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Author: Valarie

Valarie was born in Seattle and is a volunteer neighborhood history writer.

North 41st Street Pedestrian Bridge Seismic Retrofit

Posted on by Valarie

Major construction work to retrofit the North 41st Street Pedestrian Bridge across Aurora Ave North is expected to be complete by April 2025. Construction crews have reinforced the bridge’s footing, installed carbon fiber wrapping to strengthen its towers and piers, and replaced damaged concrete including nearby sidewalks and curb ramps.   

Construction workers using a lift to perform maintenance on a pedestrian bridge over a busy street. Traffic cones and barriers are in place.
The photo above shows crews working on seismic retrofit for the N 41st St Pedestrian Bridge, earlier this month (SDOT). 

Due to recent weather conditions, crews have been unable to paint the carbon fiber they installed to strengthen the bridge and finish minor restorations. Once the crews are able to complete this work, we’ll remove the traffic control measures in place. Full project completion is expected by spring 2025. 

Safety Reminders

  • Street Closure: N 41st Street is closed between Linden Ave N and Whitman Ave N until construction is complete. This closure ensures safety for everyone traveling and allows crews to work as efficiently as possible.
  • Lane and Sidewalk Closures: Sidewalks, crosswalks, and one bus lane on Aurora Ave N (either northbound or southbound depending on where work is occurring) will be temporarily closed at times to safely divert people walking, rolling, biking, and driving away from where work is occurring. Please follow all detour signs in place.  

Project Overview

Earthquakes could have a major impact on Seattle’s infrastructure. To address seismic risks to city infrastructure, the City of Seattle established a bridge seismic program to assess how vulnerable the City’s bridges were to earthquakes, and to reinforce bridges to better withstand the potential impacts of an earthquake. 

As part of the Levy to Move Seattle, 16 bridges were selected for seismic reinforcements, including the N 41st Street Pedestrian Bridge. The N 41st Street Pedestrian Bridge is an older bridge constructed in 1936 and provides a more direct connection across Aurora Avenue for the north Fremont neighborhood.  

A concrete pedestrian bridge with an art deco design spans across a multi-lane road. The bridge shows visible wear, and a low clearance sign is posted

The photo above shows the N 41st Street Pedestrian Bridge over Aurora Ave N before planned seismic retrofit improvements (Google Street view).

We’re not changing the current use and operation of the bridge. The N 41st Street Pedestrian Bridge seismic retrofit will strengthen existing bridge components and reduce the bridge’s vulnerability to earthquakes. Major construction work includes: 

  • Retrofitting the bridge’s footing.
  • Installing carbon fiber wrapping to strengthen the bridge’s towers.
  • Repairing cracks and damaged concrete.
  • Replacing bolts throughout the bridge.
  • Replacement of impacted concrete panels and curb ramps 

Harvey Funeral Home, 508 North 36th Street

Posted on by Valarie

The Harvey Funeral Home on North 36th Street, corner of Evanston Avenue, is an example of the evolution of businesses and buildings in Fremont. This site started out as a single-family home built in 1902. In early Fremont there was no zoning and as the district grew, homes were sometimes converted to commercial buildings. That is the case with this building which was expanded several times, beginning in 1928 when it opened as the Fisher-Kalfus Funeral Home. In 1955 the name became the Hoffner, Fisher & Harvey Funeral Home.

Like the Bleitz Funeral Home at the south end of the Fremont Bridge, the Harvey Funeral Home experienced a decline in business because of cultural changes in funeral preferences. The property has been sold and as of 2025 the site is slated for redevelopment. The building was presented at the Seattle Landmarks Board but it failed to win nomination for historic preservation.

Sources:

Landmarks Board nomination report, 2021.

Fremont Public Art: Troll’s Knoll Forest Lanterns

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Dear FOTK (Friends of Troll’s Knoll) Supporters:

On Saturday, March 8th when visiting Troll’s Knoll Forest, we found that a mushroom lantern sculpture (third one as you head south) had been violently damaged. The mushroom cap was split horizontally and the cradle that supported the cap had been crushed and removed from the structure (see attached photo). The four mushroom lantern sculptures on site are a collaboration between artists Michiko Tanaka and HaiYing Wu. They were installed in 2023.

HaiYing and Michiko visited the site to survey the damage. It was determined the mushroom can be repaired but will cost in the neighborhood of $2,000. The work will consist of repairing damage, reproducing a silicone mold, cement casting and installation.

We are very honored to have this work by HaiYing Wu and Michiko Tanaka and are reaching out to the community to help fund the repair as this was not an expenditure we anticipated having.

