Kennewick’s New Northern Pacific Depot
A grand new terminal hints at a bright future for the year-old town of Kennewick.
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.
The new Northern Pacific depot at Kennewick, which is said to be the finest on the line with four exceptions, will be completed in a few days and thrown open to the public. The company has taken special pains and has made a splendid depot here with commodious, separate waiting rooms for ladies and gentlemen, as well as large baggage and express rooms. The belief is growing that the company intends to build the road from Kennewick down the north bank of the Columbia River to Portland, otherwise so magnificent a depot would hardly have been erected in a town only one year old, which already possessed a depot as good as the average. The Kennewick Academy is being rapidly completed and will be ready to open January 4, 1904, under a university-trained faculty. Prospects are bright for a good attendance from the start. The school will accommodate in its present size about 70 pupils. It will be a boarding and day school and will prepare students for university work as well as teach the higher courses of academic studies.
“The belief is growing that the company intends to build the road from Kennewick down the north bank of the Columbia river to Portland, otherwise so magnificent a depot would hardly have been erected.”
This 1903 report captures the classic era of railroad-driven townsite promotion, where an expensive depot served as both civic infrastructure and a speculative signal for investment. Today, Kennewick remains a crucial transportation hub at the junction of the Columbia and Yakima rivers, though its growth is now defined by the modern regional economy rather than transcontinental rail expansion.
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