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Seattle Now & Then: The Waldorf Apartments

jrsherrard

(click to enlarge photos)

THEN: Encouraged by the rapid growth of Seattle’s business and retail districts to the north, the Waldorf, then the biggest apartment house in town, was raised on the northeast corner of Pike Street and 7th Avenue in 1906-7. (Courtesy, Museum of History and Industry)
NOW: Beginning in the Great Depression of the 1930s, the “upper Pike” neighborhood of hotels and apartment buildings grew increasingly blue and seedy. The Waldorf endured until 9:05 a.m. on May 30, 1999 when it was imploded.

The impressive speed with which the Waldorf Apartments were topped-off at seven stories was explained in the Times for August 19, 1906. “The building has been put up in record time…for the past few weeks work has been carried on day and night. The carpenters who have prepared the framework for the concrete have worked in the daytime and the concrete men have done their part at night by electric light. When completed the Waldorf will be the largest apartment house in the city and the equal in all respects of any similar building in the country. It will be ready for occupancy about Nov. 1” Not quite.

The Waldorf Building Co. started soliciting reservations for its units late in October.  (see above)  The units had much to offer, including “first class janitor service,” night-and-day elevator service, and a laundry for tenants in the basement. The promotions warned that “satisfactory references (were) required.” Through the fall of 1906 the company almost routinely announced delays, until a few days before Christmas when it reported that the Waldorf was at last “ready for occupancy.” The formal opening, however, waited until the following March 27.

A clip from The Seattle Times for Nov. 25, 1906.

Diana James, author of Shared Walls, a history of early Seattle apartment buildings, pulled from her research a novelty connected with the Waldorf construction. “Each of the apartments is to be equipped with a peculiar device, an idea of Mr. Ryan (the Waldorf’s architect), for house cleaning, so arranged that any occupant of any apartment, by the simple attachment of a short rubber hose, can clean the apartment with compressed air in a few minutes’ time, driving all dust to the basement and eliminating the necessity of sweeping. This is a feature that so far as known has never been installed in any other similar building ever constructed.”

The Waldorf’s presentation in the booming publication “Prosperous Washington.”

Perhaps because of its bay windows, I’d always imagined that the Waldorf was an oversized frame construction. I did not look closely. Rather it was not wood but concrete, and the attentive press was pleased to report, “absolutely fireproof.” The International Fireproof Construction Company was the builder. U. Grant Fay, superintendent of the construction, was, like the hotel’s status-conscious name, yet another gift from New York City. The Times announced his spring of 1906 arrival while piling on more prestige with news that Fay had been “superintendent of construction of the Hotel St. Regis of New York City, said to be the finest hotel in the world.”

The namesake, sort of, or swank symbol made flesh with an expatriate who is branded above as a “tuft hunter,” which – if you look it up – is one “that  seeks association with persons of title or high social status: snob.”  In exchange William Waldorf Astor had his millions and his hotel.  In 1890 with the death of his father, William Waldorf Astor became “the richest man in America.”  Also that year he began construction on his namesake hotel, after which  his cousin, John Jacob “Jack” Astor IV, built the adjoining Astoria Hotel in 1897.  Together they made the euphonious sounding Waldorf-Astoria, and misleading.   The cousins were rivals and not  in harmony.   Jack’s mother Lena acted as the guardian angel  of New York Society, and was in part responsible for William Waldorf’s flight to the old world with his new wealth, wife and five children. 

In the early stages of construction, the Waldorf was wrapped in class by the local media. As an example, on February 25, 1906, the Times included an architect’s sketch of the Waldorf among five illustrations for a full-page feature titled “Seattle, The Beautiful Metropolis.”

From the Seattle Times for Feb. 25, 1906. – CLICK CLICK to enlarge.
The Waldorf remodeled its lobby in the midst of the Great Depression. This splotchy pulp print was featured in The Times for Nov. 24, 1935.
The Waldorf, lower-right, with some of its neighbors in, it seems, the 193Os.  The frame home, bottom-center and just left of the Waldorf, is featured in one of the now-then’s below – the second one from the top.. 

WEB EXTRAS

Anything to add, kids?  Thru the years Jean we have touched these surrounds and with Ron Edge’s help we will follow our custom and feature a few of them.   As is also, by now, our habit, there will be repeats.   You may treat these as pavlovian opportunities or as annoying stumps in the road and jump beyond any of these web extras while coughing and/or grumbling.

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The Waldorf polished near its end.

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