The Promised Land of Ross Station
A speculative 1888 land advertisement promises a bustling future of manufacturing and homeownership at Salmon Bay, enticing Seattle laborers to invest in a 'suburban' boom.
Building Lots! Lots 40, 50 and 60x110 feet, only $100 to $150 per lot. The best located, most desirable and cheapest suburban property on the market today. It is situated within three and a half miles of the Seattle Post Office on the Seattle, Lake Shore & Eastern R.R. and within ten minutes' easy walk of Ross Station on that road. Four minutes' walk to Salmon Bay. One mile to the Seattle Coal Car Shops. This beautiful locality is particularly suited for the location of homes, as it is within easy reach of Seattle center by rail or carriage road and with the various manufactories already situated there, and the various ones that have secured sites to locate there within the next few months, there will be openings for hundreds of machinists, carpenters, masons, and in fact all kinds of skilled and unskilled laborers. Ross Post Office is soon to be established, as is also a general store, which will add much to the value, and a great advantage is that there is a schoolhouse on the ground for the children.
“This beautiful locality is particularly suited for the location of homes, as it is within easy reach of Seattle center by rail or carriage road.”
This 1888 advertisement for a 'suburban' development near Salmon Bay reveals the early roots of Seattle’s expansionist housing culture. While the specific promised infrastructure—like the Ross Station schoolhouse—has long since vanished into the fabric of the modern-day Ballard/Fremont corridor, the pitch remains eerily familiar to anyone tracking today's real estate market: the promise of affordable, accessible homes for workers on the city's fringe.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.