Ninth Avenue Regrade.” (We will attach more of them below.) Ninth is now long since renamed Airport Way, and here at the end of Holgate, it can just be made out running north and south – left to right. On the far side of Ninth are joined-twin factories that were built like wharves early in the 20^th Century above the highest tides that then still reached Beacon Hill behind them. In Jean’s repeat the

surviving “inland piers” are partially outlined in white. As the Seattle Times advertisement printed above reports, its Feb. 12, 1905 edition – and many more – were printed from plates using Great Western Smelting and Refining Co.’s metal. The Seattle branch of Great Western was housed here, one door south of the Salvation Army’s Industrial Department, in these wharf-like sheds.

Above: Looking east across 9th Ave. S. with the north facade of the Great Western factory on the right. The photo is date 1923. A year later the Salvation Army’s Industrial Dept. has moved to 914 Virginia Street and 406 12th Ave. S.. Possibly the reclamation work on 9th Ave. S. had something to do with the moves.

Below: Like the subject above, this was also recorded on May 22, 1923 and includes on the right the south facade of the Great Western factory. The largest structure on the left – on the west side of 9th Ave. S. south of Holgate Street – is the Holgate Hotel. The two story darker box to the south of the Holgate is the Bon Apartment House.

Taken from the trestle that reached 9th Ave. S. from the Great Western factory and looking north with the Salvation Army on the right - but not dated. I suspect that the reclamation is already underway here and that the tidelands showing here are getting early flooding of salt water enriched with mud blasted further north from the sides of Beacon Hill.

This Curtis was taken from the trestle that reached 9th Ave. S. from the Great Western factory and looks north with the Salvation Army on the right. it is not dated although surely sometime in 1923. I suspect that the reclamation is already underway here and that the tidelands showing are getting an early flooding of salt water enriched with mud blasted further north from the sides of Beacon Hill.

Above: Entrance to the Bon Apartments, on the right. The sign above the Bon’s open front door reads, “The Bon Apartments, 1915 Holgate, furnished, housekeeping and sleeping rooms. $1.25 a night and up. Free gas and lights.”

Airport Way’s first incarnation was in the early 1890s as a 24-foot wide plank trestle called Grant Street. Approaching the business district at its north end Grant was given the grander name, “Seattle Boulevard.” For the most part, it ran a few feet off shore from the often-sodden Beach Road that was first surveyed in 1862 at the base of Beacon Hill. (In the winter travelers took to the hill.) The trestle was soon joined in 1892 by the Grant Street Electric Railway that reached its power plant in Georgetown and beyond that South Park too.

Already in 1919, the Alaskan Stables, far right, began running in The Times classifieds under “Livestock” its horses, harnesses and saddles for sale. By then the sounds of trolleys, trucks, and motorcars were readily heard on Seattle Boulevard. Here the great sliding door into the stables is closed above the hole that was once no doubt covered with the stable’s own timber trestle.

WEB EXTRAS

As you know, Paul, the blog has been plagued with server problems which recently seemed to grow exponentially. We have, however, made alternate plans which we hope to put in place over the next week. There may be some downtime, but it should be temporary and certainly shouldn’t be any worse that the interruptions we’ve already encountered. So onwards and upwards! Anything to add, Paul?

Yes Jean. First and directly below Ron Edge (of the sometimes Edge Clippings Service on this blog) has put up three links to other features from this tidelands neighborhood, or nearby it. They may be familiar for two have appeared here recently. But, again, we treat these now-then repeats as themselves repeatable - like musical themes used in different contexts. Following these pictures-as-buttons I’ll put up a few more Asahel Curtis photos take for this project of raising the tidelands to the level of the streets, here on 9th Ave. S. (aka Airport Way) and connecting streets like Holgate.

And then I’ll reread the text at the top and revisit my notes to see if there may be something in the latter that will add to the former.

[CLICK the PICTURES Below]

FOLLOWS more photos by Asahel Curtis – or his studio – of the public works on 9th Ave. S. in 1923.

Another look north on 9th Ave.S. on May 22, 1923. The trolley line on the right and the “wagon road” on the left, between them a pipeline that is most likely installed to help in this tidelands reclamation – giving 9th Ave. S. a platform of high and dry dirt rather than a trestle over tides. The Great Western factory at the Beacon Hill foot of Holgate Street is right-of-center.

ABOVE AND BELOW: Two by Curtis looking north on July 19, 1923 from, the captions explain, from the southeast corner of Henry’s Cook House.

Dated Nov. 27, 1923, and so later than the rest, the fill seems to be here mostly in place both west and east of the trolley tracks now bedded in dirt - it seems. The pipes on the left may have done the work - in part. Both the Great Western factory and the Holgate Hotel appear about two block north on 9th. As the caption indicates, this view looks north from Walker Street, or near it.

Dated Nov. 27, 1923, and so later than the rest, the fill seems to be here mostly in place both west and east of the trolley tracks now bedded in dirt. The pipes on the left may have done the work – in part. Both the Great Western factory and the Holgate Hotel appear about two block north on 9th. As the caption indicates, this view looks north from Walker Street, or near it.

The neighborhood around 9th Ave. S. and Holgate Street, to the east of 9th, from the 1912 Baist Real Estate Map. This is a fine confession of the errant grandeur of real estate maps. Holgate in 1912, of course, did not climb Beacon Hill as shown here. It still doesn’t, but requires a curve.

Holgate and the tidelands to the west of 9th, again or still in 1912.

A FEW THOUGHTS WHILE RE-READING MY NOTES for the FEATURE ABOVE

John C. Holgate

* John Holgate made the first potential settler’s footprint on future Seattle soil in 1850 when he visited that summer and built a lean-two somewhere near the future Pioneer Square – or Place. He explored the surrounds until October and then returned to Portland and beyond to promote Puget Sound to his family and look for a wife. When he returned the land he had chosen beside the Duwamish River and near its mouth had been taken in the interim and so Holgate substituted a claim on top of Beacon Hill and in line with his future namesake street. Holgate’s younger brother Milton also settled in Seattle, tragically. The teenager was one of two settlers who lost their lives during the Battle of Seattle on Jan 26, 1856.

* The Holgate Hotel, listed at 1901 9th Ave. S., was managed by John and Minnie Wildzumas, who lived in the hotel. In a 1917 classified ad is described as a workingman’s hotel with steam heated rooms, and restaurant “in connection.” The fees for this “modern” hotel were then $1.50 and up. The Holgate endured. A May 19,1960 classified lists it as “close to Boeing (with) reasonable, single, housekeeping rooms and parking.” The Holgate was put up for Public Auction on Dec. 1, 1968, listing “furnishings of 45 room hotel: Curved glass china cabinets, bookcase-secretary, bentwood chairs, brass beds, commodes, dressers, chests, gas and electric ranges, refrigerators, miscellaneous tables, chairs, wardrobes etc. Preview Sat. 11am to 4pm. United Auction Service, Bud Chapman., Auctioneer.”

* Great Western Smelting and Refining Co. came to Seattle in 1903, but not directly to this factory on 9th Ave. S., although nearby. The first factory was at First S. and Connecticut until a roof fire uprooted them. An adver. for March 3, 1912 puts them at 1924 9th Ae. S., The 1924 Polk Directory listing for Great Western makes note that the city directory was printed on metal GW metal. By 1928 the business has changed its name to Federate Metals Corp and continue to note that the printing of that year’s business directory was done with plates furnished by Federate.