Research the archive
Narrow 22,457 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 |
|---|---|
| 1854 | 1 |
| 1863 | 1 |
| 1871 | 1 |
| 1876 | 7 |
| 1877 | 3 |
| 1878 | 2 |
| 1880 | 3 |
| 1882 | 2 |
| 1883 | 12 |
| 1884 | 1 |
| 1885 | 11 |
| 1886 | 3 |
| 1887 | 5 |
| 1888 | 3 |
| 1889 | 17 |
| 1890 | 7 |
| 1891 | 16 |
| 1892 | 91 |
| 1893 | 15 |
| 1894 | 33 |
| 1895 | 22 |
| 1897 | 3 |
| 1899 | 7 |
| 1902 | 1 |
| 1903 | 10 |
| 1904 | 4 |
| 1905 | 10 |
| 1909 | 1 |
| 1911 | 2 |
| 1912 | 1 |
| 1914 | 15 |
| 1915 | 15 |
| 1916 | 10 |
| 1917 | 8 |
| 1918 | 4 |
| 1922 | 1 |
| 1923 | 2 |
| 1924 | 3 |
353 stories matching canal
- The Judge Who Warned Seattle Not to Sell Its Waterfront to a Canal Company
In 1894, Judge John J. McGilvra urged Congress to build the Lake Washington Ship Canal and warned that a private company's tideflat scheme would put tolls on the water and enrich speculators at public expense.
- Seattle Lost the Ship Canal Fight in One Olympia Night
The 1892 Democratic state convention rejected the Lake Washington ship canal, humiliated King County's delegates and nominated Henry J. Snively for governor — setting off a political feud over Seattle's waterfront future.
- Seattle and Tacoma Nearly Came to Blows Over the Ship Canal
At the 1892 Democratic state convention, King County's demand for a canal plank turned the floor into a shouting mob — and the vote flipped twice in a single night.
- The Ship Canal Double-Cross at the Democratic Convention
Seattle's delegates went to Olympia ready to die on the canal plank. Their own campaign manager had already sold them out.
- The Canal That Would Raise Salmon Bay—and Fill Its Marshes
Government engineers promise Seattle property owners that the Lake Washington ship canal will not strand them: excavated earth will fill submerged land and a public street will run alongside the right-of-way.
- The Canal Plank That Nearly Tore Washington’s Democrats Apart
In Olympia, King County delegates fought Pierce County over whether to endorse the Lake Washington canal. They settled on a vague promise, then spent the night shouting each other down.
- The Chamber Wants 500 Letters to Congress for a Nicaragua Canal
Seattle's Chamber of Commerce trustees endorse a coast-wide letter-writing campaign aimed at forcing a Senate vote on the Nicaragua canal before the middle of January.
- The Canal Came With a Catch: Seattle Had to Secure the Land
Congress had finally committed to a Lake Washington ship canal, but the money came with a condition: Seattle had to secure a free right-of-way from property owners. In 1894, civic leaders began the campaign that would decide whether the project moved forward.
- Seattle Democrats Bolt Their Own Party Over the Lake Washington Canal
Furious that the state convention caved to Pierce County and denounced the Lake Washington canal, King County Democrats vow to vote the Republican ticket — and to knife their own party from top to bottom.
- Who Should Own the Canal That Would Make King County?
In a long letter to the editor, a Seattle correspondent takes apart the bill letting King County buy the Washington Canal — and warns that handing the region's only outlet to a private company would 'sell the birthright of the future citizens.'
- The Canal That Would Invent South Seattle
At meetings in Georgetown and River Park, property owners pledged land, cash, and labor to a waterway scheme they promised would drain the Duwamish and turn tide flats into gold.
- The Canal That Would Make Seattle an Island
In 1883, surveyors proposed locks and canals linking Lake Union and Lake Washington to tidewater—so coal could move by water and Seattle could 'practically stand on an island.'
- Cheers, Hisses and a Canal: The Night Tacoma Cheered the Ditch It Was Told Would Ruin It
At a packed Republican mass-meeting in Germania Hall, speaker after speaker dared the crowd to believe the Lake Washington canal would destroy Tacoma — and the crowd roared back that it would not.
- The Political Price of Panama
When Democratic senators tried to expose the secrets behind the Panama Canal, they inadvertently revealed a web of European intrigue that bolstered the case for American intervention.
