Banking on Seattle’s Resilience
When the First Presbyterian Church laid its cornerstone in 1893, they buried a message of defiance against the global financial panic.
The story, cleaned up
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The cornerstone of the new edifice of the First Presbyterian Church of Seattle, Wash., was laid with impressive ceremonies on August 23 by Rev. George F. Whitworth, the founder of the church. Among the articles deposited in the stone was a blank book containing the following memorable statement: 'A bank has never failed in Seattle to date. We have twenty banks. We have just passed through a commercial and financial panic which has been worldwide. There has not been a failure of any kind in Seattle.' This is a somewhat unprecedented proceeding in the annals of church building, yet it is not inappropriate that a town with such a record, which even the financial storms of the past summer have not shaken from its firm foundations, should feel like handing it down to future generations imperishably preserved.
“A bank has never failed in Seattle to date. We have twenty banks. There has not been a failure of any kind in Seattle.”
In 1893, Seattle was betting its identity on the stability of its banks as a shield against global depression. Today, Seattle’s identity is defined by the opposite: a boom-and-bust economy driven by the volatility of tech giants and housing markets, making this 19th-century confidence in 'firm foundations' feel like a ghost of a much quieter city.
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