The $12,000 Gamble: Seattle’s Plan to Woo the East with a Car Full of Dirt and Fruit
In 1889, local booster George Storrs proposed a radical marketing stunt: load a railroad car with Puget Sound’s minerals and produce, tour the Eastern U.S. for six months, and pay for it by charging every resident $0.10.
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.
After President George B. Adams had called the Board of Trade to order last evening, Secretary Kit tinker announced that Mr. George Storrs desired to address the body on the subject of an exhibit car.
The necessary permission was granted and Mr. Storrs arose and stated that when he came to Washington he was greatly impressed with its resources and products and thought that if the latter were shown to the people of the East they would make a great impression on them and induce many to come here in search of homes. So he conceived the idea of an exhibit car, to be loaded with the fruits, grains, vegetables and minerals of Puget Sound and the country in the interior of Washington Territory contiguous to the Northern Pacific Railroad.
The car is to be taken first to Ohio, Northern Indiana and Southern Michigan and from thence to the Atlantic seaboard and through the Eastern and Middle states. His idea was to start from here in September and to journey through the East for a period of six months. In addition to displaying the products of the country he would also distribute advertising matter.
He had made a calculation based on a population of 75,000 people in the leading cities of the territory, and the cost would be 10 cents per capita, or a total of $12,000. On a basis of a population of 20,000 the Chamber of Commerce of Tacoma had, by resolution, agreed to pay its pro rata of the expense of $12,000 for the car, which would be $330, provided the other towns would do as much in proportion to their population. At this rate the proportion of Seattle would be $2,200; that is to say, assuming the population...
This 1889 proposal mirrors modern municipal marketing budgets and 'branding' efforts, but with a far more direct democratic funding model: asking every citizen to chip in ten cents for civic promotion. It highlights how early Seattle leaders understood that physical infrastructure (the Northern Pacific Railroad) was useless without the narrative infrastructure of tourism and settlement to justify it.
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