Research the archive
Narrow 25,688 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 |
| 1858 | 2 |
| 1859 | 2 |
| 1860 | 1 |
| 1861 | 1 |
| 1862 | 4 |
| 1863 | 3 |
| 1864 | 3 |
| 1872 | 11 |
| 1876 | 71 |
| 1877 | 77 |
| 1878 | 37 |
| 1879 | 10 |
| 1880 | 10 |
| 1882 | 13 |
| 1883 | 37 |
| 1884 | 22 |
| 1885 | 66 |
| 1886 | 44 |
| 1887 | 33 |
| 1888 | 22 |
| 1889 | 78 |
| 1890 | 14 |
| 1891 | 37 |
| 1892 | 121 |
| 1893 | 84 |
| 1894 | 97 |
| 1895 | 67 |
| 1897 | 2 |
| 1898 | 6 |
| 1899 | 22 |
| 1900 | 5 |
| 1902 | 1 |
| 1903 | 45 |
| 1904 | 38 |
| 1905 | 7 |
| 1907 | 2 |
| 1908 | 14 |
| 1909 | 34 |
| 1910 | 16 |
| 1911 | 7 |
| 1912 | 3 |
| 1914 | 27 |
| 1915 | 32 |
| 1916 | 40 |
| 1917 | 50 |
| 1918 | 8 |
| 1922 | 2 |
| 1923 | 22 |
| 1924 | 12 |
| 1925 | 8 |
| 1928 | 6 |
| 1929 | 1 |
1,378 stories matching communiti
- The Treasurer’s Bond Had a Hole in It
Seattle’s treasurer-elect filed a $90,000 bond, but wives’ names were penciled in, signatures were missing, and one backer wanted out.
- Her Wages Bought the House at Fourth and Plum. The Sheriff’s Deed Was Canceled.
Elizabeth Burkett turned a $700 gift into a hotel and a home. When a Pierce County judgment against her husband threatened it, a Thurston County judge traced the property back to her own labor.
- The Lease a Husband Had No Right to Sign
A Tacoma mercantile firm stopped paying $500-a-month rent, arguing the leased property was community property and the wives had never signed. Washington’s Supreme Court said the lease was not absolutely void—but the tenants had rights too.
- The Night Kennewick Lit Its Community Christmas Tree
Snow fell as hundreds of children gathered at Second and Yakima for candy, carols and a Boy Scout–guarded tree—with enough left over to send bags to a Spokane orphanage.
- The Great Snohomish Church Hunt: Why Our Clergy Keep Fleeing
A local editorial lambasts the community's inability to retain a minister, blaming itinerant preachers for their incompetence and demanding a permanent, educated clergyman who will actually work rather than just preach.
- The Temple of Thought: Snohomish Builds Its Own Athenaeum
A visiting orator declares the new Snohomish Athenaeum a 'temple of science, literature, and art,' rising from the wilderness to preserve the intellectual legacy of the Pacific Northwest.
- Thanks, Portland — Kennewick Already Has a Harbor
When the Portland Oregon Journal offered free wharf plans to upper Columbia towns, Kennewick's editor declined with civic pride: the Port of Kennewick already had a port engineer, a plan and the best wharf on the river.
- The 'Rich Deed' That Wasn't: Snohomish’s Wild Gold Rush Hoax and the Community’s Reality Check
A sensational tale of a legendary gold mine in Snohomish captivated locals, but the paper quickly pivots to a sobering assessment of the lumber industry's financial struggles and the region's agricultural potential.
- The Price of Marriage: Judge Hanford’s Ruling on Community Debt
A federal judge defines the unequal stakes for husbands and wives when a spouse faces a crushing legal judgment.
- The Night Kennewick Didn't Show
A Finley Grange fair meant to buy a piano turns into a bitter lesson in small-town loyalty, with only two Kennewick families in the hall.
- The Heirs Who Came for a Snohomish Subdivision — and Went Home Empty
Five years of litigation over half of a $40,000 estate ends in a demurrer: under the law of 1879, a dead wife's share of the community property belonged to her husband, and the people who bought lots in the Clay addition can keep their houses.
- Vancouver Paper Acknowledges Sympathy for Expelling Chinese Residents
A 1885 dispatch from the Vancouver Independent reveals the chilling, unchecked spread of anti-Chinese sentiment as communities across the Washington Territory debated the forced removal of residents.
- A Million-Dollar Land Grab and the Wife Left Behind
Abandoned for ten years in Pennsylvania, Mrs. J. E. Jordan comes to Seattle's superior court to stop her husband from deeding away the community's real estate to a medicine company — and names the men who helped him do it.
- The Mail-Order Menace: How Catalogs Were Killing Kennewick’s Main Street
A fiery editorial in the 1914 Courier-Reporter warns that buying from Montgomery Ward’s catalog is a betrayal of local commerce, arguing that every dollar sent to Chicago or New York directly causes the death of small-town merchants.
- The Divorce of a Capitalist
A bitter court battle over community property in 1893 Seattle reveals the fragility of marital assets and the legal weight of the 'community property' distinction.
- The Town Where Horses Wore Wooden Shoes
La Conner grew slowly on a rocky knoll in the Skagit delta, diked its tidal flats, and shipped out hay by the ton—while its horses clumped through spring mud in wooden moccasins.
- Kennewick Crushes Liberty Loan Goal
Despite being a community of borrowers rather than investors, local residents exceed their financial quota to support the war effort.
- The Sudden Passing of Captain E. A. Starr
A beloved community leader and steamship captain dies suddenly under mysterious circumstances.
- The Town That Forgot to Celebrate
Kennewick's editor warns that civic apathy is turning the community into a ghost town, one canceled event at a time.
- The Unsung Toll of the Snohomish Frontier
A poignant obituary for Julia E. Haskell reveals the fragile reality of life, health, and community dependence in 1878 Snohomish.
- A Seattle Wife Sued Her Husband for Beating Her. The Court Said She Couldn't.
Judge Osborne ruled that a married woman could not maintain a damages action against her husband for assault—even after testimony of a fist to the eye and kicks with heavy boots—sending the case to the state Supreme Court.
- The Price of Loyalty in Kennewick
Mayor Sherk forms a Vigilance Corps to monitor local residents for signs of 'disloyalty' toward the U.S. war effort.
- The Town That Lost Its Custom House
An observant traveler visits Port Townsend and finds a community reeling from political retaliation and questionable pulpit interpretations.
- The Railroad's Land Grab: How Northern Pacific Hoarded Snohomish’s Future
A local resident exposes the legal loopholes allowing the railroad to retain millions of acres in Western Washington, arguing that this concentrated ownership is strangling settlement and keeping land prices artificially high.
- A Community Under Siege: The Whidbey Island Diphtheria Outbreak
A harrowing account of how a single family was devastated by diphtheria in Oak Harbor during the summer of 1887.