(click to enlarge photos)



WE INTERRUPT THIS FEATURE WITH A LOOK AROUND THE CORNER & NORTHEAST TO THE INTERSECTION OF JEFFERSON STREET & THIRD AVENUE. THE CITY HALL – AKA KATTZENJAMMBER CASTLE – IS ON THE RIGHT, AND THE YESLER HOME – (a domestic castle with 27 rooms) – ON THE LEFT.
The reader will easily note that with few exceptions the featured photo’s line-up of Seattle Police on the north side (left) of Yesler Way, between Second and Third Avenues, are looking east at the long parade float that is either crossing Yesler Way or standing in its intersection with Third Avenue. The rooftop banner that runs the length of the float names the sponsor, the “National Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.” The flip side for at least one of the four MOHAI prints covering this Independence Day scene, holds a type-written sticker that reads “taken July 4, 1898, before the Spanish American War veterans returned. Picture made in front of police headquarters.” A hand-written addition to the sticker reads “3rd and Yesler,” and the gray-blue back of the print itself concludes the captioning with “Called ‘Electric Float’ Taken by W.T. Milholland.”

The inscribed date, 1898, is very inviting. The Independence Day weekend that year included the sensational news that America’s revenge for the February 15th unexplained sinking of the USS Battleship Main – “Remember the Maine!!!” – in the Havana harbor was at hand. On the third of July, with the American navy in pursuit, the Spanish Caribbean fleet fled the Santiago, Cuba harbor. In the days that followed the Spanish dreadnaughts that were not destroyed, surrendered. Certainly this waxing war news was on the minds of nearly every one among the estimated 75,000 citizens and visitors that crowded downtown Seattle on the 4th for 1898. One year later this patriotic party was remembered by The Times reporter covering the 1899 Independence Day festivities as “the biggest celebration that the city ever had.” However, and almost certainly, this Yesler Way scene was not part of that record-setting event. The caption was incorrect by one year. The float named “Electric” won second place in the 1899 – not 1898 – parade competition.

In The Times 3 O’clock Edition for July 5, 1899, [SEE ABOVE] the float is described as a “dynamo in full operation.” The electricity was generated by steam from a boiler flaunted on the float. It powered a “call system of the Postal Telegraph Company, a phonograph and a telephone” and was also wired to a printing press carried on the Metropolitan Printing and Binding Company float was next in line. On the far-right end of the float a tower of steam shoots from its roof. Most likely the hissing noise of escaping steam also attracted the attentive white-gloved police.

Independence Day for 1899 was a wet one, and many outdoor events were either canceled or avoided. The fireworks, however, were not expunged but rather admired for their reflections off the low clouds. In the featured historical photo, the gray sky offers little contrast with the scene’s two famous towers, both of them serving for part of their careers, as King County Court Houses. In 1890, the top-heady tower on the First Hill horizon, replaced the frame one rising far left on Third Avenue. With King County moved up the hill, its abandoned home at Third Avenue and Jefferson Street served as Seattle’s City Hall from 1890 to 1909, and was famously nicknamed the Katzenjammer Kastle for its Rube Goldberg collection of additions, which included the police department.

Below: ANOTHER TIMELY INTERRUPTION with PALMISTRY from in-with-and-under the Late-19th Century (the clip is from July 5, 1898) and its claim to have broken or penetrated the barriers between the PAST, PRESENT and FUTURE and so ALSO of or between NOW and THEN, or if your prefer THEN and NOW. (Note that scheduled sittings with a “reader” are required.)

WEB EXTRAS

Anything to add, boyos? Yes Jean the kids on the block have a few past features to adjoin. Some of these will be like growing chestnuts to some of the reders. (Note: a careful or curious eye will find blog contributor Ron Edge posing in one of them, but only after clicking) May we ask that the mother of all learning is what? May our mothers answer, “REPETITION.”)
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THEN AND NOW : LOWER YESLER WAY

