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Published in The Seattle Times online on July 3, 2025
and in Pacific NW Magazine of the printed Times on July 6, 2025
For 40 years, Wallingford’s critter column
has sensed the Animal Storm all around us
By Clay Eals
In a sense, it’s all about the senses.
In 1975, sculptor Ron Petty, then 36, moved to the hillside neighborhood north of Lake Union and took note of “the tremendous amount of wildlife here.” Ten years later, thanks to $30,000 contributed by Wallingford residents and businesses, he shaped life-size versions of more than 60 critters from 32 species clambering around and peeking out from a monumental column of bronze and aluminum.
To great fanfare, he installed the 16-foot tower on July 27, 1985, across from the old Food Giant at the southeast corner of Wallingford Avenue and 45th Street. He named it Animal Storm.
“It was just kind of like a storm cloud raining animals,” he reflects today, summoning another palpable fact of local life, what some call Seattle sunshine. In fact, on the pillar Petty even represented our legendary showers as narrow, rectangular bars slipping angularly between the creatures.
Rain or shine, the sculpture draws people who want to see, photograph and touch it close-up, especially kids. And at 11 a.m. Saturday, July 12, 2025, during the 2025 “Wild in Wallingford” parade, Petty’s first and best-loved major creation will get a 40th-anniversary salute. Amid drill teams and floats, inhabitants are encouraged to attend in animal garb.
That would please Petty, who relishes seeing newcomers and returnees examining the pole and finding its squirrels, birds, geese, slugs, bats, cats, fish (one is concave with eggs inside), raccoons, ducks and even a dog wearing a tiny peace-sign collar pendant. He delights in recalling a class of blind grade-schoolers who caressed and identified the critters.
Capping the pedestal is a pounce-ready feline modeled after the artist’s “Mama Cat” at the time. “When I was doing the drawings for the piece, the cat kept walking across the drawing table,” he says. “One of the final times I kicked the cat off, I told her if she stayed off the table, I’d put her on top of the sculpture. And I did.”
Circled by a base of engravings and a broad, curved bench and backed by courtyards of the landmarked Wallingford Center retail and service hub (formerly Interlake School, built in 1904-1908), Animal Storm quickly became the community’s most prominent visual and tactile showpiece.
Petty, also known for his similar but more somber 1988 memorial sculpture at Ballard’s Fishermen’s Terminal, remains grateful for the early faith that Wallingford placed in him to create an enduring tribute to the smaller breathing beings nearby us all.
It’s a profusion, he says. “We just don’t realize that until we actually look close to see what is here.”
WEB EXTRAS
Big thanks to Ron and Marjan Petty and especially Sarah Martin of Historic Wallingford for invaluable help with this installment!
The Historic Wallingford page on Animal Storm has lots of background information, photos, news clips and videos, including the filmed 1985 dedication ceremony, thanks to Sarah Martin.
To see Clay Eals‘ 360-degree video of the “Now” prospect and compare it with the “Then” photos, and to hear this column read aloud by Clay, check out our Seattle Now & Then 360 version of the column.
Below, you also will find 1 additional video, 9 additional photos and 4 historical clips from The Seattle Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer online archive (available via Seattle Public Library), Newspapers.com, Washington Digital Newspapers and other sources that were helpful in the preparation of this column.
