How Seattle Raised $50,000 for Its Canal — Bootblacks Included

The most notable feature of the recent subscription in Seattle of a subsidy of $50,000 for the construction of the Lake Washington canal is that the greater portion of it was derived from contributions not exceeding $300 each. It was a popular subscription in every sense of the word. All the people, rich and poor alike, joined in it. Even the bootblacks of the town clubbed together and raised $50 as a cash donation. In a subscription of this sort the spirit evinced by the people in raising it is more significant than the sum itself. In the way of recent American enterprises $50,000 is not a very great sum, and in fact hardly sufficient to be accounted an important news item; but it is a great sum to have been raised in these hard times by popular subscription; and when one recalls the class jealousies which exist in so many cities in this country, it is important to note that they do not exist in Seattle and that men of moderate means are found in that city heartily assisting a great corporation to carry out an undertaking of such magnitude. Where this spirit exists the growth of the community is certain. It will overcome every obstacle, because the very moment a plan for overcoming it is devised there will always be among the people a sufficient energy and a sufficient capital to carry the plan into effect. No man in a community will allow evils to exist for fear that any proposed remedy would benefit his neighbor more than himself. All men will work for the general good and each will rely upon his own industry and sagacity to get his proper share of the resulting prosperity. Nor can there be any doubt that prosperity will result. The spirit of local patriotism never fails to justify her votaries by the rewards she confers on them, and in every community where that spirit is honored there is found sooner or later work for every worker and use for every dollar. The region around Puget Sound is rich in a thousand elements of industrial and commercial greatness. The great Sound itself confers an advantage which it would be hard to overrate, and the natural resources of the country back of it are more abundant than can be calculated. All of these things will have much to do in providing for the commercial greatness of the cities that have been founded there, but they will not supply everything. The dominant element of human prosperity is in humanity itself, and the surest proof of what the future of Seattle will be is to be found in this recent exhibition of what the Seattle spirit is.