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Month: October 2024

Fremont Public Art: The Fremont Guidepost

Posted on by Kathleen

“Center of the Universe” guidepost at Fremont Avenue and North 35th Street

Located just north of downtown Seattle beside sparkling Lake Union, the neighborhood of Fremont is known for its geographic centrality.

Since the 1960s Fremont has been known for its quirkiness, when an economic lull drove down rents and attracted more artists and students to the area. Although the local economy has improved since the arrival of several high-tech companies, the funky and eclectic vibe of Fremont has continued.

According to the Fremont Chamber of Commerce and “Fremont Scientists,” this “strangeness” exists because of an “odd gravitational pull” that places Fremont at the Center of the Universe. Here, a unique geophysical force also creates an overwhelming urge “to return again and again.”

Reasoning that Fremont’s “center of the universe” location could “neither be proven nor disproven,” residents set up a helpful “Center of the Universe” guidepost at Fremont Avenue and North 35th Street in the early 1970s. In 1994, this location was officially proclaimed the Center of the Universe by the Metropolitan King County Council.

Here’s more about how the Fremont neighborhood in Seattle became known as the Center of the Universe.

Fremont Public Art: Late for the Interurban

Posted on by Kathleen

East of the Fremont Bridge on North 34th Street, near Adobe Plaza, Seattle’s favorite clown, JP Patches, and his friend, Gertrude, are forever “Late for the Interurban” in these bronze statues created by Washington sculptor Kevin Pettelle. The Interurban was the train to Everett with its transfer point by the Fremont Bridge, referenced by the Interurban statue there.

Installed in 2008 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the J.P. Patches TV show, and viewable through a bronze “television” also created by the artist, the Late for the Interurban statues were funded primarily through donations from local fans who grew up watching the show.

Fremont Public Art: Waiting for the Interurban

Posted on by Kathleen

In 1978, a down year economically for the Fremont neighborhood, artist and local resident Richard Beyer was tasked with creating a “community focal point” in honor of Fremont’s centennial.

Known for his humorous and humanistic style, Beyer sculpted from rough aluminum six life-size figures and a dog with a human face and placed them at the site of the former station for the “Interurban,” the Seattle to Everett trolley line with a stop in Fremont that had greatly contributed to Fremont’s early growth and prosperity — and that had stopped running almost 40 years previous, in 1939.

At Waiting for the Interurban, the figures stand under a pergola designed by Peter Larsen from Environmental Works.  Installed in 1979, it mirrors the roofline slant of the original train station.

Over the years, Waiting for the Interurban has become both a popular tourist attraction and a favorite spot for locals to publicize events or celebrate holidays with signage or decorations draped over the figures.

The Fremont Neighborhood in Seattle is Founded in 1888

Posted on by Valarie

Each neighborhood of Seattle proudly waves the banner of its unique name, and yet many were named in a similar way:  by real estate investors.   Fremont in Seattle was also named by real estate investors.  What made the Seattle neighborhood called Fremont stand out from others, was its good location, its jump-start after Seattle’s Great Fire of 1889, and its vigorous developers who utilized the growing streetcar system to advantage.

Continue reading “The Fremont Neighborhood in Seattle is Founded in 1888”

Charles H. Baker: Land Investor in the Fremont Neighborhood of Seattle

Posted on by Valarie

The Fremont neighborhood has a lively history which parallels the story of the City of Seattle’s growth and development.  Just as in the beginnings of Seattle in what is now downtown, the earliest white settlers of Fremont were attracted by the availability of natural resources, most importantly water and timber.

Located just to the northwest of Lake Union, Fremont was on the banks of a stream which at first was called The Outlet, flowing westward through today’s Ballard and then out to Puget Sound.  The Outlet was also called Ross Creek and it was used to float logs to mill.  Eventually the creek became part of the route of today’s Lake Washington Ship Canal.

Charles H. Baker came to Seattle in 1887 as a single man determined to make his fortune and establish himself so that he could get married.  He worked as a surveyor for Seattle’s homegrown railroad corporation, the Seattle, Lake Shore & Eastern.

