The River's Flow
In the wake of the Great Seattle Fire of 1889, the city rebuilt itself with stone and brick, but the most positive result from the disaster was the development of the Cedar River Watershed, Seattle's primary water supply to this day. Through the efforts of Mayor Robert Moran, who acted quickly to win public approval for a municipal water system, and City Engineer R.H. Thomson, who struggled through hard economic times and a volatile political climate, work began on the first pipeline in 1899.
On January 10, 1901, Seattle residents began receiving water from the city's new Cedar River watershed. Exactly four years later, the Cedar Falls hydroelectric plant began lighting Seattle street lamps for the first time. More pipelines came later to meet the needs of a growing metropolis, and in 1927 the large storage reservoir developed by the Seattle Water Department at Lake Youngs was put to use. In 1962, the Tolt River supply system began supplementing the Cedar River supply system.
By this time, many cities across America had begun fluoridating their water supplies, which reduced the rates of tooth decay in their communities. In 1951 the Seattle-King County Department of Public Health asked the city council to treat city drinking water with fluoride, but the proposal faced fierce opposition and the council sent the fluoridation question to voters, who overwhelmingly rejected it in March 1952. Another attempt failed in 1963, but five years later fluoridated water finally won the approval of a smiling majority, and the Seattle water department began fluoridation on January 12, 1970.
Boats Come and Go
On January 10, 1914, fishing boats from cities all around Puget Sound gathered for the opening of Seattle's Fisherman's Terminal on Salmon Bay. The facility was one of the first projects for the Port of Seattle, which had been formed less than three years earlier. When the port's first commissioners were tasked with determining which projects needed the most attention, a central home for the region's scattered fishing fleet was at the top of their list.
Native Americans fished Puget Sound waters for centuries, and soon after the arrival of non-Native settlers in the 1850s, they were joined by growing numbers of commercial fishermen. Besides an abundance of salmon, Washington's waters were also filled with plenty of halibut, cod, crab, and more. The fishery was especially enticing for European immigrants who came from countries where fishing was a way of life.
Many Norwegian fisherman settled in Seattle's Ballard neighborhood, as well as in Poulsbo and other waterfront cities. Anacortes and Bellingham both had robust Croatian fishing communities, where some families fished commercially for generations.
