Research the archive
Narrow 27,002 newspaper stories by words, years, place, newspaper and subject. See when and where they ran, then download what you find.
Put a phrase in quotes ("rent strike") or leave a word out with a minus (strike -baseball). Old scans misspell names, so when little is found, near-spellings are offered.
Refine
Show the numbers
| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1876 | 6 |
| 1877 | 1 |
| 1882 | 4 |
| 1883 | 6 |
| 1884 | 3 |
| 1886 | 4 |
| 1887 | 1 |
| 1888 | 2 |
| 1889 | 5 |
| 1890 | 1 |
| 1891 | 3 |
| 1892 | 12 |
| 1893 | 7 |
| 1894 | 11 |
| 1895 | 9 |
| 1899 | 1 |
| 1903 | 3 |
| 1904 | 6 |
| 1905 | 3 |
| 1908 | 1 |
| 1909 | 5 |
| 1911 | 1 |
| 1912 | 1 |
| 1915 | 1 |
| 1916 | 4 |
| 1917 | 1 |
102 stories matching backward
- Ballard’s Fire Chief Killed by a Falling 1,200-Pound Head-Block
Frank Finnerin was guiding five men across a mill tramway when the stringer gave way. He died fifteen minutes later in the boarding house, leaving a wife and three small children.
- The Nancy Comes to the Pend d'Oreille
A fast gasoline launch purchased in Portland will run daily between Metaline and Newport, promising same-day connections to Spokane.
- The Great Dayton Fire: A Block of Ashes and a City’s Near Miss
On the night of April 2, 1882, flames consumed three blocks in downtown Dayton, Washington. While the town paid with its buildings, Seattle’s own fire department narrowly escaped disaster thanks to a single force pump.
- A Fight for the Right to a Shave in Pioneer Square
H. R. Cayton, editor of a Black Republican weekly, is thrown out of a barber shop after the proprietor demands an old debt, sparking a scuffle and a smashed window.
- The Well That Killed Twice
A promising new homestead a few miles east of Whatcom became a death trap when a pocket of gas swallowed John Kidwell and the neighbor who tried to save him.
- 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 Former Seattle Policeman Fell Between the Logs — and the Tide Took Him Before Anyone Could
Edward Kane went out at nine o'clock to bring in a raft of spruce. At noon his hat and pike pole were floating on water barely four feet deep, and there was no body to be found.
- A Judge Tells Seattle's School Board It Can't Raid the Building Fund to Pay Old Debts
Judge Langley rules that the $35,000 levied for new schools must build new schools — and Queen Anne parents, whose children sit in an 'open, barn-like' schoolhouse, suddenly see a six-room building within reach.
- Seattle’s Own: How Local Capital Built the Denny Hotel Without Asking for Help
While other cities relied on outside investors or government subsidies, Seattle’s promoters raised the full capital for the new Denny Hotel in just four days through a grassroots campaign of local shareholders.
- Three Deaths Down the Shaft: A Seattle Reader Demands Elevator Reform
After yet another fatal plunge in the Seattle National Bank building, a correspondent catalogs a decade of elevator disasters and calls on the city council to require inside doors before the cages can move.
- The Contractor Died in the Church He Was Building
Charles R. Brown, a prosperous Seattle builder, collapsed in the gallery of the unfinished First Presbyterian Church—three minutes from work to death.
- Grand Jury Exposes Seattle Brothels and Liquor Sales to Native Americans
In September 1876, a King County grand jury reported widespread lawlessness in Seattle, including indictments for selling liquor to Native Americans, running gambling houses, and maintaining public nuisances.
- Whose Ox Gets Gored: Kennewick Draws the Line on County Bridge Bonds
A Prosser editor's jab over a Columbia River bridge bond prompts the Kennewick Courier-Reporter to deny it ever sought a bridge — and to attack commissioners' power to borrow without a vote.
- The Vice President's Cousin and the $1,000 Port Townsend Swindle
A smooth-tongued 'loan agent' traded on Adlai Stevenson's name to collect membership fees from Port Townsend's most respectable Democrats — then hid behind unreturned abstracts and 'free stock' worth $100 a share.
- The Day the Kingston Died: A Steamship Collision and the Pilot’s Tale
Pilot Gatter recounts the terrifying moments when the steamer Glenogle collided with the passenger liner Kingston in Puget Sound, sending hundreds of feet of steel into the water.
- The Iron Vein: Seattle’s Gamble on the Railroad
In 1876, local leaders rallied behind a desperate bid to connect the young city of Seattle to the interior coal mines and grain lands, arguing that the railroad was the only path from frontier outpost to global port.
- She Fought a Sailor in the Dark—and Helped Police Find Him by Morning
Mary Kriser, who ran a lodging house at South Second and Weller streets, was robbed and sexually assaulted in September 1894. A neighbor broke down a door, and police identified a suspect within ninety minutes.
- 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.
- Trail Wars: Spokane Fights for the Road to the Coeur d'Alene Gold
As prospectors rush the new Coeur d'Alene diggings, Spokane boosters battle a Portland paper over which trail is passable — and who gets to outfit the stampede.
- Four Hundred Ladies Watch the Gymnasts and Japanese Fencers
The Seattle Athletic Club closed its season with a ladies' smoker: horizontal-bar feats, four-round boxing bouts, and Japanese fencing masters from Tokyo who kept the house in a roar.
- 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 Rockets Turned Around: Tacoma's Fourth of July Went Up in a Sheet of Flame
A spark touched off the entire $500 pyrotechnic stock at Wright Park, driving rockets and bombs into a crowd of thousands and leaving women and children burned, trampled and briefly lost in the smoke.
- Samuel Hill Warns Seattle Would 'Die Like Rats in a Trap' Without Highways
As Congress weighs the Latimer and Brownlow road-funding bills, the Seattle utility magnate and son-in-law of James J. Hill makes the case that paved highways out of the city are a matter of survival, not comfort.
- New Whatcom’s Ledger Had a Credit Side, Too
After a defalcation and the Panic of 1893, New Whatcom’s mayor and a local editor argued over whether the city was broke or merely bruised.
- The Wagon King Tells Seattle to Build Roads and Put Idle Men to Work
Clem Studebaker, visiting from South Bend, says Puget Sound is beautiful but backward: good roads, an army-built highway system, and the Nicaragua canal would cure unemployment.