The survey work brought Charles Baker into contact with Seattle’s movers and shakers including Judge Thomas Burke, Edward C. Kilbourne and William D. Wood, and Baker’s name is seen on land investments with these men, including plats in Fremont and plats in the Wedgwood neighborhood in northeast Seattle.

Charles Baker lived in Seattle for about fifteen years.  During his time in Seattle his land investments failed partly because of the economic depression which began in the year 1893.  Another reason why his investments failed was because they were in lands which were slow to develop, such as today’s Wedgwood neighborhood, which was too far from downtown Seattle to be convenient.

In the 1890s Charles Baker built the power plant at Snoqualmie Falls, only to lose ownership of it because of legal issues when his father died.  In 1904 Baker gave up on Seattle and moved to Florida.  Even though the power plant which Baker built continues to supply electricity to Seattle today, few people are aware that it was Charles Baker who made this essential contribution to Seattle.

One of Charles Baker’s early investments (1888) was a plat of land at a high point in western Fremont at N. 43rd Street, which he named Palatine Hill.  The name came from Baker’s home in a suburb of Chicago, Illinois.

In later years the streets in the plat had to be renamed for clarity, but the name Palatine Avenue was used for the former Adams Court (on the far right on the plat map.)  On the left side of the plat map, Crawford shows the boundary with the Crawford family property, which became 3rd Ave NW.

One avenue formerly called Peck was later renamed Baker Ave NW between 2nd Ave NW (Harmon) and 3rd Ave NW (Crawford.)  Chicago Street is now 1st Ave NW.  What was designated as Palatine on the original plat map, is now called NW 43rd Street.  Some of these street name changes reflect Seattle’s 1895 ordinance to reorganize the street naming system.  It was required that north-south routes be called avenues, and east-west was called a street.  That is why plats earlier than the 1895 ordinance, like Baker’s 188 Palatine Hill plat map, have had name changes.  Plats filed from 1895 onward, had to conform to the street system and have unique names for their streets, not re-using common names such as Broadway.

Waldo B. Staples and the Canal Marina

Posted on by Valarie

When the Lake Washington Ship Canal was constructed in 1911-1917, people hoped that the canal would benefit Seattle’s business environment.  It was difficult to foresee, however, all that might happen, and what would be the actual impact of the canal work.  In the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle, Waldo B. Staples found that the new, deeper and wider canal caused problems at first, but then unexpectedly the canal created a new means of livelihood for him.

Continue reading “Waldo B. Staples and the Canal Marina”

The Fremont Bridge Collapse of March 13, 1914

Posted on by Valarie

In 1914 work was ongoing to dig the present ship canal at Fremont. The original, narrow channel had already been made wider and had been spanned with a bridge called a trestle, meaning a flat, rigid structure supported by posts.  The trestle bridge was wide enough to support streetcar rails and had a lane for the increasing number of automobiles which were being driven in Seattle.  During the work of digging a much deeper and wider channel for the ship canal, the waters of Lake Union were held back by a timber dam at the northwest corner of the lake.

Continue reading “The Fremont Bridge Collapse of March 13, 1914”

1937 Works Progress Administration (WPA) photos of Fremont properties

Posted on by Heather Pihl

Digital photo collection by Margaret Heather Pihl (née McAuliffe)

WPA Project: The digital photo collection is comprised of nearly 3,000 digital images of photos taken in Fremont in 1937 as part of a countywide Works Progress Administration (WPA) project. The WPA project was conducted between 1937 and 1941 and involved documentation and a photo survey of properties in King County for taxation purposes. The survey was conducted in north-south strips (township ranges), starting at the western end of King County and ending by the Cascades. All of Seattle was done in 1937. The Eastside was done by 1938, and the rest of King County to the east by the end of 1941. The final project included approximately 200,000 photos. 10-15% of the funding for the project was from King County, and the rest from a federal government grant. The project started and stopped, following the flow of funding. After the WPA project was finished, the King County Assessor’s Office took over surveying properties and updating the records. The Puget Sound Regional Branch of the Washington State Archives includes the King County property records up to 1972. 

