The Boomtown That Almost Wasn't: Seattle in 1876
While the rest of the nation struggled through a deep economic depression, a local newspaper reflects on the unprecedented industrial and infrastructure expansion that transformed Seattle from a village into a bustling coal and lumber hub.
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 year which has just drifted from the confines of the present has been an eventful one in the history of our city. While a general feeling of uncertainty has prevailed throughout the Eastern states, attended by hard times and general business dejection, the heavy cloud of financial depression has been less formidable here. Seattle has been favored with a degree of prosperity, for which we have great reason to congratulate ourselves. At no period in the history of our pioneer city has its growth been so rapid. Building has been going on in every quarter. All of two hundred buildings have gone up during the past twelve months. Among them is a fine two-story brick building erected by the Frauenthal Brothers on Commercial Street at a cost of $10,000, a new hotel costing $17,000, and a county jail costing $16,000. Perhaps the most important work is the building and completion of the first fifteen miles of the Seattle & Walla Walla Railroad, an almost accomplished fact. The grading of Front Street and the systematic development of the city's infrastructure have also moved us away from the appearance of a 'large country village' toward a more symmetrical urban future. Our prosperity is rooted in the coal mines, particularly the Newcastle mine, which has seen production grow nearly fourfold in two years, and the industrious sawmills that define our landscape.
“At no period in the history of our pioneer city has its growth been so rapid. Building has been going on in every quarter.”
In 1876, Seattle was defining itself through rapid infrastructure investment and industrial output to insulate itself from national financial panics. Today, that same drive for 'symmetrical' growth and the struggle to balance industrial demand with a livable urban core remain the central tensions of Seattle’s housing and economic policy.
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