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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1854 | 62 |
| 1858 | 29 |
| 1859 | 52 |
| 1860 | 27 |
| 1861 | 101 |
| 1862 | 87 |
| 1863 | 69 |
| 1864 | 32 |
| 1865 | 11 |
| 1871 | 11 |
| 1872 | 140 |
| 1876 | 812 |
| 1877 | 678 |
| 1878 | 526 |
| 1879 | 64 |
| 1880 | 180 |
| 1882 | 130 |
| 1883 | 911 |
| 1884 | 499 |
| 1885 | 838 |
| 1886 | 492 |
| 1887 | 484 |
| 1888 | 440 |
| 1889 | 1,324 |
| 1890 | 287 |
| 1891 | 1,115 |
| 1892 | 2,855 |
| 1893 | 2,829 |
| 1894 | 2,116 |
| 1895 | 1,830 |
| 1896 | 2 |
| 1897 | 62 |
| 1898 | 196 |
| 1899 | 446 |
| 1900 | 114 |
| 1902 | 34 |
| 1903 | 1,332 |
| 1904 | 1,126 |
| 1905 | 124 |
| 1907 | 53 |
| 1908 | 351 |
| 1909 | 1,545 |
| 1910 | 413 |
| 1911 | 160 |
| 1912 | 73 |
| 1914 | 261 |
| 1915 | 300 |
| 1916 | 545 |
| 1917 | 332 |
| 1918 | 45 |
| 1919 | 5 |
| 1920 | 1 |
| 1922 | 18 |
| 1923 | 185 |
| 1924 | 151 |
| 1925 | 64 |
| 1928 | 14 |
| 1929 | 19 |
2,231 stories
- The Contractor Who Left a Trail of Debt
After securing $1,500 in contract payments, a local builder vanished in a rowboat, leaving his creditors behind in the dust.
- Seattle Boarding House Ad Barred Chinese Workers in 1876
In 1876, a Seattle boarding house advertised that it would not employ Chinese cooks, a public exclusion that reflected rising anti-Asian sentiment and helped shape the city’s labor history.
- The Bigamist Who Beat the System: John Miller’s Shocking Acquittal
A notorious fraudster accused of stealing $10,000 from Leland Stanford’s Credit Mobilier pool walks free for lack of evidence, prompting a sarcastic editorial jab at Oregon Republicans.
- The Wooden Walls of Puget Sound
A survey of the booming fleet of vessels built in Washington Territory in 1877, and why the local economy was missing out on the profits of its own timber.
- The Captain's Final Voyage
A maritime tragedy in Seattle, as a hardened ship captain finds faith and a peaceful end following the sudden, harrowing loss of his wife.
- The Unstable Ground Beneath Tacoma
A historic landslide on the Tacoma waterfront serves as a stark reminder of the city's precarious geography.
- Racing the Iron Horse on the Trestle
A man’s late-night walk toward the city turns into a desperate sprint for life against an oncoming train.
- The Price of Living 'Down on the Sawdust'
A Seattle laborer was fined $5 after evicting his partner for public intoxication, offering a stark look at the criminalization of poverty and survival in the 1870s.
- The Perils of the Seattle Coal Incline
Two railroad workers are severely injured within 24 hours while attempting to board moving coal cars in a grim, repetitive industrial accident.
- The Price of Panic: Foreclosures in 1878 Seattle
A wave of Sheriff’s sales, spurred by defaulted debt and legal judgments, reveals the precarious financial reality of Seattle property owners during the late 1870s.
- The Unlikely Hero of the Fire Escape
When a local doctor patented a new fire escape in 1878, he had to prove it could survive the ultimate test: a 'timid' gentleman from the New England Hotel climbing down from a third-story window.
- The Perils of the Lumber Truck
A young boy narrowly escapes a gruesome fate after a tumble on Seattle's busy waterfront.
- The Solitary End of a Salmon Bay Logger
A lonely worker’s death by suicide at a cabin in Salmon Bay highlights the hidden struggles of the frontier laborers who built the region's early economy.
- The Price of Order: Seattle’s 1878 County Budget
A deep dive into the 1878 King County audit reveals a frontier government struggling to balance the books through liquor licenses, jail construction, and the high cost of local justice.
- The Man Who Wouldn't Die: The Last Survivor of the Alamo Walks Among Us
A heroic frontiersman named Jimmy Kennon has resurfaced in Washington Territory, proving false reports of his death. He claims to be the sole survivor of the Battle of the Alamo and a legendary scout who once rescued a captive from Sioux hands.
- The Day Seattle’s Streets Became a Minefield
In September 1876, the city’s main commercial artery was so full of potholes and water that officials warned it would become 'deplorable' before winter set in.
- The Confidence Man of Front Street
A colorful encounter with a local schemer illustrates the 'get-rich-quick' fever that defined the early days of Seattle's business district.
- The Ill-Fated Voyage of the Amateur Fishermen
A grand, masculine outing on the waters of the sound takes a disastrous, soggy turn when one boisterous ‘Apollo’ puts his foot through the boat.
- The Shocking Case of the Napping Keeper
A Seattle hospital patient, presumed to be suffering from narcotic poisoning, is jolted back to 'life' by a doctor’s electric battery—only for the doctors to realize they had the wrong man.
- The Great Sewer Brawl of Washington Street
A minor street scuffle turned into an unintended construction project when a crowd of onlookers broke through the sidewalk into the city sewer.
- The Great Seattle Silence: A Christmas Without Drunks or Arrests
In a rare departure from holiday tradition, the city remained remarkably sober and quiet on Christmas Day 1876, with zero arrests recorded despite the usual festive revelry.
- The Waterfront Gunfire Crisis of 1877
An urgent plea from Seattle’s waterfront workers to stop the reckless recreational shooting that was putting lives at risk.
- The Struggle for a Safer Seattle Waterfront
As the city rapidly expands its harbor, a push for a new railing along the waterfront aims to protect nighttime travelers from accidental falls.
- The 1877 Guide to Starting Over in Seattle
When settlers from the Midwest wrote to the Seattle Intelligencer asking about the frontier, they got a blunt primer on the local economy, the 'bonanza' of land speculation, and the reality of life in the rainy territory.
- Bidding on the Destitute: Seattle’s 1877 Poverty Contracts
Before modern social safety nets, King County put the care of its 'indigent poor' up for competitive bid, seeking the lowest price for housing and medical services.