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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1854 | 1 |
| 1861 | 5 |
| 1863 | 1 |
| 1876 | 3 |
| 1877 | 2 |
| 1878 | 1 |
| 1880 | 1 |
| 1882 | 1 |
| 1885 | 4 |
| 1887 | 1 |
| 1889 | 3 |
| 1891 | 8 |
| 1892 | 6 |
| 1893 | 7 |
| 1894 | 2 |
| 1895 | 6 |
| 1903 | 1 |
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55 stories matching swan
- Seattle's 1895 Warning: Secure Cedar River Water Before Private Speculators Do
City Engineer R. H. Thomson says Seattle's overworked pumps cannot survive another summer and urges the city to buy the Cedar River watershed, dams and reservoir sites while it still can.
- The Monster Canoe That Defeated a Donkey Engine
Judge James Swan's colossal Northwest canoe sat nine months on the wharf — until one determined shipping agent and a hundred willing hands hauled it aboard the Dakota for Philadelphia.
- The Legal Quandary of Chinese Exclusion
A local judge grapples with the harsh realities and administrative conflicts of the 1892 Chinese Exclusion Act.
- 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 Seal Pup Wars: A Local Naturalist vs. The Smithsonian’s ‘Sense-Keeper’
James G. Swan, a long-time Neah Bay resident and customs inspector, challenges Henry W. Elliott’s decades-old claim that newborn fur seal pups sink like stones, offering eyewitness testimony from Captain Elijah McAlmond that they swim.
- The Old Man and the Confidence Men
An elderly traveler is swindled out of his watch and checks by a pair of smooth-talking con artists in a Seattle saloon.
- The Great Seal Controversy: Do Pups Swim or Sink?
Local mariners and traders challenge the prevailing scientific 'fables' about seal pup habits to protest federal regulation of North Pacific sealing.
- Fourth of July at Fort Simcoe
A report on an orderly, celebratory Fourth of July gathering of Indian families and local white residents at Fort Simcoe.
- Rabies Outbreak Reported in White Swan
Authorities fear coyotes are spreading disease, urging residents to secure pets.
- Two Hundred Odd Fellows Take Walla Walla — and an Old Man Cannot Speak
The state grand lodge opens three days of sessions at the Odd Fellows' Temple, elects its officers, and surprises an eighty-year-old past grand master with a veteran's jewel.
- The Octopus and the Seal: A Local Captain’s War Against a Washington Monopoly
In 1901, Port Townsend resident James G. Swan published affidavits from experienced hunters to debunk Professor Elliott’s claim that seal pups sink like stones, exposing the Alaska Commercial Company’s stranglehold on federal policy.
- Women, Workers, and a $40,000 School Bond
Olympia prepared to vote on a new high school, with women at the polls and labor demanding that local hands build it.
- The Murder of Chief Swell
A faithful ally to white settlers is murdered in a cold-blooded territorial dispute, exposing the impotence of the Indian Agency.
- The People’s Ticket: Olympia’s 1891 Caucus Revolt
A printed slate handed out at the door, a mayor booed as 'defeated,' and a second-ward protest meeting: the fight over who would control Olympia's city nominations.
- Smallpox Scare Drives Indigenous Families from Port Townsend
After learning of a smallpox outbreak in British Columbia, a group of Kuyoquot Indians preparing to work the canneries turns back to protect their communities from contagion.
- The Trial of Ferdinand Falkenbarg
A shooting incident involving the 'Duke of York' and his family sparks outrage in Port Townsend, revealing the complex, fading status of local Indigenous leaders in the frontier era.
- The Mutinous Voyage of the Bark McNear
A crew alleges their captain was perpetually intoxicated, abusive, and endangered the ship while failing to provide decent food.
- The Shipwreck of the Persevere
A vessel founders near Cape Flattery, leading to a precarious encounter with local tribes and a recovery effort by Indian Agent H.A. Webster.
- The First Scythes: Makah Men Arrive in Port Townsend Looking for Work
Five men from Neah Bay came to town in 1876 to hire themselves out as mowers. A local editor praised their tools—and exposed the era's patronizing ideas about 'civilizing' Native people.
- The Sealing Monopoly Judge Swan Called a ‘Monumental Humbug’
A federal report from Port Townsend shows Puget Sound sealers thriving while a Smithsonian expert blasts the Alaska Commercial Company’s grip on the Pribilof Islands.
- Two Explosions on the Great Northern Grade Killed a Powder Driver
A load of dynamite tumbled into the upper Wenatchee River; days later, 100 kegs of black powder went up and Swan Johnson was blown eighty feet.
- The Swan of the Cascades
A rare and haunting encounter near the mountain pass ends in an act of Victorian mercy.
- The Search for a Proper Resting Place
When Seattle officials sought a name for a new city cemetery in 1885, they turned to Makah traditions to find a title befitting the 'land of the hereafter.'
- The Saloon Brawl That Mistakenly Made Headlines
A tavern fight in Hamilton, Washington, turned into a minor civic ordeal when a local justice of the peace panicked and assumed a man had been murdered.
- A War Party Among the Makah
James G. Swan recounts the violent return of a Makah war party to Neah Bay after a retaliatory expedition against the Elwha people near Dungeness.
Also about this, in other words
- The Violent Night at Port Blakely
A drunken dispute at a remote saloon leaves a man dead and a community reeling from the sudden eruption of gunfire.
- Wash Tubs and Tin Cans: A Hover Serenade
When a group of friends arrived to serenade newlyweds in Horse Heaven, they realized they had forgotten their instruments.
- A Close Call on the Grant Street Bridge
A real estate agent’s commute turned chaotic when local duck hunters accidentally peppered his horse with birdshot.
- The Mystery of the Yakima Avenue Diver
A rare northern bird is discovered in the middle of a city street at night, baffling locals until a taxidermist cements its place in history.
- The Unsinkable Seaman
After losing his leg in a shipboard accident, an American sailor invents a wooden limb that keeps him working the high seas.
- A Literal Sagebrush Collision
A local man's unadvertised diving exhibition ends in a heap of sagebrush.
- The Aristocratic Goose of Seattle
A satirical fable from the 1880 Seattle Daily Intelligencer offers a sharp critique of status-seeking and the folly of high-society marriages.
- The Great Yakima Duck Caper
A wild northern bird is lassoed in the middle of town by electric light, leading to a spectacle at the local hotel.