8135 HistoryLink.org articles now available.
Diablo Dam incline railway climbing Sourdough Mountain, 1930. Courtesy Seattle Municipal Archives, 2306.
Children waving to ferry, 1950. Courtesy Museum of History and Industry.
Loggers in the Northwest woods. Courtesy Washington State Digital Archives.
Be sure to check out our new podcast, Square One, which delves deeper into the stories included in our self-guided walking tour of Pioneer Square's LGBTQ+ history.
Find the podcast on your favorite podcast service. A video version is available on HistoryLink's Vimeo channel.
Our thanks to Historic South Downtown for its generous support of the tour and podcast.
1/26/2023
Battle in Seattle
On the morning of January 26, 1856, an estimated 1,000 Salish warriors came over the ridge of First Hill and attacked the tiny village of Seattle at present-day Pioneer Square. The settlers returned the Indian fire during the skirmish, reinforced by marines and a howitzer from the U.S.S. Decatur, anchored in Elliott Bay. Sporadic gun volleys continued until 10 o'clock that night, when the attackers retreated. They left behind two dead settlers, but none of their own - not even a trace of blood.
Rising tensions had led to bloody acts by both newcomers and Natives before the "Battle of Seattle," but the attack marked the climax of active resistance led by Nisqually Chief Leschi (whose presence at the scene is in dispute) and other tribal leaders against the treaties dictated and imposed on the tribes by Territorial Governor Isaac Stevens in late 1854 and 1855.
Chief Leschi was eventually captured, and his half-brother Quiemuth surrendered soon after. Quiemuth was murdered by persons unknown, and Leschi was hanged in 1858 over the protests of many pioneers. It wasn't until 2004 that Leschi was finally exonerated by a special state historical court.
Slain in Shoreline
On January 26, 1969, civil rights leader and Seattle Urban League Executive Director Edwin Pratt was killed by a shotgun blast outside his home in Shoreline. The assassin was never found. Pratt's funeral at St. Mark's Cathedral remains the largest in that church's history.
During his tenure with the Urban League, Pratt championed equal housing in the fight against restrictive covenants and housing discrimination. He also supported the Triad Plan, a proposal developed by an Urban League committee for reorganizing Seattle's de facto segregated elementary schools. And after President Lyndon Johnson launched the War on Poverty in 1964, the Seattle Urban League was one of the first agencies to be awarded Office of Economic Opportunity funds, which led to the creation of the Central Area Motivation Program.
Shortly before he was killed, Pratt spoke out against discriminatory hiring practices in the construction industry – a movement that would pick up steam later that year. Although there has been much investigation and speculation into who may have murdered Pratt, the case remains open more than a half-century after the crime. Pratt has since been commemorated by Edwin Pratt Park, the Pratt Fine Arts Center, and – most recently – the Shoreline School District's Early Learning Center.
On January 26, 1700, a massive earthquake struck the Pacific Northwest, sending a tsunami across the Pacific that slammed into Japan, where several sources recorded the event – the earliest documented historical occurrence in our region. It is estimated that the temblor was at least 9.2 on the modern Richter scale, making it the region's most powerful known earthquake ... so far.
On January 29, 1906, to promote the historical importance of the Oregon Trail, 76-year-old Ezra Meeker began to retrace the path that brought him to the Pacific Northwest. His travels were so well publicized that a few years later he took the trip again in the name of historic preservation, and to promote a transcontinental highway for auto traffic.
On January 27, 1909, Samuel Cosgrove was sworn in as Washington's sixth governor. Seriously ill with Bright's disease, Cosgrove left Olympia two days later to convalesce in California but never returned, dying two months after his inauguration.
Eighty years ago this week, on January 31, 1943, a fire swept through the Lake Forest Sanitarium, a rest home in northern King County. The blaze killed 32 of the residence's 49 elderly and disabled tenants. In numbers of fatalities, it is the worst fire in the county's history.
On January 28, 1986, the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded during takeoff, killing seven astronauts, including Cle Elum native Dick Scobee. And on February 1, 2003, the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during re-entry, killing seven astronauts, including former Spokane resident and UW graduate Michael P. Anderson, and former Anacortes resident William McCool.
This week marks anniversaries for four King County libraries. The Federal Way Regional Library was dedicated on February 1, 1992, Woodinville opened its first modern library exactly one year later, the Kirkland Library opened in its new building on January 30, 1995, and the Carnation Library opened on January 31, 2009.
The Longview News began publishing 100 years ago this week, on January 27, 1923.
"Chief Leschi should not, as a matter of law, have been tried for the crime of murder"
--Washington State Chief Justice Gerry Alexander
