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.
Refine1 on
Show the numbers
| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1854 | 1 |
| 1859 | 1 |
| 1860 | 1 |
| 1861 | 1 |
| 1862 | 3 |
| 1863 | 3 |
| 1871 | 8 |
| 1872 | 110 |
| 1876 | 536 |
| 1877 | 378 |
| 1878 | 279 |
| 1879 | 15 |
| 1880 | 134 |
| 1882 | 98 |
| 1883 | 511 |
| 1884 | 326 |
| 1885 | 566 |
| 1886 | 361 |
| 1887 | 327 |
| 1888 | 314 |
| 1889 | 800 |
| 1890 | 11 |
| 1891 | 340 |
| 1892 | 1,332 |
| 1893 | 1,606 |
| 1894 | 1,246 |
| 1895 | 1,087 |
| 1896 | 2 |
| 1897 | 9 |
| 1898 | 21 |
| 1899 | 366 |
| 1900 | 6 |
| 1902 | 6 |
| 1903 | 153 |
| 1904 | 71 |
| 1905 | 2 |
| 1907 | 1 |
| 1908 | 2 |
| 1909 | 76 |
| 1910 | 26 |
| 1912 | 1 |
| 1914 | 5 |
| 1915 | 5 |
| 1916 | 28 |
| 1917 | 10 |
| 1923 | 9 |
| 1924 | 12 |
| 1925 | 3 |
| 1928 | 14 |
| 1929 | 17 |
11,240 stories
- One Man a Car and Twenty-Five Miles an Hour: Labor Demands the Streetcars Keep Their Bargain
The Western Central Labor Union charges Seattle's trolley companies with running unsafe, understaffed cars — and the council gives them twenty days to comply or forfeit their franchises.
- The $18,000 Fake Prize Fight That Landed a Butte Businessman in Jail
F.H. Pilling borrowed $18,000 from a friend to bet on a prize fight that never happened. The con artists vanished, and Pilling spent nearly a year behind bars before making bail.
- A Ring, a Resignation and a Democratic Landslide in Seattle
Mayor-elect Ronald insists the sweeping Democratic victory was no party triumph but a popular revolt against boss rule, a pliant police chief and corrupt registration.
- A Divorce, a Vanished Lawyer, and a Plot to Hide the Property
Ella J. Nance says her husband and his brother conspired to put their community property beyond her reach—and her attorney has disappeared with her fee.
- A Hospital for the Poor, Not the Pauper House: Seattle General Prepares to Open
The Seattle General Hospital will open June 15 in the leased Avon house on Front Street, offering free treatment to the needy and a training school for nurses—backed by a women's auxiliary that has already raised funds through lunchrooms.
- The Seattle Grocer Who Died Chasing Central American Trade
J. E. Chilberg clawed back from a fire, a failed corporation and a panic to build a Puget Sound steamship trade with Guatemala — then went down with the foundering Colima on the voyage that was supposed to secure it.
- The Converted Burglar and the Wire That Carried Him to Seattle
A Salvation Army convert walked into the Post-Intelligencer office to tell how he crossed the Kansas penitentiary wall hand over hand on an electric-light wire. This week a Kansas keeper came to take him back.
- A Seattle Improvement Company Tried to Dispossess a Black Homeowner—He Cited the Constitution
S. H. Stone bought a lot in a 'high-class' residence addition. When white neighbors objected, the company moved to undo the sale—and his lawyer answered with the U.S. Constitution.
- Ballard Fights the Tide Land Fill
The Ballard City Council moves to block a private contract to fill in Salmon Bay, fearing it will ruin the harbor and burden local commerce.
- Anti-Chinese Violence at King and South Seventh
Two young men, intoxicated and looking for trouble, brutally assaulted two Chinese laborers in a targeted act of racist violence.
- A.P.A. Secures Victory in Ballard School Election
The American Protective Association flexes its political muscle in a high-turnout school board race.
- Seattle's Filipino Editors Draw a Line: Restrict Us If You Must — But Never Shut Us Out
As agitation builds in Congress to bar Filipinos from the mainland, the editors of Seattle's Filipino Forum weigh the Johnson bill and conclude that a quota, however bitter, is preferable to outright exclusion — which they call an imperialist injustice.
- The Filipino Answer to a Labor Organizer’s Exclusion Demand
In 1929, Seattle’s Filipino Forum took on the Central Labor Council’s campaign to bar Filipino workers—and dismantled the racist case line by line.
- Filipino Students Face a Closing Door at American Universities
A Filipino student leader in New York charges that West Coast universities, including the University of Washington, are quietly shutting out Filipino applicants — admitting just one of twenty last year.
- A University of Washington Scholar Asks Why Filipino Workers Are Being Pushed Out
In 1928, as Congress weighed excluding Filipinos from the United States, a UW researcher set out to document the migration — and the labor resentments driving it — across Washington, Oregon and Alaska.
- Counting the Invisible: A Census of Filipinos in the Pacific Northwest
A 1929 study estimates roughly 7,000 Filipino workers scattered from Seattle to Alaska — and admits the numbers are guesswork, because many hid their identities from the people counting them.
- The Merchants’ Bank Fails to Save Itself
Stockholders fall short of the Comptroller’s demand, leaving Charles H. Baker to wind up the failed Seattle bank.
- A Girl Died in a Magnetic Healer’s Home. Her Father Was Kept Outside.
Vina Kelly, 14, died at her brother-in-law’s West Street practice. The coroner ordered an inquest after conflicting death reports and a father’s late-night grief.
- Chief Seattle's Promise, Recalled in a Fishing-Rights Case
Col. B. F. Shaw came to Seattle to testify in a Point Roberts fishing case—and remembered the 1855 Point Elliott treaty, when 6,000 Indigenous people gathered and Chief Seattle offered friendship.
- Free Farms for the Worthy Poor: Seattle Tries the Pingree Plan
A Detroit-born scheme to hand out quarter-acre plots to the destitute is taking root in Seattle, with hundreds of families already on the waiting list.
- The Ditch That Wouldn't Die: Supreme Court Kills Lake Washington Canal Assessment
Five justices strike down the $1,075,000 assessment meant to fund Seattle's long-sought Lake Washington canal — a project that has been the city's obsession and a state election issue for a quarter century.
- The Anaconda Goes Into Elliott Bay to Eat the Flats
The giant dredger that will dig the Lake Washington canal is launched at Moran's foundry tonight — and its pumps, chewed to honeycomb by Swinomish sand, hint at how hard Elliott Bay's bottom will fight back.
- The Ballad of Mrs. Mattie: A Seattle Streetcar Scandal
When a drunken motorman tried to force his way into a woman's streetcar car, the resulting courtroom drama exposed the raw power dynamics of early Seattle transit—and left the defendant claiming he was libelled by the press.
- The Great Labor War: Seattle Council Erupts Over Chinese Workers
In a fiery session in April 1882, Seattle’s City Council nearly came to blows over whether public grading contracts should be reserved exclusively for white laborers.
- The Great Seattle Lottery: A $100,000 Sawmill and a Road to Nowhere
In 1876, the Washington Territory legislature authorized a massive public lottery to fund a road through Snoqualmie Pass. The grand prize? Yelver’s Steam Saw Mill. It was a bold gamble on infrastructure that reveals how early Seattle funded its growth.
Download the first 10,000 as a spreadsheet (CSV) · Show them on the map