- Seattle’s Canal Demand Became a Political Trap
At the 1892 Democratic state convention in Olympia, King County’s push for a Lake Washington ship canal collided with a Pierce County-led alliance—and James Hamilton Lewis’s gubernatorial hopes hung in the balance.
- The Secretary of the Navy Rides a Streetcar and Sees Seattle's Future
Secretary of the Navy Herbert spends a rainy Sabbath touring the proposed Lake Washington ship canal, is dazzled by the view from Broadway, and declares the waterway not only certain but a naval refuge in wartime.
- The Legislators Who Came to See a Ditch—and Left Believers
A steamboat tour of Smith Cove and Lake Union turns Eastern Washington lawmakers into ship-canal converts.
- The Canal Fight That Would Reshape Seattle
Senator Allen's enemies are attacking him over his support for the Lake Washington ship canal — but the 1889 legislative memorial shows one of his loudest critics once voted for it.
- They Said Seattle's Ship Canal Was Hogging the Money. The Appropriations Bill Said Otherwise.
A Pierce County Democratic plank accuses Washington's senators of starving Northwest rivers and harbors to fund the Lake Washington canal. A Seattle paper answers with receipts — $2.3 million for the Columbia, roughly $100,000 for the canal — and an old rivalry with Portland and Tacoma underneath.
- Tacoma Refuses to Play Dog-in-the-Manger on Seattle's Ship Canal
When Seattle's chamber pushed a Lake Washington ship canal, Tacoma's president said regional gain mattered more than blocking a rival—then hedged.
- Seattle Cut Water Rates—Then Claimed the Lake
In one night at City Hall, the council trimmed water bills for every ratepayer and got legal cover to take Lake Washington water, even if it meant digging its own canal past a private company.
- Seattle Wined and Dined the Legislature to Sell the Ship Canal
In February 1893, city leaders invited every state lawmaker to Seattle at city expense—then walked them to the Lake Washington portage to argue for county bonds and a canal.
- A Million Dollars Secured for the Lake Washington Canal
David E. Durie returns from the East with financing for the tide flats waterway and ship canal, contingent on right-of-way and lock guarantees.
- The $5.5 Million Bet That Would Reshape Seattle's Waterfront
St. Louis investors sign on to fill the tide flats and dig a canal linking Lake Washington to Puget Sound, betting Seattle will become the Pacific coast's leading city.
- The Canal That Could Freeze England: A Climate Warning from the Isthmus of Panama
In 1877, Seattle’s press warned that digging a canal through Central America might divert the Gulf Stream, plunging Europe into an ice age—a bizarre but prescient look at early environmental anxiety.
Also about this, in other words
- The Dream of a Waterway: Seattle's 1892 Vision
Before the Panama Canal, Washington's Senator John B. Allen championed a trans-hemispheric waterway through Nicaragua to liberate the Pacific Northwest from the high costs of rail transit.
- The Navy Wants a Freshwater Harbor in Seattle
A federal board backs the Lake Washington canal as a strategic refuge for steel ships—and a way to escape the teredo worms eating Puget Sound's timber wharves.
- A Small Sum, a Large Victory: Washington Gets Behind the Lake Washington Canal
Congress sets aside $25,000 for the canal — a modest figure that Seattle reads as the federal government finally saying yes to a waterway Oregon spent years fighting.
- The Great Canal Vision of 1894
Captain Symons reports on the ambitious, multi-million dollar proposal to carve a ship canal through Seattle's south end to connect Puget Sound with Lake Washington.
- Naval Officers Advocate for a Fresh-Water Canal
High-ranking officers from the USS Mohican argue that a ship canal connecting Puget Sound to Lake Washington would provide a vital, secure fresh-water anchorage for the U.S. Navy.
- The Great Canal Dream of 1887
A visionary project to link Lake Union and Lake Washington promises to turn Seattle into a fresh-water harbor, revolutionizing the lumber industry and securing the city's future.
- The Senatorial Candidate and the Canal
Ole Hanson brings his fiery brand of politics to the Kennewick Commercial Club, debating the Panama Canal's toll exemption.
- The Dream of a Gateway to the Lakes
In 1892, Senator Watson Squire made a bold pitch to Congress for a ship canal connecting Puget Sound to Lakes Union and Washington, arguing it would be a strategic marvel for the U.S. Navy and the region’s commercial might.