Seattle Bets on a Canal, Tide Flats and a New Iron Works
A state press report says Seattle is the one Washington city with major projects this year: a $900,000 canal and tide-land scheme, plus an iron furnace and car works backed by New York capital.
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.
Seattle appears to be the only city in the State that has any enterprises of magnitude projected this year. It has worked energetically on the Lake Washington canal, and forced itself into the tide-flat improvement proposition, the capital for which is said to have been secured in St. Louis, and the whole shifted from the government to private enterprise. The canal location has also been shifted from the north to the south end of the city. The financial part of the scheme having been completed, the only delay is occasioned by the securing of right-of-way. It is estimated that about $900,000 will be expended on the canal and in the improvement of the tide lands. The other enterprise under consideration is the Citizens' iron furnace and car works, in which New York capital is enlisted, and which is an assured fact, but active work will not begin before May or June.
“It is estimated that about $900,000 will be expended on the canal and in the improvement of the tide lands.”
The Lake Washington Ship Canal eventually opened in 1917, reshaping Seattle's shoreline and turning the tide flats into industrial land. The 1895 report captures the booster logic of the era—private capital, public right-of-way, and a city selling itself as the only place in Washington with projects big enough to matter.
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