On April 27, 2019, a Saturday afternoon, a tower crane being dismantled at a construction site in Seattle's South Lake Union neighborhood suddenly collapses, the latticed mast sections falling onto th...
On July 21, 2019, Edgar Martinez of the Seattle Mariners is inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. For Martinez and his legions of fans, it comes as the culmination of years anticipation an...
On August 29, 2019, five recipients of the 2019 Mayor's Arts Awards gather for an awards ceremony at the Charlotte Martin Theatre at Seattle Center. The individual 2019 recipients are historian and st...
On October 24, 2019, the Sea Mar Museum of Chicano/a/Latino/a Culture, which uses artifacts, photos, art, and videos to showcase the history and culture of the state's Spanish-speaking communities, op...
On November 10, 2019, the Seattle Sounders win their second MLS Cup -- the Major League Soccer championship -- by defeating Toronto FC 3-1 in front of 69,274, the biggest crowd ever at CenturyLink Fie...
On November 21, 2019, demolition work is completed on the decommissioned Alaskan Way Viaduct in Seattle. The final concrete and steel columns at the north end of the viaduct, which have remained in pl...
On December 8, 2019, a Blaine resident finds an unusually large dead hornet in his yard and calls the Washington State Department of Agriculture (WSDA). He also reports having seen a live hornet at hi...
On December 31, 2019, First and Pike News, the iconic newsstand located in the entryway of Pike Place Market, closes after 40 years, its demise mirroring the decline of the newspaper industry and the ...
On January 20, 2020, the first confirmed case of Coronavirus Disease 2019 in the United States is diagnosed in Snohomish County, north of Seattle. The patient is a 35-year-old man who has recently ret...
Washington Governor Jay Inslee declares a State of Emergency following the first two reported U.S. deaths from Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), in Kirkland, on February 29, 2020. The deaths actual...
On March 9, 2020, with two weeks left in the winter quarter, the University of Washington moves to hold all classes online to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. More than 52,000 students, along with fac...
Washington Governor Jay Inslee (b. 1951) orders a statewide school closure to slow the spread of COVID-19, on March 13, 2020. Several schools in the Puget Sound region have already been shuttered for ...
On March 18, 2020, near the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the ornate, custom-designed bronze gates created by internationally renowned sculptor George Tsutakawa are stolen from the Washington Park A...
Washington residents begin a period of COVID-19 isolation when Governor Jay Inslee (b. 1951) issues a statewide "Stay Home-Stay Healthy" order on March 23, 2020. The order changes life fundamentally f...
On March 23, 2020, the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) closes the West Seattle Bridge after rapidly expanding cracks are found in its support structure. Further investigation reveals that ...
On April 8, 2020, a severe COVID-19 outbreak at the Spokane Veterans Home results in the first of many deaths. The deceased was a resident who had been on end-of-life care before contracting the coron...
The Tyson Fresh Meats plant in Wallula shuts down on April 23, 2020 because of a deadly COVID-19 outbreak among its workers. The company takes this step when more than 100 cases of the virus and one d...
On April 29, 2020, volunteers hand out free potatoes in a drive-through giveaway that causes a rare traffic jam in the small Eastern Washington city of Ritzville in Adams County. The distribution of n...
On June 12, 2020, Black Lives Matter Seattle-King County calls for a statewide day of action that includes a March of Silence and a general strike. The protest is one of scores held across the nation ...
On September 2, 2020, The Creative Advantage arts program, a citywide initiative dedicated to eliminating gaps in access to arts education, expands to include 81 schools in the Seattle Public School D...
On October 6, 2020, the Seattle Storm completes a three-game sweep of the Las Vegas Aces to win its fourth WNBA championship. The victory caps a season like no other in league history. Because of the ...
On October 7, 2020, Bartell Drugs announces that it has been purchased by Rite Aid. The sale of the 130-year old company brings an end to the oldest family owned drugstore chain in the country.
In the election of November 3, 2020, Washington voters re-elect Governor Jay Inslee (b. 1951), and nine of the state's 10 members of Congress who are seeking re-election. Former Tacoma Mayor Marilyn S...
On November 26, 2020, about a dozen family members and friends of Black theater pioneer Douglas Q. Barnett gather to celebrate the naming of Douglas Q. Barnett Street, a one-block honorary designation...