While it is disappointing having art vandalized, our group is committed to maintaining the art and nature of the site. If you have visited the site lately you may have noticed all of the daffodils and tulips we planted are coming up. We expect even more visitors to the site next year because of 2026 FIFA World Cup. We hope you can make a donation to help with this repair and keep up the momentum at Troll’s Knoll. (Friends of Troll’s Knoll is Seattle Parks Foundation Community Partner, and a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. Tax ID: 91-1998597).

Thank you.

Leo Griffin
President
Friends of Troll’s Knoll
fremonttrollsknoll@gmail.com

Bleitz Funeral Home, 316 Florentia Street

Posted on by Valarie

The Lake Washington Ship Canal was completed in 1917 and the former small stream flowing westward past Fremont, was widened and deepened for the passage of larger vessels. Before that time there had been a much smaller channel and a bridge, and areas on the south side of the bridge were still considered part of Fremont. The new, wide channel caused a demarcation so that today, the south side of the Fremont Bridge is considered to be in the Queen Anne neighborhood.

In 1904 an ambitious young man, Jacob Bleitz, came to Seattle to set up his funeral home business. He had attended the Chicago College of Embalming in 1900, then set up business in Wichita, Kansas, for a time.

In Seattle, Jacob Bleitz gravitated to the Fremont neighborhood where he joined the Masonic group, the Doric Lodge. He accessed his business contacts there and opened his funeral home business in Fremont in 1906. Bleitz seemed to want to keep developing for better facilities. He moved to another intersection in Fremont and then, in 1921, he built his own building on the south side of the Fremont Bridge, at Florentia Street. The Bleitz building is today very visible in its location right next to the bridge.

Changes in cultural expectations of funeral services, such as a greater emphasis on cremation, have caused a decline in the number of mortuary facilities in Seattle. After the Bleitz business closed and the building was sold, a developer applied to tear it down and build a new office building there. This plan was stopped in part, by the historic landmarking of the building in 2017, under the City of Seattle Historic Preservation Program.

The Bleitz building was then sold to another developer who was willing to work with the historic preservation program. Permission was granted to demolish a “non-contributing” structure, a drive-up, on the west side of the building as it was not original. The western side of the property was available for a new building. The new building is joined to the Bleitz by a courtyard and the property has been renamed Fremont Crossing.

Sources:

Bleitz history:  company photos in the Now and Then column of June 16, 2022.

Historic Landmark Nomination, Bleitz Funeral Home, March 1, 2017, Seattle Landmarks Board.

South of the Bridge in Fremont, blog article about the Bleitz and other developments.

B. F. Day Elementary School, 3921 Linden Avenue North in Fremont, Seattle

Posted on by Valarie

The Fremont neighborhood was opened for settlement in 1888 and its early residents were very active in organizing their community. Since Fremont was not yet within the Seattle City Limits, there was no school district oversight so some community members, such as the Goddard family, taught groups of children in homes.

The neighborhood grew rapidly. After Fremont was annexed to the City of Seattle in June 1891, the Seattle School District rented a community hall to be used for classes.

Fremont resident B.F. Day was a real estate salesman who knew that the availability of a school would attract homebuyers. Mr. & Mrs. Day donated land that they owned in the 3900 block of Linden Avenue for the site of the school. On May 2, 1892, four rooms had been completed in the new building which went on to have eight rooms. The population of Fremont grew so rapidly that by 1899 enrollment exceeded capacity. The students at B.F. Day were sent to temporary locations while another eight rooms were added to the school building. Another addition was made in 1915.

B.F. Day Elementary School is the longest continuously-operating school building in Seattle. The building was given “landmark” status in 1981 under Seattle’s Historical Preservation program. In another sense, the school building certainly does serve as a “landmark” in old photos as the roofline is visible on one of the highest elevations in the neighborhood.

Sources:

Seattle’s Pioneers of Fremont: B.F. Day. (Blog article)

People of the Ship Canal: A.J. Goddard, Businessman and Legislator (Blog article)

Fremont Historic Resources Survey – Context Statement by Caroline Tobin, January 2010.   City of Seattle Historic Preservation.

The Fremont Branch Library at 731 North 35th Street

Posted on by Valarie

The Fremont neighborhood is the site of many “firsts” in Seattle, and it was the first to have a branch library.

In the 1890s there was only one public library in Seattle, located downtown. Residents of the growing Fremont neighborhood set up a reading room with privately donated books and newspapers where anyone could come to sit and read. A Seattle Daily Times article of January 1900 told of the formation of a library committee headed by Sidney Elder, a pharmacist at Fremont Drug Company, 3401 Fremont Avenue. The committee included other businessmen and their wives, who organized a community fund drive to buy books.

