The Seattle Nurseries of 1877
A glimpse into the blossoming commercial landscape of early Seattle, when local agriculture and ‘city-hardy’ fruit trees were the foundation of a growing frontier town.
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.
Located one mile east from Yesler’s Wharf on the road to Lake Washington, the Seattle Nursery offers fruit trees, shrubbery, and herbaceous plants to the settlers of the region. Among the current offerings are several choice varieties of peaches adapted to this climate and known to ripen early. How’s Stage runs past the nursery twice a day, providing ready access for those looking to cultivate the fertile soil of the growing settlement. Proprietor O.W. Lawton invites the public to inspect the stock as the spring planting season arrives in the Washington Territory.
“Several choice varieties of peaches that are adapted to this climate and ripen early.”
In 1877, Seattle was a small mill town looking toward the hills for agriculture; today, that 'road to Lake Washington' is a densely paved urban corridor. The transition from peach orchards to urban sprawl captures the rapid metamorphosis of Seattle from a frontier outpost into a high-density metropolis.
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