The Gift That Built a School for Seattle’s Boys
A $50,000 donation from a Philadelphia philanthropist helped establish Washington College, an institution designed to educate the 'young men and boys' of the territory.
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.
Washington College for young men and boys, located in Seattle, Washington Territory, has received a magnificent gift of fifty thousand dollars from Mr. C. B. Wright, of Philadelphia, for the permanent welfare of the institute. With the additional contributions of $14,000 by the citizens of the territory and the generosity of Christian men and women, a large and well-appointed building has been erected as a home for the education of the young men and boys of Washington. The building is located on high ground, commanding a view of the city, heated with furnaces, and supplied with hot and cold water and bath rooms. It is thoroughly ventilated. The dormitories have been arranged so that each boarder may have a room of his own. Teachers occupy rooms adjacent to the pupils so that they can exercise a fatherly care and watchfulness over those committed to their trust. At meals, teachers and pupils sit at the same table, forming one family. Rev. John Tait has taken charge of the institution. Mrs. Tait will, herself, supervise the housekeeping and culinary department, with at least their younger children under her motherly care.
“At meals, teachers and pupils sit at the same table, forming one family.”
The building described is the historic Washington College (later the site of the original University of Washington campus), reflecting an era when Seattle's elite civic leaders and eastern financiers saw private schooling as the essential foundation for building a 'civilized' frontier city. Today, as Seattle faces intense debates over university funding and the role of private vs. public capital in education, this story highlights the long, complex history of philanthropic influence on our local institutions.
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