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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1858 | 4 |
| 1859 | 10 |
| 1860 | 2 |
16 stories matching point
- A Child's Fatal Fire at Point Roberts
The second son of Alexander Hahn died after his clothes caught fire while playing with his brother.
- A Miraculous Escape on Puget Sound: Two Steamers Collide Near Steilacoom
The steamer Northerner and a second vessel met suddenly on the water in October 1858, crushing the little steamer’s bow and nearly sending its captain into the Sound.
- Opening the Cascade Gateway
A committee of citizens reports on the progress of a new wagon road through Snoqualmie Pass, promising a vital link between the Sound and the interior.
- Death and a Trace of Gold on the Fort Simcoe Trail
A Washington Territory prospecting party lost one man to an accidental gunshot and two others to drowning, and found only a disappointing show of gold.
- ‘Rule or Ruin’: A Territorial Lawmaker Turns on Governor Stevens
Confined to his room with a cold, a member of the Washington Territorial Legislature answers his critics — defending his right to name the governor's unpopular appointees and accusing a ruling clique of trying to shut the rest of the territory up.
- The Steilacoom Gold Rush Fever
Reports from Colville suggest a new mining boom is drawing men away from the territory's established industries.
- The Winter War Blueprint: An 1858 Campaign to Subdue the Tribes
A field letter from the Indian war in Oregon and Washington urges the Army to occupy the Colville Valley, cut off Indigenous trade, and expel missionaries and Hudson’s Bay Company employees.
- The Similkameen Gold Rush
A government expressman brings word of a new, lucrative gold strike in the Similkameen region, sparking excitement and fear of a dangerous, ill-prepared rush.
- The Military Road That Opened the Northwest
A $100,000 federal appropriation sends Lieut. John Mullan back to the Pacific to push a wagon road from Fort Walla Walla to Fort Benton—and with it, a tide of settlers into Oregon and Washington.
- Six Hours, Sixteen Thousand Feet: Puget Sound's Lumber Boom
A correspondent touring the Sound in 1860 marvels at new sawmills at Utsalady and Port Gamble, where wild country is being turned into lumber camps and the Territory is already boasting of a manufacturing future to rival the older states.
- Steilacoom’s Editor Asks Who Will Start the Fire Brigade
With wooden buildings packed into the business district and no reservoir, engine or ladder company, the Puget Sound Herald warns that a single blaze could erase the town’s prospects.
- Speculators Send a Surveyor to San Juan, and a Boundary Dispute Turns Hot
Americans from Victoria and Puget Sound move to preempt land on the disputed island, betting that U.S. jurisdiction will follow—and warning that trouble may follow first.
- A Boomtown Year: Steilacoom Runs Out of Empty Houses
In its first-anniversary survey of Puget Sound, the Herald finds every vacant building in Steilacoom filled — and thirty new ones thrown up in eight months.
- The Territory’s Muskets Were ‘About as Dangerous at One End as the Other’
A Pierce County taxpayer audits the 1859 Legislature: condemned arms, a new enrolling clerk, and the old habit of hoping Congress will pay.
- The Wagon Road That Would Bind Puget Sound to the Columbia
Vancouver residents petition Congress for $50,000 to build a military road to Steilacoom, arguing it would open trade and settle the country between the Columbia River and Puget Sound.
- The Killer Who Walked Into the Council and Bared His Breast
On San Juan Island, a man accused of killing a chief's son returned to face tribal justice—and his family watched him offer his own heart to the dead man's brother.