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182 stories matching ash
- The Engineer’s Ash-Box Ghost: A Tale of New Year’s Eve Peril
In a column dated October 1870, the Seattle Daily Intelligencer reprints a harrowing tale from an old engineer about surviving a wreck by hiding under his locomotive's ash pan during a blizzard.
- The Tragedy at White Ash Mine
Ten miners are trapped in a flooded colliery with little hope of rescue, sparking a somber realization for local families.
- Domestic Tragedy Ends in Murder
A confession reveals a deadly conspiracy and a motive rooted in marital strife.
- The Underground Fire Beneath Jackson Street
Firemen battle a persistent blaze burning within the tide-flat ashes beneath the electric light works.
- Tragedy in the Woods: Two Brothers Die in Fire
A ranching family returns to their home near Colby to find their children dead in the ashes, sparking a community effort to assist the destitute parents.
- The Great Seattle Fire: Building a City from Ash and Embers
In the immediate aftermath of the devastating 1889 fire that leveled the city’s business district, Seattle residents and property owners rush to clear the smoldering ruins and plan a more substantial, brick-built future.
- The Great Fire of Seattle: A City in Ashes
As the dust settles on the inferno that consumed the heart of the young settlement, residents face the daunting task of rebuilding from nothing.
- The Night Cheney Burned to the Ground
A pre-dawn fire decimated half of Cheney’s business district, leaving city officials to suspect arson as the town vowed to rise again from the ashes.
- The Human Cargo in the Ash Pan
A steamship captain reveals the desperate lengths to which his crew went to smuggle Chinese laborers past authorities in the Puget Sound.
- Formaldehyde in the Milk: Seattle's Pure Food Prosecutions
State Dairy and Pure Food Commissioner E. A. McDonald reports eight Seattle milk sellers fined for adulteration, including formaldehyde and low butterfat, as part of a statewide crackdown.
- Hot Ashes Nearly Burn Down Olympia’s Pride
A carelessly discarded batch of hot ashes smoldered for hours in the Capitol Steam Laundry before bursting into flame beneath the Olympia Hotel.
- Rising from the Ashes: The Great Seattle Fire of 1888
While the downtown core smoldered, Seattle citizens gathered in the courthouse—lit by tallow dips—to demand a modern city of brick and stone, rejecting makeshift wooden shacks and dreaming of a reconstructed metropolis.
- The City in Ashes
After a devastating fire leaves Ellensburgh in ruins, North Yakima reflects on the fragile nature of boomtown prosperity.
- The Desert Blooms: Harnessing the Yakima River
A look at the massive Sunnyside Canal project promising to turn 75,000 acres of arid volcanic ash into a fruit-growing paradise.
- The Great Fire That Turned Seattle’s Suburb into Ash
A fast-moving blaze in the early morning hours consumed nearly all of South Seattle's business district, leaving dozens of families destitute and causing over $100,000 in damage.
- From the Ashes of the Great Seattle Fire
A desperate plea for resilience and community support in the days following the catastrophic 1889 fire that leveled the city’s business district.
- The Ashes of Affluence: How Seattle’s Burnt District Became a Goldmine
While the city mourns the destruction of its commercial heart, savvy investors are turning charred lots into fortunes, with property values tripling in just years.
- The Phosphorus Terror of Hoquiam
A saboteur sows the streets with incendiary devices, nearly reducing the town to ash before the rains intervene.
- The Great Buckley Fire Wipes Out East Main Street
A lumber town’s business district is reduced to ash after a mill fire jumps the tracks and consumes an entire city block.
- The Man Who Robbed Seattle's Fire Relief Fund Walked Out of Prison on Friday
Five years after the great fire of 1889 turned Seattle to ash, the secretary trusted to hand out relief money — an inspector who forged checks to invented men — finished his sentence and went free, his full take never known.
- The Desert Blooms: Bringing Irrigation to the Selah Valley
A ambitious engineering effort to bring water to 50,000 acres of arid volcanic ash soil promises to transform the North Yakima region into a premier agricultural hub.
- Seattle’s Tinderbox: A Warning from the Ashes of Reno
As a massive fire ravages Nevada, this Seattle editor sounds the alarm over the city’s wooden buildings and exorbitant insurance costs, urging brick construction before disaster strikes.
- Rising from the Ashes
How Snohomish views the devastating Great Seattle Fire and its own precarious growth.
- The Buried Assessment of Prospect Avenue
A long-forgotten ordinance from the city's past resurfaces, hitting property owners with an unexpected bill for a street expansion years in the making.
- The Mysterious Disappearance of L. Fare
A pioneer resident vanishes from his Keyport home, which was found burned to the ground; sheriff finds no evidence of a body in the ashes.
Also about this, in other words
- A Hearth Turned to Ash
A family breakfast was interrupted by a devastating chimney fire that consumed their home ten miles outside of town.
- Tragedy in the Ashford Coal Mine
A foreman dies in a heroic but doomed effort to rescue his colleagues trapped by an explosion of fire damp deep beneath the earth.
- A Fire Trap in the Making
Carelessness with ashes and exploding lamps threaten to consume a downtown business block.
- Arson Attack at Snohomish Mercantile
An incendiary device was discovered burning in the floorboards of a Chinese-owned store, nearly igniting the heart of the business district.
- Cigarettes Ignite a Spokane Lumber Yard
A blaze in the Falls City Lumber Company yard leaves a homeowner and a company with thousands in losses.
- Rising from the Ashes: A Retail Giant’s Rebirth
After the Great Seattle Fire destroyed their store, Toklas, Singerman Co. pledges to build a new retail empire in a city still cleaning up the soot.
- Arson Attempt Targets Chinese Business District
A deliberate fire set in the basement of Wah Chong's store nearly triggers a catastrophe for the city's business sector.
- A Warning Ignored, a Blast That Broke Four Ribs
A Great Northern worker was badly injured near Newport when a heavy blast threw a rock into his chest, despite warnings to move.