On November 22, 1993, the Seattle City Council approves Community Preferred Reuse Plan for Sand Point. The ambitious and somewhat controversial plan covers 151 acres of the former naval base and inclu...
On November 30, 1993, the Tacoma City Council approves the Chinese Reconciliation Resolution (Resolution 32415) to make amends for the 1885 expulsion of the entire Chinese community in Tacoma by the m...
On December 13, 1993, in a decrepit warehouse on Pier 48 along Seattle's Elliott Bay waterfront, beloved Seattle grunge-rock band Nirvana wows a select audience with 18 stellar songs that encompass th...
On January 1, 1994, William H. Gates III, 38, co-founder of Microsoft Corporation, marries Melinda French, 29, a mid-level Microsoft executive, in a $1 million seaside ceremony on the Hawaiian island ...
On January 10, 1994, Democratic State Representative Helen Sommers (b. 1932) of Seattle's 36th District, is appointed chair of the House Appropriations Committee by Speaker Brian Ebersole (b. 1947). I...
On Tuesday, January 25, 1994, in the wake of the sudden death of Mayor Jack Hyde (1934-1994), Harold Moss (1929-2020) becomes the first African American mayor of Tacoma. Hyde had asked his close frien...
In 1994, Tacoma City Light taps the Wynoochee River in the Olympic Mountains for hydroelectricity. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built a flood-control dam there in 1972. Tacoma invested $25 million...
On April 1, 1994, Snohomish County residents Helen Thayer (b. 1937) and her husband Bill Thayer (b. 1926) set out for a year in the Arctic Circle, where they plan to study the behavior of arctic gray ...
On April 5, 1994, Kurt Cobain (1967-1994) commits suicide at his home at 171 Lake Washington Boulevard in Seattle. His body is not found until April 8, when it is discovered by an electrician. The 27-...
On April 11, 1994, the North Bend Library reopens in a new 9,600-square-foot building located at 115 E 4th Street. The new facility replaces a building on the same block originally built in 1958 and e...
On April 14, 1994, U.S. President Bill Clinton (b. 1946) appoints Robert Santos (1934-2016), Filipino American community activist, as the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) secretary's representative...
On April 16, 1994, Group Health Cooperative members debate a resolution recognizing violence as a public health issue, and the majority vote to pursue an aggressive campaign to combat violence. The p...
On May 27, 1994, the State of Washington conducts its last execution by hanging. Charles Rodman Campbell, age 39, is put to death for the 1982 murders of two women and a child. Campbell has a choice b...
On June 10, 1994, Mary Maxwell Gates, mother of Microsoft co-founder William H. Gates III and a woman widely admired for her civic activism, dies of breast cancer at age 64. Gates was the first female...
On June 20, 1994, Dean A. Mellberg (1974-1994), age 20, enters the Fairchild Air Force Base hospital annex with a MAK-90 assault rifle and shoots and kills Major Thomas E. Brigham, psychiatrist, and C...
On June 24, 1994, a giant U.S. Air Force B-52H Stratofortress crashes at Fairchild Air Force Base, Spokane County, while rehearsing maneuvers for an air show, killing four airmen. The accident occurs ...
On July 2, 1994, the American Hop Museum opens in Toppenish. The building, originally a creamery, dates to 1917, by which time hop growing had become big business in the Yakima Valley. Today Washingto...
On July 16, 1994, the Skykomish Library in northeastern King County celebrates two important milestones: the library's move to a new location the previous year and the upcoming 50th anniversary of the...
On July 19, 1994, the new Algona-Pacific Library, part of the King County Library System (KCLS), opens at 255 Ellingson Road in Pacific. The two small South King County cities of Pacific and Algona pr...
On July 24, 1994, lightning ignites a forest fire in the Wenatchee National Forest at Tyee Creek that will burn for 33 days before it is contained. The fire destroys 35 homes and cabins, but many more...
On August 20, 1994, the first issue of Real Change, Puget Sound's Newspaper for the Poor and Homeless, hits the streets in Seattle. It is sold by licensed vendors who are, for the most part, themselve...
In the fall of 1994, the Washington grain train begins rolling. The Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) and the Washington State Energy Office have purchased and repaired 29 used rai...
On September 30, 1994, the City of Newport Hills (later Newcastle) takes form. Residents of Newport Hills had voted to incorporate as a city on November 2, 1993. This became the fifth new city in King...
On October 27, 1994, the Puget Sound Regional Council Executive Board adopts Resolution EB-94-01, ending the search for a new airport site to supplement Seattle-Tacoma (Sea-Tac) International Airport,...