On September 16, 1851, Luther M. Collins (1813-1860), Henry Van Asselt (1817-1902), and Jacob Maple (or Mapel) (1798-1884) and his son Samuel Maple (1827-1880) select the first Donation Land claims wi...
On September 25, 1851, David Denny (1832-1903), John Low (1820-1888), and Lee Terry (1818-1862) arrive in a vessel commanded by Capt. Robert C. Fay at the mouth of the Duwamish River in the future Kin...
On September 27, 1851, the Collins Party encounters Denny Party scouts at Duwamish Head. These two groups will be the first non-Indian settlers of the Seattle area. David Denny (1832-1903), John Low (...
On September 28, 1851, John Low (1820-1888) and Leander (Lee) Terry (1818-1862) select Donation Land claims on Alki Point not far from the future site of Seattle. David Denny (1832-1903) and Lee Terry...
On November 13, 1851, the Denny Party lands at Alki Point, not far from the site of the future Seattle.
No later than November 28, 1851, Charles C. Terry (1828-1867) opens a store on Alki Point. This is the first store in the future King County. Terry arrived at Alki Point with the Denny Party on the sc...
On December 9, 1851, all seven adult male settlers at New York (renamed Alki) begin cutting down trees and loading lumber on the ship Leonesa, bound for San Francisco. This represents the future King ...
On December 11, 1851, the schooner Robert Bruce is deliberately set on fire by the ship's cook and burns to the water line. The schooner is in Willapa Bay in what is now Pacific County in southwest Wa...
On February 15, 1852, Arthur Denny (1822-1899), Carson Boren (1824-1912), and William Bell (1817-1887) select Donation Land claim sites on the eastern portion of Elliott Bay. Most of the original sett...
On February 23, 1852, the families of Loren and Lucinda Hastings and Francis and Sophia Pettygrove arrive at the site of Port Townsend with another family and several single men. They are the first no...
On March 31, 1852, David "Doc" Maynard arrives at Alki Point. He has come from Olympia in a canoe paddled by Chief Seattle and other Duwamish Indians.
On April 1, 1852, Nicholas Delin (1817-1882) begins construction of a water-powered sawmill at the head of Commencement Bay in what will become Tacoma. By the end of the year, the mill will be cutting...
On April 3, 1852, Father Louis Joseph D'herbomez and Father Charles M. Pandosy found a mission on Ahtanum Creek in what will become known as the Yakima Valley. They call the mission Saint Joseph (not ...
On April 3, 1852, the first contingent of the Denny Party relocates from Alki Point to the eastern shore of Elliott Bay, the site of future downtown Seattle. Those who make the move on April 3 are: Wi...
In 1852, Catholic Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate Father Charles Pandosy and Father Eugene Casmire Chirouse (1821-1892), in company with Yakama people, labor with shovels to dig the first irriga...
On May 1, 1852, Charles C. Terry (1829-1867) officially homesteads on Alki Point. Many decades later, on this site, a West Seattle business district known as the Alki starts operating at about the int...
On August 22, 1852, at the invitation of Arthur Denny (1822-1899), visiting Bishop Modeste Demers (1809-1871) celebrates Mass in Henry Yesler's sawmill cookhouse. Although the town has no Catholic set...
On September 11, 1852, The Columbian, Washington's first newspaper, is published in Olympia. Washington is not yet a territory, much less a state, and Olympia is identified in the paper's front-page b...
On September 20, 1852, Ulysses S. Grant (1822-1885), then a 30-year-old Brevet Captain, later a famed Civil War general and United States President, arrives with the 4th Infantry regiment at Columbia ...
The opening of a post office is an important marker of the beginning of a community. On October 12, 1852, the first Seattle Post Office is established. Arthur A. Denny (1822-1899) is appointed postmas...
On October 20, 1852, Henry Yesler (1810-1892) arrives in Seattle. He had come from Ohio via California and Portland, and was seeking a suitable site for a steam-powered mill. The land on the Elliott B...
On October 30, 1852, the Olympia newspaper The Columbian prints an advertisement for Dr. David S. Maynard's store, the "Seattle Exchange." This (and a notice in the same issue about Henry Yesler's saw...
On October 30, 1852, the Olympia newspaper The Columbian reports that "a new steam mill is in process of erection by Mr. H. L. Yesler [Henry Yesler] at Seattle." The region's first steam-powered saw m...
In December 1852, Captain Henry Roeder and Captain Russell V. Peabody establish Whatcom Mill on Bellingham Bay. It is one of the first American settlements at what will become the city of Bellingham.