Fremont Photo Project background: Fremont resident Heather McAuliffe created the collection over a period of 11 weeks in 2004, making weekly trips to the Puget Sound Regional Branch of the Washington State Archives.  She photographed all available early property photos of Fremont that were archived with King County Assessor Property Record Cards. She used a Canon G-2 Power Shot digital camera mounted on a light stand provided by the Archives to photograph the available images.  She chose the boundaries for project to be from 8th Ave NW to Stone Way N. and from the Ship Canal to N. 50th Street, based on Fremont’s Neighborhood Plan. She created the collection to be an enjoyable and useful resource for the neighborhood and to raise awareness of Fremont’s history and the need to preserve it. The collection is not copyrighted and she has donated copies of the collection to the Fremont Historical Society, the Puget Sound Regional Branch of the Washington State Archives and the Fremont Library with the intent that the images be freely duplicated and used for educational purposes.

Missing photos: Users of the collection may find that there is no photo for some properties. It may be for one of the following reasons: 1) The structure was not built yet; 2) Only a negative may be available at the Archives; 3) The structure may have been moved; 4) The property address may have changed. In some cases where the 1937 photo was not available, a later photo was substituted.

Prints available at the state archives:
The photos are not as sharp as they would be if printed directly from the negatives and are sepia toned in appearance. Prints are available from the Puget Sound Regional Branch of the Washington State Archives.

Fremont Historical Society

The Fremont Historical Society was founded in July 2004 by Heather McAuliffe to provide education on Fremont’s history. The Historical Society is working in partnership with the Fremont Branch of the Seattle Public Library to build a library collection of hardbound/electronic items related to Fremont’s history. 

Coralee Steele

Posted on by Karen Nelda

Fremont resident, Colonel Coralee Steele, was in charge of the World War II field hospital in France that followed General Patton, landing in Normandy the day after D-day.

