A Sunday Visit to the Seattle Missions
A traveler reflects on the diverse congregations and the labor of local churches in the growing city of Seattle.
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.
Arriving at Seattle on Saturday evening and being kindly greeted by Rev. W. D. Harrington, pastor of the Methodist church at that place, I soon found myself in a favorable situation to discover the status of things Methodist under his oversight. On Sunday morning I visited one of the several rooms they are occupying for their meetings and found it used to be a brewery. On the walls of the room, there were Chinese characters indicating that the church did not overlook the poor heathen at our door. In the class meeting there were those who spoke in their native tongues with much feeling; some ignorant of their language, I could only understand one word—the name of our common Savior, Jesus. There were present of other nationalities there. How large is God's family. The sermon in the morning was by Rev. J. H. Skudmore, recently of Union Academy, Olympia, and was much happy in its delivery and effect upon the audience. When he closed there were not a few tearful eyes and tender hearts in the room. At 2 p.m. the pastor, Brother Harrington, had the difficult and delicate task of preaching the funeral of Chief Engineer Knapp, who lost his life in the burning of the steamer Mississippi. The duty was well performed in a thoughtful and tender manner.
“How large is God's family. Scarcely a niche under the sun where men do not call him Father, and breathe the name of our Savior.”
This account captures Seattle in a moment of rapid transition, where space once used for brewing (a centerpiece of 19th-century social life) was being reclaimed for religious mission work. It highlights the city's early multicultural and maritime character, marked by the constant danger of boiler explosions on the Sound.
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