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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1876 | 2 |
| 1877 | 6 |
| 1878 | 4 |
| 1880 | 1 |
| 1883 | 2 |
| 1885 | 3 |
| 1886 | 1 |
| 1887 | 1 |
| 1888 | 1 |
| 1889 | 5 |
| 1891 | 2 |
| 1892 | 2 |
| 1893 | 4 |
| 1894 | 7 |
| 1895 | 10 |
| 1903 | 1 |
52 stories matching devise
- The Wealth of the Nation Trapped in the Vaults
A century and a half ago, President Grover Cleveland grappled with a modern-sounding crisis: federal budget surpluses causing economic panic, skyrocketing costs for common goods, and the crushing weight of a tariff system on working families.
- The Perilous Path to Union Bay
A steamship pioneer makes a daring, experimental voyage to prove that a 'long-ignored' channel could transform the future of Seattle’s local trade.
- The Empty Vault: How the Pioneers' Association Went Broke
A financial audit of the Washington Territorial Association reveals a treasury with no money and a membership list full of ghosts, raising questions about the future of Seattle's oldest civic society.
- The Lure of the City and the Reality of Hard Times
A frontier editorial warns local farm families that the 'fancied comforts' of Seattle often end in unemployment and vice.
- The Great Seattle Tide-Land Grab
Powerful corporate interests are organizing to seize Seattle’s valuable waterfront, leaving citizens and commerce at the mercy of speculators.
- The Anatomy of a Political Glutton
A satirical 1885 editorial dissecting the sudden, transformation of humble private citizens into greedy 'Ins' once they secure public office in Washington territory.
- The Daily Parade of Moral Rottenness
A fed-up Seattle resident petitions City Hall to end the brazen practice of parading sex workers through the city's main streets by carriage and brass band.
- The Fight for Seattle’s Soil
A 19th-century editorial warns that land monopolies and timber speculation threaten to turn Washington into a land of feudal tenants, sparking a civic debate on who truly owns the future of the Northwest.
- The Man Who Would Make Seattle Beautiful
A landscape architect from Cleveland arrives in the Pacific Northwest with a radical proposal: tear down the ugly retaining walls and let nature take over.
- Railroad Chief Blasts Seattle's Tide-Flat Terminal Plan as Too Costly
The Northern Pacific's chief engineer examines the tide-land plat and warns that filling costs and legal encumbrances could make the terminal scheme prohibitive, jeopardizing railroad centralization.
- Seattle's 1894 Budget Crisis: $89,787 Short and Cutting the Police
A comptroller's statement exposed a looming deficit, the council created a retrenchment committee, and eight patrolmen were dropped from the force—over the mayor's personal objection.
- The Fight for the Soil: Washington's Early Constitutional Crisis
An 1870s editorial argues that without strict land ownership caps, Washington Territory faces a future of feudalism and labor exploitation.
- How Seattle Raised $50,000 for Its Canal — Bootblacks Included
A San Francisco paper marveled that Seattle's Lake Washington canal fund came in small donations from rich and poor alike, a civic-spirit story with a Puget Sound lesson.
- One Street, Eight Names: The Tide-Land Map That Broke Seattle's Addresses
When the tide-land appraisers published their new plat, they named the filled waterfront after the states and the big cities — ignoring every street already on the ground. City Engineer Thomson's renaming scheme collapsed on the spot.
- The 1895 Legislature Bets on the University of Washington
A burst of bills from Olympia — bonds on school lands, a liquor-free campus zone, and money to finish the new buildings — leaves the young university's future 'practically assured.'
- Seattle Rallies for the Franklin Mine's Widows and Orphans
A newspaper fund drive, a Madison Park benefit and Black community organizers push relief past $275 for the families of miners killed in the Franklin disaster.
- Creditors Circle a Seattle Hotel as an Heir Fights a Forced Sale
The executor of the Harmon estate asks for time to collect a judgment and mortgage the New England Hotel, while an heir accuses creditors of trying to seize valuable property at a sacrifice.
- A Hospital Takes Shape in a Rented Building
A charitable board leases the Avon building near Cedar Street and calls on churchwomen to furnish and oversee Seattle’s new general hospital.
- The Land Grab That Stalled Seattle’s Growth
A local editorial warns that the Northern Pacific Railroad’s hoarding of millions of acres is strangling settlement and development in Washington Territory.
- Ten Cents a Month to Save Seattle's Library
With the library closed for lack of funds, the commission and City Council try a subscription fee—and a last-minute deal to reopen.
- Seattle's 1877 Plea: Build a Wagon Road Over the Cascades Before Portland Steals the Inland Empire
With no railroad yet across the mountains, a Seattle newspaper argued the city's future depended on a wagon road to Yakima—before Portland grabbed the inland trade forever.
- Seattle and Tacoma Call a Truce for the Interstate Fair
A Tacoma delegation arrives in Seattle to plan a joint Seattle-Tacoma day at the fair, with city officials pledging exhibits, parades and a united front.
- Seattle's Fire Chief Accused as the Council Wrestles a Telephone Franchise and a Paving Bill
Both houses of the city council meet late into the night: charges that Chief Hunt holds office under false pretenses, a twenty-five-year franchise for the Seattle Home Telephone Company, and a fight over who pays for the sick and injured.
- The Farmer Who Said the Colleges Were Failing Rural Washington
Addressing the state dairymen, farmer Wm. F. Izett argues that the land-grant colleges move too slowly and cost too much to save the farm — and pitches a cheaper, faster kind of agricultural school as the 'machine gun' the countryside needs.
- The Sewer Under Beacon Hill
After quicksand, floods and a costly detour, Seattle’s South Tunnel is weeks from completion—and somehow still inside its $100,000 budget.