  • Coralee I. Steele was born on February 13, 1903, the 13th of 14 children of David Matthew Steele and Elizabeth Blevins Steele. The family lived at 608 Blewett St. (now N. 35th St.) in Fremont. The house would have been near the site where the brick Thompson Building now stands, formerly housing the Triangle Tavern and now home to 9 Million Unmarked Bills. Coralee attended B. F. Day School. (Steele family archives and history, courtesy of Karen Hedelund)
  • In 1920, the family moved with their younger children to Alsea, Oregon. After graduating from Multnomah Training School for Nurses, Ms. Steele returned to Seattle and graduated from the University of Washington with a B. S. in Nursing Education in 1933 with post-graduate work in Hospital Administration and Ward Teaching. (Steele family archives and history, courtesy of Karen Hedelund; Seattle Sunday Times, June 11, 1933, Vol. 56, No. 162)
  • After graduation, she worked in Seattle in the 1930s and early 1940s, as the Night Superintendent and Operating Room Supervisor at King County Hospital, and later, the Superintendent of Maynard Hospital in before entering active duty in the Army Nurse Corps on September 10, 1942. (article from the history of the 50th General Hospital, courtesy of Thomas Hutchinson, President, 50th General Hospital Association; Seattle Daily Times, July 17, 1942, Vol. 65, No. 198)
  • Ms. Steele served as the chief nurse of the 50th General Hospital throughout her active duty. The 50th General Hospital was a mobile hospital and had been established in Seattle for service in World War I. In 1942, it was reactivated with doctors and nurses from hospitals throughout Washington. They trained for over a year at Camp Carson, Colorado, before traveling, in December 1943, by train to the Boston Port of Embarkation and by convoy on the troop ship Edmund A. Alexander to England. (50th General Hospital, Unit History, WW2 US Medical Research Centre, www.med-dept.com; Seattle Daily Times, July 17, 1942, Vol. 65, No. 198)
  • The 50th General Hospital unit landed in Liverpool and traveled by train to Scotland to operate the military hospital in Cowglen, a suburb of Glasgow. The unit was assigned to the 3rd Army, under the command of General George S. Patton. For six months, they treated American soldiers who had fallen ill while on Army transports from the US to the port of Greenock, 26 miles from Cowglen. (50th General Hospital, Unit History, WW2 US Medical Research Centre, www.med-dept.com.)
  • After D-Day, June 6, 1944, the 50th relocated to France in support of the Allied invasion forces. They landed at Utah Beach and most of the unit marched inland about 7 miles to Carentan. The nurses traveled in trucks through Cherbourg, then joined the rest in Carentan. Initially, teams of surgeons, nurses, and enlisted men were sent to various field and evacuation hospitals near the front. Construction of the tent hospital was underway in a cow-pasture in Carentan by the end of July 1944. By mid-August, the 50th was operating a 400-bed hospital which grew to 1,000 beds by the end of the month. (50th General Hospital, Unit History, WW2 US Medical Research Centre, www.med-dept.com)
  • In November 1944, the 50th General Hospital moved forward into northeastern France and established the hospital in an old French Cavalry post in Commercy.  The facility was a considerable up-grade as the buildings were stone with walls four-feet thick; however, considerable work was required to put in heating, lighting and plumbing systems. By the end of 1944, the 50th General Hospital had a total roster of over 600 officers and enlisted personnel. Captain Steele was the highest ranking nurse among the hospital’s 81 nurses. (50th General Hospital, Unit History, WW2 US Medical Research Centre, www.med-dept.com)
  • The Battle of the Bulge and the Battle of the Rhine were fought from December 1944 through the spring of 1945. The large number of casualties arriving at the 50th General Hospital required increasing the capacity to over 2,300 beds. (50th General Hospital, Unit History, WW2 US Medical Research Centre, www.med-dept.)
  • After the war ended on May 8, 1945, the work of the 50th fluctuated. Initially, the number of new patients slowed but, as other hospital units closed, patients were transferred to the 50th. During this time, some doctors and nurses in the 50th were redeployed to the Pacific. Eventually, the number of patients declined so that by the end of August, they were operating only two wards. (50th General Hospital, Unit History, WW2 US Medical Research Centre, www.med-dept.com)
  • “Late in June 1945, fifty medical installations in France and Germany were instructed to send one nurse to Paris to attend a special two-week educational course beginning July 1st, … in French history, art, architecture, and literature to foster mutual understanding between our two countries. We saw the Venus de Milo and 85 famous paintings the second day after they were put back in the Louvre.” From an article written by Major Steele for the American Journal of Nursing, October 1945. (The American Journal of Nursing, Vol. 45, No. 10 (Oct 1945)
  • On October 27, 1945, the Seattle Times reported that Maj. Steele had landed in New York City from Marseille, France aboard the transport George Washington along with many other members of the 50th General Hospital. (Seattle Daily Times, October 27, 1945, Vol. 68, No. 300)
  • As a member of the 50th General Hospital, Maj. Steele received a Presidential Unit Citation for Meritorious Service ribbon and three campaign ribbons for participation in the Normandy Campaign, Northern France Campaign, and the Rhineland Campaign. (Thomas Hutchinson, President, 50th General Hospital Association; “A Brief Unit History”, 50th General Hospital, Program from 50th General Hospital Inactivation Dinner, September 9, 1995, courtesy of Loretta Green, Providence Archives)
  • In July 1947, Ms. Steele enrolled in the Army Nurse Corps Reserve. She was able to retain her rank of Major and served as chief nurse of the 310th Hospital Center. She retired from the reserves as a Lt. Colonel. (Seattle Times, July 17, 1947)
  • In 1958, Ms. Steele was a passenger in her brother-in-law’s car when an accident occurred. She was severely injured and her sister died. Although Ms. Steele’s right side and hand were paralyzed, she was able to continue her career, working as superintendant of nurses in hospitals in California, Oregon, and Washington. (Steele family archives and history, courtesy of Karen Hedelund)
  • She was working in Albany, OR, when she suffered a hemorrhaging stroke in 1974. She recovered but required care in a nursing facility. The Veterans Administration did not have such accommodations for women veterans so she was moved to a private facility in the Chehalis/Centralia area where two of her nieces lived. She passed away on August 19, 1989 and is buried at the Willamette National Cemetery, Portland, OR. (Steele family archives and history, courtesy of Karen Hedelund)