Same Streets
← All stories

Launch of the Schooner Chehalis

The largest vessel ever built on Grays Harbor slides into the water at Hoquiam.

The four-masted schooner Chehalis was launched at Hoquiam at 2:45 p.m. last Saturday, in the presence of a large crowd. The launching was a success in every particular, the schooner going off the ways smoothly. She is the largest vessel ever built on Grays Harbor, and has a capacity for about 1,000,000 feet of lumber.

“She is the largest vessel ever built on Grays Harbor.”

— Printed in Aberdeen Herald (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1891
Then · 1891135 years apartNow · 2026

This event highlights the absolute dominance of the timber economy in 1890s Grays Harbor. The transition from wooden schooners to modern industrial shipping mirrored the town's evolution from a timber camp to a major maritime port.

The original page

Aberdeen Herald (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1891-08-27. Library of Congress, Chronicling America.

From readers

No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.

About this story

From
Aberdeen Herald (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, AUG 27, 1891, Page 4
Text
Cleaned up from the page — spelling and layout repaired — not a word-for-word transcription. The page itself is above, for exact wording.
Rights
Public domain
Place
46.98093, -123.88934 · placed automatically
The paper in the Library of Congress catalog ↗