Herman Chapin's $300,000 Bet on Seattle
Despite a period of financial stringency, a local bank president secures Boston capital to build a massive, iron-and-glass department store complex on Second Avenue.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Herman Chapin, president of the Boston National bank, has just returned from a three weeks' absence in the East, where he completed arrangements for the construction of a magnificent new building which will be the first of its kind ever erected in Seattle. The building is to occupy an entire half block on Second street, between Madison and Spring. Fronting on Second street and 250 feet in length, the building will extend back 110 feet to an alley between Front and Second streets. The building will be a four-story brick structure—two stories below the level of Second street and two above—and the Second street front will be entirely of iron and plate glass. It will be constructed on the plan of department stores, with the idea of getting different lines of business into the same building. Mr. Chapin secured $300,000 subscribed with which to buy the lots and erect the building, calling it a show of confidence from the wealthiest and most conservative people in the country in the soundess of Seattle as a commercial and financial point.
“I look on the times now about the same as they were seven years ago, when I first came to Seattle and made my first investments for my Boston friends.”
This piece chronicles an era where 'Eastern capital' was the lifeblood of Seattle's rapid development. The reliance on external, speculative investment to drive massive urban projects mirrors the contemporary cycle of real-estate development in downtown Seattle.
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