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| Year | Stories |
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| 1860 | 1 |
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| 1877 | 3 |
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50 stories matching genius
- A Seattle Woman Defends the Italian Immigrant
Interviewed at the Rainier, a language teacher recently returned from Europe rejects the caricature of Italians as a degraded race and describes them as industrious, sober, and devoted to home and family.
- The Fragile Earth Beneath Our Feet
An 1877 editorial from the Seattle Daily Intelligencer warns that the city's obsession with waste and its failure to return fertility to the land mirror the downfall of Rome.
- The Industrial Engine of Snohomish
How a trio of Maine brothers revolutionized logging in the Pacific Northwest with a singular, patented invention.
- The Medal-Winning Blacksmith of Dayton
How a small-town Washington inventor gained international acclaim from the Parisian Academy of Inventors for a clever sidehill plow design.
- The Sudden Passing of Captain E. A. Starr
A beloved community leader and steamship captain dies suddenly under mysterious circumstances.
- Kent Threw a Civic Ball to Buy a Fire Hose
When the town's fire hose fell apart under pressure, Mayor Overlock and the council turned a Washington's Birthday ball into a fundraiser—and sold tickets to nearly everyone in town.
- Three Thousand Pack the Armory to Cheer Debs and Denounce Pullman
Seattle workingmen and their allies fill Armory Hall to hear the strikers' side of the fight — a night of fiery speeches, white ribbons of peace, and one heckler hustled out the door.
- The $5,000 Wager That Sent a Man Around the World With Nothing
Paul Jones reaches Seattle with $300 left to earn, a paper suit on his back, and a Boston bet that has already carried him through Japan and the Suez Canal.
- A Night of Revelry at the Cannery
While anti-Chinese sentiment was rampant in Seattle, workers at the Myers cannery held a joyous, boisterous celebration for their cultural labor holiday.
- Sixteen Paupers, a Clay-Bed Well, and a Farm Not Fit to Live On
County commissioners tour the county poor farm and find cracked fences, filthy bedding, horses bleeding on barbed wire and water unfit to drink. The old place will be sold, they say — but only if a poor farm is worth having at all.
- The Captain Who Died for His Flag
A Seattle lawyer’s final wish—to be killed in battle while holding the American flag—was tragically fulfilled in Manila, casting a storm over the local community.
- Two Famous Authors on Tour — and Haweis Fires His First Shot at Ingersoll in Seattle
The Rev. H. R. Haweis and the explorer George Kennan lecture to overflow crowds at St. Mark's and the Seattle Theater, but the city gets a piece of history: Haweis's reply to the great agnostic was written here, in two days, at a local minister's suggestion.
- The Tariff Trap: How Washington’s Congressman Warned Against the 'Grasping Monopolies'
Rep. Scott Finn delivers a fiery two-hour speech in Congress, arguing that protectionist tariffs don't help workers but instead feed trusts and hurt farmers.
- A Spokane Woman Makes the Case for the Ballot
Writing to the paper 'from a womanly standpoint,' Mrs. B. R. Gove argues that taxation without representation is tyranny — and that Washington's women deserve the vote.
- A Spokane Craftsman's Twelve-Year Masterpiece in Human Hair
Charles Streib spent over a decade creating portraits of Generals Washington and Sherman from thousands of strands of human hair—a feat of patience and artistry that astonished the city.
- The Canal That Could Freeze England: A Climate Warning from the Isthmus of Panama
In 1877, Seattle’s press warned that digging a canal through Central America might divert the Gulf Stream, plunging Europe into an ice age—a bizarre but prescient look at early environmental anxiety.
- The Ring of Corruption: How King County’s Auditor Hid the Books
A scathing editorial in the Puget Sound Dispatch exposes Gardner Kellogg for refusing to explain thousands of dollars in missing county funds, accusing him of treating public office as private property.
- When Seattle Society Turned Shakespeare Into a Skirt-Dance Spectacle
The Seattle Athletic Club packed Cordray's Theater for three nights with an all-local Shakespeare travesty, imported costumes, and a cameo from 'everybody' in society.
- The Paper War: Port Townsend vs. Seattle
In 1876, a small rival town accused Seattle of economic sabotage over who printed their business cards.
- Spokane's Board of Trade Fights to Save the Northern Pacific Land Grant
In February 1884, Spokane Falls merchants rallied against a Congressional bill that would forfeit the railroad's land grant — and with it, they feared, the town's entire future.
- The Taxpayer Who Couldn’t Sue the State
Washington’s Supreme Court dismisses the Agricultural College case, ruling that a private resident cannot halt state spending in equity—only the attorney general can.
- The Body in the Hen House: An Unidentified Murder Near Eagle Harbor
A well-dressed stranger was found half-burned in an abandoned Kitsap County farmhouse, with only spectacles, a corkscrew, and a torn newspaper to say who he was.
- Billy Fife: Self-Taught Caricaturist of Frontier Seattle
A biography of Billy Fife, a sailor and self-taught caricaturist whose sharp wit and rare artistic skill captured Seattle's frontier life.
- Anything to Beat Stretch: The Whole County Ticket, Man by Man
The Sun walks Snohomish County's 1876 ballot from sheriff to coroner, and finds a whaling skipper turned pile-driver, a college-trained logger, and a sheriff whose enemies have a slogan of their own.
- The Rise and Lonely Fall of Spokane's Richest Man
Banker Anthony M. Cannon, who helped build Spokane from a cabin by the falls, dies broke and bereaved in a New York hotel — days after a secret second marriage made him tabloid prey.