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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1854 | 3 |
| 1859 | 2 |
| 1861 | 1 |
| 1862 | 2 |
| 1865 | 1 |
| 1872 | 4 |
| 1876 | 26 |
| 1877 | 31 |
| 1878 | 20 |
| 1879 | 1 |
| 1880 | 2 |
| 1882 | 3 |
| 1883 | 20 |
| 1884 | 8 |
| 1885 | 23 |
| 1886 | 7 |
| 1887 | 7 |
| 1888 | 17 |
| 1889 | 42 |
| 1890 | 8 |
| 1891 | 30 |
| 1892 | 45 |
| 1893 | 42 |
| 1894 | 60 |
| 1895 | 30 |
| 1897 | 1 |
| 1898 | 2 |
| 1899 | 9 |
| 1900 | 1 |
| 1902 | 3 |
| 1903 | 29 |
| 1904 | 19 |
| 1905 | 6 |
| 1908 | 1 |
| 1909 | 11 |
| 1910 | 2 |
| 1911 | 5 |
| 1912 | 1 |
| 1914 | 4 |
| 1915 | 4 |
| 1916 | 17 |
| 1917 | 20 |
| 1918 | 3 |
| 1919 | 1 |
| 1923 | 6 |
| 1924 | 1 |
581 stories matching materi
- The Forest Empire That Built Washington
A sweeping 1900 survey of the state's lumber industry counted billions of feet of standing timber, 250 sawmills, and $7 million a year in wages—proof that the trees, not the cities, came first.
- New Law Reshapes Local Construction Business
A legislative change forces material men to provide duplicate invoices, altering building financial practices in Tacoma.
- New Law Empowers Workers to Claim Liens
A significant legislative act passes, allowing laborers and material providers to secure their pay through property liens.
- Under Fire on the Way to Spokane: Seattle's Militia Rode Into a Rail War
Col. Joseph Green's detachment returns from Spokane after escorting a mutinied company through burned bridges, ambushes and striker country—and the city turns out to cheer.
- The Great Moss Panic of 1878
Seattle's early city council once declared war on rooftop greenery to prevent the city from burning down.
- Seattle’s Fire Chief Fights a Naturalization-Fraud Indictment
Chief Hunt’s lawyers argued that false statements on his citizenship papers did not matter—because Washington’s constitution had already made him a citizen.
- The Clay Under Seattle Built a Million-Dollar Industry
King County clay works turned local deposits into firebrick, paving brick, sewer pipe and architectural terra cotta—winning federal tests and employing hundreds of men.
- The Counterfeit 'Rye Straw' Cigar Scam
Tobacco merchants discover a deceptive new counterfeit cigar wrapper made of chemically treated rye straw.
- Construction Stalls on Walla Walla’s Grand New High School
A shortage of skilled bricklayers and delayed materials push the completion date of the city's premier educational facility into late autumn.
- The Ghost of Fort Steilacoom: Workers Cheated Out of Their Wages
A group of laborers at the new asylum construction site speak out against contractors and commissioners who left them unpaid and used rot-prone materials.
- The Fifty-Year Streetcar Bargain
Seattle's house of delegates spent a night haggling over Fred Sander's railway franchise—how much rent, how often, and whether Seattle-made steel could be required.
- The Body in the Hen House: An Unidentified Murder Near Eagle Harbor
A well-dressed stranger was found half-burned in an abandoned Kitsap County farmhouse, with only spectacles, a corkscrew, and a torn newspaper to say who he was.
- The Birth of Mechanic's Liens in Washington Territory
A landmark 1854 statute established the right for laborers to place liens on buildings and land to ensure they were paid for their work.
- A Wife's Testimony Was Enough: Supreme Court Reverses Divorce Denial
The Washington Supreme Court ruled that a wife's own account of cruelty and habitual drunkenness could justify a divorce, reversing a lower court that had dismissed Nellie Lee's case.
- The Death of the American Shipyard
In an 1873 speech, Congressman Alexander Mitchell argued that excessive taxation and protectionist tariffs were systematically destroying the American shipping industry, forcing once-prosperous shipbuilders into obsolescence.
- The Crumbling Walls of Steilacoom
A group of builders and taxpayers exposes shoddy construction at the new Territorial Asylum.
- The Unintended Cost of a Building Delay
A construction dispute over the Gottstein Building leads to a rare courtroom victory for the defendants against a major contractor.
- The Fight to Protect Seattle’s Builders from Disappearing Contractors
In 1891, local lawmakers drafted a landmark lien law to ensure workers and suppliers were paid even when contractors fled with the money.
- 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.
- A Free Kindergarten Wants the Old South School—and the City's Horses Out
The Free Kindergarten Association asks for the old South School building, now the city stables, promising donated labor and materials—but the school board cannot muster a quorum to answer.
- The Fire Ordinance of 1892
New city laws mandate fireproof construction materials in North Yakima's central business district to protect against catastrophic loss.
- Broken Rails and Broken Promises
A construction company sues the Canadian Pacific Railway for failing to deliver materials on time, causing a project to stall.
- The County's Ledger: A Glimpse into Snohomish Life in 1877
Minutes from the Snohomish County Commissioners reveal a town in transition: new justices, bridge bids, and the quiet bureaucracy of building a community on the edge of the frontier.
- The Great Tacoma Brick Boom: A City Building Itself Into the Future
As ten new brick structures rise on Water Street and real estate auctions fetch record prices, Tacoma’s leaders are betting big on a booming future—despite labor shortages and material scarcity.
- The Judge Who Was Both Defendant and Accused
In a stunning legal double-header, Judge Wickersham is convicted of seduction in one court, then immediately indicted for perjury by the federal grand jury in the very same day.