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106 stories matching hardwar
- The $40 Forgery That Fooled Seattle’s Hardware Elite
A dashing stranger with a dark mustache and bare chest walks into W.P. Boyd & Co., flashes a forged check from the Seattle Hardware Company, and vanishes with $40 in cash—leaving behind only a single typo that saves the victim from total ruin.
- Fire Scare in Everett
A hardware store blaze threatened to consume a full city block of frame buildings.
- The Newport Hardware Man Who Went Through Johnstown — and Kept the River Mud to Prove It
In his store window, E. E. Reid displays a gilded St. George torn from a clock and a rocking chair pulled from the 1889 Johnstown flood — silt still hardened in the crevices — and jokes that he is still selling hardware because the flood only went through him, not over him.
- The Mysterious Hardware Peddler
A man arrested at Front and Pike streets offers a flimsy excuse for the odd assortment of hardware in his possession.
- Spokane Hardware Dealers Enforce Union Pricing
Wholesale hardware stores agree to penalize non-union horseshoers by doubling supply costs.
- Three Break-ins at One Hardware Store—and an Armed Holdup in the Lumber Yards
Reid Hardware was burglarized for the third time, with guns and knives stolen, while Ralph Kennedy was relieved of $2.80 at revolver-point in the lumber yards.
- A Pioneer's Desperate End
After business reverses and personal tragedy, a pioneer hardware merchant dies by suicide in his North Seattle store.
- A High-Wire Heist at Ninth and Commerce
Budding criminals scaled a twelve-foot transom to loot a hardware store, only to ignore a massive, unlocked safe in favor of a handful of change.
- Elevator Mishap at Hunt Mottet Hardware
A 14-year-old employee was critically injured while operating a freight elevator in downtown Tacoma.
- Seattle Rallies for the Families of the Franklin Mine Dead
As donations begin arriving at the Post-Intelligencer, Seattle’s Black community organizes its own relief committee for the families of miners killed in the Franklin disaster.
- Seattle Goes Door to Door to Dig Its Canal
Volunteers bank nearly $28,000 in a single day, pushing the $800,000 Lake Washington Waterway fund close to its goal — with everyone from banks to hardware clerks chipping in.
- The Opera House Gets Moved for a Concrete Block
H. M. Lund will replace Newport's Opera House with a two-story reinforced-concrete hardware store, while the old theater is sold and rolled north on Washington Avenue.
- Seattle's Merchants Band Together Against Freight Rates
Leading shippers in the city convene at the Bailey block to form a new organization to challenge discriminatory transportation costs.
- Disaster at the Hardware Store
A shelf collapse at a prominent Seattle hardware firm results in injury and property loss, highlighting the hazards of downtown commercial growth.
- The Eight-Hour Push: Seattle Hardware Stores Lead the Way
Local hardware merchants agree to close at 6 p.m. to grant employees the 'benefit of the long summer evenings' for rest and recreation.
- Seattle’s First Battle for a Long Weekend
In 1889, Seattle’s hardware merchants pioneered a movement to close shops early on summer evenings to give workers time for leisure and self-improvement.
- The Opium Smuggler of the Union Depot
A traveler posing as a hardware salesman is arrested in Spokane after authorities discover 1,300 pounds of contraband in his luggage.
- A Two-Year Railroad Fight Ends with a $6,000 Check
After two years in court, H. M. Lund's property dispute with the Idaho & Washington Northern ends in a buyout; his hardware store will move to Washington Avenue and the old building will come down.
- The Tragic Collapse at the Hardware Store
A routine day at a Seattle business turned into a scene of horror when a deep, shifting excavation buried a worker alive.
- The Kent Burglary Manhunt
A hardware store robbery leads to a tense, armed pursuit through the thickets of the Green River valley.
- The Midnight Track-Layers
A hardware store owner battles a railroad company that allegedly used stealth to install tracks in front of his home and business.
- The Iron Hook Assault
A hardware store clerk is severely injured by a one-armed man wielding a prosthetic iron hook in a dispute over a wheelbarrow.
- The Blacksmith Who Wasn't: A Stranger’s Fatal Mistake in Walla Walla
S.F. Olson, a visitor from Touchet, died after being struck by a hack in downtown Walla Walla. His identity was only confirmed by a receipt from a local hardware store, leaving his family and origins unknown.
- The Ballard Burglary That Left a Trail
A botched break-in at a Ballard hardware store left behind the tools of the trade, complete with the thief's initials.
- Fifteen Years, Rate Caps and a Free Phone: Newport Bargains With the Telephone Company
The city council cut a proposed 35-year franchise down to 15, capped rates at $1.50 for a two-party line, demanded a free city phone and reserved wire space on every pole.
Also about this, in other words
- Domestic Dispute Leads to Arrest in Richland
A man faces jail time after allegedly threatening his wife with a firearm during a domestic dispute.
- The Hardscrabble Frontier of the Stillaguamish
A detailed 1879 survey of the Stillaguamish River valley reveals a diverse community of pioneers, Prussian soldiers, and dreamers attempting to tame the wilderness of the upper valley.
- The 'Hard Times' Social in Black Diamond
Coal miners and their families in Black Diamond held a 'Hard Times' social, where the most bedraggled costumes were awarded prizes, offering a brief moment of levity during a period of economic strain.
- The World-Famous 'Nonpareil' Comes to Fairhaven
Jack Dempsey, the legendary middleweight champion, brings a high-profile glove contest to the local Casino Theatre, electrifying the town.
- The Hard Pan Tax Dispute
A small-town legal battle in Anacortes reveals how railroad companies and local governments clashed over the definition of 'rock' to dodge municipal assessments.