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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1854 | 1 |
| 1859 | 1 |
| 1861 | 1 |
| 1862 | 6 |
| 1863 | 1 |
| 1864 | 2 |
| 1865 | 1 |
| 1872 | 17 |
| 1876 | 52 |
| 1877 | 48 |
| 1878 | 33 |
| 1879 | 3 |
| 1880 | 17 |
| 1882 | 18 |
| 1883 | 41 |
| 1884 | 14 |
| 1885 | 52 |
| 1886 | 19 |
| 1887 | 22 |
| 1888 | 42 |
| 1889 | 81 |
| 1890 | 11 |
| 1891 | 46 |
| 1892 | 95 |
| 1893 | 82 |
| 1894 | 123 |
| 1895 | 48 |
| 1897 | 2 |
| 1898 | 2 |
| 1899 | 21 |
| 1900 | 5 |
| 1902 | 4 |
| 1903 | 55 |
| 1904 | 35 |
| 1905 | 5 |
| 1907 | 2 |
| 1908 | 1 |
| 1909 | 34 |
| 1910 | 3 |
| 1911 | 7 |
| 1912 | 3 |
| 1914 | 8 |
| 1915 | 10 |
| 1916 | 23 |
| 1917 | 7 |
| 1918 | 2 |
| 1923 | 10 |
| 1924 | 7 |
| 1925 | 3 |
1,126 stories matching less
- A Mountain of Coffins: Franklin Buries Its Miners
After a mine fire killed 37 men, the coal town of Franklin held a day of funerals—five graves at Black Diamond, three Italian miners on a hillside, and widows whose grief doctors feared would kill them.
- Spokane Falls Devastated by Fire
Following the Great Seattle Fire, the sister city of Spokane Falls faces its own catastrophic conflagration, with millions in damages.
- The Centennial That Saved Seattle: How 8,000 Souls Turned a Territorial Mist into a City
On July 4, 1876, despite being late to statehood and lacking federal funding, Seattle’s pioneers pulled off a spectacle of flags, steamers, and speeches that proved the town was here to stay.
- The Floor Gives Way: Panic and Death at Seattle’s Morris Opera House
A grand opening night turns into a nightmare when the second-story floor of the newly converted theater collapses into the stables below, killing several and injuring dozens in one of the city's earliest major disasters.
- Hanged on a Doubt: Washington Territory's First White Execution
When John Thompson was hanged in Seattle in 1877, many believed he was guilty of manslaughter, not murder. The Dispatch made the case that the law had taken a life it should have spared.
- The Great Debate: Where Should Seattle's Ship Canal Go?
In 1892, federal engineers weighed the massive engineering feat of connecting Lake Washington to Puget Sound, deliberating whether to carve the path through Salmon Bay or Smith Cove.
- The Receiver Cut Their Pay 2 Cents an Hour. A Judge Made Him Put It Back.
When the Rainier Avenue Electric Railway's court-appointed receiver trimmed motormen's wages from 20 cents to 18 cents an hour, the crews — months behind on pay, with houses in Columbia City bought out of their own wages — took him to court and won.
- A Wall of Smoke and Flame Across Puget Sound
Forest fires from Hood Canal to the Nooksack Valley left dozens of families homeless in 1894, while smoke turned steamboat travel blind and daily life in Seattle into a gray haze.
- A Tent City Emerges in Seattle
A desperate housing shortage and the high cost of living have forced hundreds of residents into tent encampments.
- Northern Pacific Railroad's Columbia River Land Grab
A skeptical look at how the Northern Pacific Railroad is using speculative track-laying to claim 1,000,000 acres of public land.
- The Great Seattle Streetcar Heist
A scathing editorial exposing the city council's plans to give away a lucrative cable car franchise on Front Street without public oversight or fair payment.
- The Great Pacific Northwest Timber Heist
A federal investigation reveals that $40 million worth of timber was pilfered from government lands in the Puget Sound region since 1855, fueling a battle over corporate exploitation of public resources.
- The Great Railway Monopoly Struggle of 1877
An editorial from the Seattle Weekly Dispatch reveals the town's early, bitter fight against the Northern Pacific Railroad's land-grabbing tactics.
- Seattle's Sewer Scandal Exposed
Newly unearthed records reveal massive overspending and corruption in the city’s sewer construction projects.
- The Battle for Cheaper Lights
Mayor Campbell's administration faced intense pushback from the city council while attempting to dismantle an electric lighting monopoly.
- The Nation on the Brink: Rail Workers Push for Eight-Hour Day
As contract negotiations fail, two million workers threaten a total shutdown of the nation's rail system, prompting intervention from President Wilson.
- Acquittal for a North Second Street Shopkeeper
A jury deliberates for less than fifteen minutes before acquitting a man accused of assaulting a young girl.
- The Cold Truth at City Hall
A winter coal shortage brings a parade of desperate applicants to a city official who doles out fuel with a mix of bureaucratic cruelty and casual dismissals.
- The Tax Swindle: How Seattle’s Printer Defrauded His Neighbors
In 1872, the publisher of the *Puget Sound Dispatch* exposed a collusive scheme between local tax collectors and a rival newspaper to overcharge delinquent taxpayers for legal notices, sparking a bitter war of words in the territorial press.
- The True Cost of the Eight-Hour Day
As 1886 labor strikes roil the nation, local analysis weighs the temporary gains of the eight-hour movement against the looming threat of business closures and a housing market in decline.
- The Iron Vanguard of the Pacific
While the USS Nipsic was an aging relic of a bygone naval era, its arrival at the Puget Sound station in 1892 marked a pivotal, hard-fought milestone in Seattle's rise as a major military port.
- The Union Veteran Who Sued the Railroad for a Million-Dollar Tacoma
Anthony P. Carr says Northern Pacific agents helped a claim-jumper steal his homestead. More than a thousand Tacoma lots—and the people living on them—depend on what the Supreme Court decides.
- Taxation Without Representation for the Poor
A scathing breakdown of how local tax laws favor wealthy landowners while crushing the small lot owner.
- The Shoe That Could Save Seattle: Why We Must Stop Exporting Our Hides to San Francisco
An editorial in the Puget Sound Dispatch argues that Seattle’s economic survival depends on manufacturing its own boots and shoes locally, rather than shipping raw hides south for a 10% premium.
- The Brutal Survey of Cedar River
Engineers and directors trek through 20 miles of 'impenetrable thickets' to survey a potential rail expansion for the Seattle and Walla Walla Railroad.