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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1889 | 7 |
| 1891 | 1 |
| 1892 | 6 |
| 1893 | 2 |
| 1894 | 3 |
| 1895 | 8 |
27 stories matching newcom
- Surviving Seattle on a Shoestring
A newcomer details the precise costs of feeding a family of eight in 1890s Seattle, offering a rare glimpse into the household economics of the era.
- Fatal Rail Yard Accident Claims Newcomer
A sailor known only as 'Nels' is killed while walking the Northern Pacific tracks at night.
- The Forgotten Family on the Garret Floor
An impoverished immigrant family, suffering from diphtheria in a cramped Seattle attic, highlights the desperate housing conditions facing newcomers in 1889.
- A Tragic End in the Louvre Saloon
A lonely newcomer finds a desperate end in Tacoma, leaving behind only letters from a sister and a failed promise of sobriety.
- A Sober Assessment of the Seattle Boom
A local businessman warns Easterners against the 'real estate sharks' and urges caution for those moving West.
- The City Bids Farewell to Its Founding Father
Thousands of mourners, from pioneers to laborers, gathered at the Yesler mansion to honor the man who built Seattle’s first mill and served as its patron.
- The Great Northern's First Departure
Seattle celebrates as the first through passenger train to St. Paul departs Marion Street, marking a new era of transcontinental connection.
- A Trainload of Black Miners Arrives in Roslyn — to Find the Strike Already Broken
Two hundred seventy Black miners and their families came from the Midwest to replace striking Northern Pacific coal miners. By the time they arrived, the white miners had returned to work.
- Fifteen Japanese Arrive by Night, and the Immigration Men Lose the Trail
A small sloop from British Columbia put a group of Japanese immigrants ashore in Seattle under cover of darkness; officers suspect a smuggling scheme and a deliberate evasion of the immigration law.
- The Cedar Boom Transforms Edmonds
A surge in timber production is turning the small town into a bustling manufacturing hub, quickly exhausting the local supply of vacant housing.
- The Pioneer’s Tale: A Life in the Early Puget Sound
Captain Henry Roeder, one of Whatcom County’s earliest settlers, recounts his journey from the California gold fields to establishing the region’s first sawmill.
- Seattle Bids Farewell to Its Founding Father
As Henry Yesler, the man who built the city's first sawmill, is laid to rest, Princess Angeline and the city's pioneers reflect on the rapid transformation of their frontier home.
- The Harbor Master’s Religious Test
An immigrant laborer claims he was denied city sewer work specifically for being a Greek Catholic.
- The Great Courthouse Debate
A citizen weighs in on the bitter feud over where to build King County's new courthouse, pitting the convenience of the downtown business district against the grandeur of the hill.
- The Senatorial Duel: A Tale of Two Cities and One Beltway Seat
As the Washington legislature prepares to convene in 1891, the race for the U.S. Senate descends into a fierce local rivalry between established incumbent Watson C. Squire of Seattle and the ambitious newcomer Judge William H. Calkins of Tacoma.
- The Coal That Wasn't: A Town’s Brief Hope for a Mining Bonanza
A newcomer to Seattle claims to have found a vein of coal in the hills, sparking local excitement before the details vanish into silence.
- The Laundries of Lenora Street
A cat-and-mouse game between Seattle authorities and Chinese migrants navigating the exclusionary landscape of 1892.
- The Daily Parade of Moral Rottenness
A fed-up Seattle resident petitions City Hall to end the brazen practice of parading sex workers through the city's main streets by carriage and brass band.
- Hellfire and Fainting: A Celebrity Preacher Packs Seattle's Jubilee Hall
The English broad churchman drew such a crowd that two people fainted and latecomers were turned away from Jubilee Hall.
- The Boomtown That Stretched Itself Thin
A local builder’s report from 1889 reveals how rapid development and land speculation transformed Snohomish into a fragmented town of 'additions,' while warning of an impending labor downturn.
- The Man Who Spent Like a Lord—and Might Have Been Nobody
A mysterious newcomer at Seattle’s Northern Hotel flashed gold and convinced much of the lobby he was Lord Sholto Douglas, brother of Oscar Wilde’s lover—until a skeptic began asking questions.
- The Employment Agents Who Sold Phantom Jobs
Seattle's labor commissioner wants City Hall to crack down on agents who charge workers for jobs that don't exist—or pay them in worthless due bills.
- The Condemned Murderer Who Ran the Jailhouse Court
Thomas Blanck, awaiting execution for murder, was unanimously elected to preside over the county jail's prisoner-run tribunal—complete with fines, lashes, and a Bible in his cell.
- The Snohomish Land Grab: How Original Owners Inflated Prices and Plotted in the Dark
A scathing review of the town's growth reveals a community divided by greed, where original plat owners are accused of hoarding land and manipulating records to squeeze newcomers out of the real estate boom.
- The Colony Train Bound for Whidbey Island
Eighteen Michigan farm families arrived in Seattle to take land near Oak Harbor, part of a Dutch-led colonization push promising dairies, fruit farms and a thousand new households on Puget Sound.