The Great Migration to the 'Power of Central Washington'
An 1889 promotional poem and report lured families from the 'crowded cities' of the East and Midwest to the promised land of the Wenatchee River valley.
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.
Come all ye sons of labor, who wish to change your kit, who have spirit enough to travel beyond your native limit. Cannot leave the crowded cities where work is sometimes scarce, and come with us and settle in Central Washington. You can take the Northern Pacific railway to reach this valley and ticket through to Ellensburg, the gateway we ascend. Present there by way, northeastward, home thirty miles or some, where you can take a steamer upon the Columbia flood, ascending that proud river to reach our valley city, the 'Power of Central Washington.' Five miles from this young city, eastward o'er the hill, you'd reach the lovely prairies surrounding Waterville. A rich valley city, laid out by A.T. Greene, it stands without a rival—the best land site. The men are wide awake to welcome everyone who wants in any way to settle in Central Washington. The soil is rich and loamy, from two to feet deep; the sub-soil is immense and clay that all the moisture keeps. There are lakes and springs and streams, and the Columbia too, furnish all with water the Big Bend country through.
“Come all ye sons of labor, who wish to change your kit, who have spirit enough to travel beyond your native limit.”
This 1889 'invitation' mirrors the aggressive real estate promotion that has defined Seattle’s history for over a century. Today, instead of seeking 'room to settle' in the Big Bend, residents grapple with the scarcity of the very land and housing that this historical copy once promised as an endless, cheap resource.
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