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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1854 | 1 |
| 1872 | 2 |
| 1876 | 2 |
| 1877 | 4 |
| 1878 | 1 |
| 1883 | 6 |
| 1884 | 3 |
| 1885 | 2 |
| 1889 | 3 |
| 1891 | 9 |
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| 1893 | 3 |
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| 1895 | 6 |
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54 stories matching precious
- The Knight in Blue: Officer Grant’s Chivalrous Knife Work Saves a Tacoma Lady
When a piece of lace tore during the Christian Endeavor convention, one Seattle policeman didn't just offer sympathy—he offered his pocketknife and a bow.
- The Tragedy of the False Gold Rush
An editorial on the human cost of feverish speculation and the empty promises of distant mining 'Eldorados.'
- The Gold Rush That Was Coming for the Colville Reservation
A Spokane prospector returns from the northern mineral belt with news of rich rock—and a prediction that the Indians will not long keep their land.
- The Tragedy at the Waterfront
A young Seattle woman's late-night walk leads to a fatal plunge into the bay, leaving behind a grieving husband and a city searching for answers.
- The Great Seattle Fire Erased Our Roots
An early record of Seattle’s vanished architecture and the displacement of its first churches following the devastating 1889 fire.
- The Dream of a Northern Bosphorus: Seattle in 1872
A period travelogue captures the raw, rugged ambition of a frontier Seattle, where coal, timber, and dreams of a transcontinental railroad promised to transform a small sound-side village into a global commercial power.
- Sheriff Blocks 28 Miners From Landing — a Newspaper Calls Out the 'Chronic Pauper Hunter'
In 1877, a steamboat captain brought 28 out-of-work miners from Victoria to Port Townsend. The sheriff said they were paupers and refused to let them off the boat. This Seattle editor wasn't having it.
- Fairhaven's Booster Gospel: A Correspondent Says Come With Money, Not Without
A Chicago Record writer tours the Sound and pronounces the coast counties blessed—while conceding the sawmills have gone dark and the camps emptied.
- The Idle Crowd: Seattle's 1877 Moral Panic over 'Street Loafers'
A local editor observes the growing ranks of the unemployed and 'non-descript' men gathering on Seattle corners, questioning how they survive in a bustling, labor-dependent territory.
- The Diva’s Relic: When a Sacred Charm Held Up a Seattle Opera
A superstitious cantatrice once refused to perform because she’d lost a piece of the True Cross—forcing her manager to hunt through trunks until the curtain rose.
- A Silver Strike North of the Falls Promises a Fortune
Four men from Tacoma and Spokane incorporate the Spokane Mining and Smelting Company on a claim in the Colville country, with assays running nearly $60 a ton.
- The Monument to the Fallen: Olympia’s Call to Honor Washington’s War Dead
A committee of eleven civic leaders has launched a campaign to erect a permanent memorial at the state capital for the volunteers who died in the Spanish-American and Philippine wars, arguing that their sacrifice demands an enduring tribute.
- The Fight Over the Road Through the Cascades
A state wagon-road bill sets Cascade Pass against Slate Creek, with mining claims, Lake Chelan freight and a $33,000 price tag hanging in the balance.
- The Judge Forgot the Evidence, and the Gambling Case Walked
Charles Shaw’s Union Club prosecution ended when the judge couldn’t recall Chief Rogers’ key testimony. The gambling furniture went out the door anyway.
- Is There Gold Under Tacoma's School Land?
A federal geologist is sent to sample the gravel of school section 16, where John G. McElroy claims a fortune in placer gold and the state says it is ordinary school land.
- The Original Miners: How Native Americans Discovered the Metaline's Lead Riches
Long before white prospectors staked claims, Indigenous people mined lead in the Metaline region to make bullets and slugs—and their ancient workings still dot the landscape.
- Six Drowned and the Dead Looted: The Wreck of the Strathblane
Eyewitnesses described a fearful scene off North Beach as the iron ship Strathblane broke apart—farmers rode into the surf to save survivors while others rifled the dead.
- The Gold in Swauk Creek — and the Railroad That Wanted the Ground Under It
Miners in Kittitas County had quietly pulled a fortune in placer gold from Swauk Creek for over a decade. When the Northern Pacific moved to patent the land, they finally went public with the numbers.
- The Water Belongs to the People—Not the Syndicates
A.M. Stevens of Ellensburg warns that handing arid lands to the states is the first step toward private control—and argues the federal government must build the reservoirs.
- The Night Fire Nearly Took Browne's New Brick Block
A stove left burning in a plaster-drying room set Spokane Falls' finest new brick building alight — and the town had nothing but buckets to fight it with.
- The Train They Hoped Would Stop: Spokane's Bid for the Last-Spike Spotlight
A mass meeting at Cannon's Hall appointed a committee to welcome President Villard's Northern Pacific excursion and make sure the editorial train lingered long enough to see the falls.
- The Gold Rush That Wouldn't Wait for Spring
A Spokane Falls merchant is summoned back to the snowbound Coeur d'Alene mines as fortune hunters pour in a month early — and the Falls positions itself as the gateway to the new El Dorado.
- The Centennial Call: Snohomish Citizens Urged to Claim Their History
As the nation prepares for the 1876 Independence Day celebration, local leaders in Snohomish argue that the county must stop waiting for Seattle or other larger towns to represent them. Instead, they propose a unified county-wide gathering to preserve the region's unique settlement history.
- The $800 School Contract That Smelled Wrong
A losing bidder says Seattle’s school board changed the bonding rules mid-bid to steer the South School job to a higher bidder—and cost taxpayers hundreds.
- The Tacoma Gold Rush That Was Salted With Quicksilver
A mining journal exposes how placer claims on Tacoma school land turned a public trust into a speculative jackpot—complete with imported gold, alleged bribery, and a land office that kept saying yes.