The Fremont Reading Room moved several times until the community petitioned the Seattle library system to build a branch library in Fremont. Philanthropist Andrew Carnegie provided funds for the building itself. Another community fund drive and funds from the City of Seattle were used to purchase the land and add Fremont to the Seattle library system.

Architect Daniel R. Huntington received the commission to design the Fremont Branch Library building, which opened on July 27, 1921. The building’s architectural style is Mission Revival/Spanish, with red clay roof tiles, stucco walls and ornamental black ironwork on windows, railings and front gates.

In 2003 the Fremont Branch Library was “landmarked” as a significant structure worthy of historic preservation, under the City of Seattle’s Historic Preservation program.

Sources:

“Fremont Branch, Seattle Public Library.” HistoryLink Essay #3967 by David Wilma, 2002.

Fremont Drug Company in Seattle: Part One, Beginnings.” This blog article tells about an early business in Fremont and the active community members who helped organize Fremont’s reading room.

The Fremont Hotel Building, 3419 Fremont Avenue North

Posted on by Valarie

The Great Seattle Fire of June 6, 1889 made news headlines all over the USA and drew opportunity-seekers to Seattle. Skilled workers such as carpenters knew that they would have a good chance of finding employment in the rebuilding of the city. Others, including teachers, attorneys, bankers and businessmen also sought opportunities in the rebuilding of Seattle.

A young man, Charles Remsberg, came to Seattle in 1889 and settled in the newly created suburb of Fremont where he found a place as an active community member. He studied to earn a law degree and was elected Justice of the Peace in Fremont, so that ever after, he was referred to as Judge Remsberg.

Judge Remsberg became a business investor in Fremont real estate. In 1901 he built in the 3400 block on the west side of Fremont Avenue. The building had storefronts at the sidewalk level and some office spaces on the second floor, which also contained the Fremont Hotel. In June 1903 a fire started, possibly in the chimney flue of one of the businesses. The fire destroyed much of the building and Judge Remsberg determined to re-build with more fire-resistant materials. Remsberg’s next venture was as founder of a bank across the street at 3416 Fremont Ave, with business partner Samuel Dixon. The Remsberg & Dixon Bank also sold fire insurance.

In 1911 a new street, Fremont Place, was cut through on the diagonal at the corner of 35th, giving more space for traffic to and from Fremont Avenue’s approach to the Fremont Bridge. Judge Remsberg’s corner Fremont Hotel building was slightly sheared off by the creation of the street, so he commissioned architects to adapt the building to the remaining land. This created the curved facade of the Fremont Hotel building, very eye-catching at this prominent intersection. A prefabricated building material, rusticated concrete blocks, also made the building stand out from its surroundings of mostly wood-frame or brick-fronted buildings.

Today the Fremont Hotel building appeals to the eye with its curved front, unique rusticated facade and large windows into shops. In 1979 the building was nominated for historic preservation due to its “visual prominence that underscores its historical associations with long-term business and civic institutions in the Fremont District.”

Sources:

Caroline Tobin, Historical Survey and Planning Study of Fremont’s Commercial Area, Fremont Neighborhood Council, 1991.

“Destructive Fire in Fremont,” Seattle Daily Times, June 24, 1903, pages 1 and 2.

“People of the Ship Canal: Remsberg & Dixon, Fremont Businessmen.” Blog article, 2017, by Valarie.

The McKenzie Building at 3400 Fremont Avenue North

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By 1927 Fremont was a well-established neighborhood with a busy commercial district along Fremont Avenue North and the side-streets including North 34th Street. In that year a pioneer building, Hotel Dixon, was demolished to make way for a new-era commercial building with storefronts at the sidewalk level and offices upstairs. There also is a basement which today still houses successful businesses.

The McKenzie Building at 3400 Fremont Avenue North was designed by Seattle architect John R. Nevins, a resident of the early Wedgwood neighborhood in northeast Seattle.

Today the building at 3400 Fremont Avenue North is still known as the McKenzie, with the name spelled out in decorative tile and brickwork. David McKenzie (1858-1929) was a business investor who came to Seattle in 1907 and had a varied career. Along with business interests he served as one of the three King County Councilmen, and he was director of the Westlake Public Market until 1925. In 1926 he was one of the investors in Fremont’s Queen City Bank which had been organized by Fremont businessmen including Bryant Lumber Company executives.

In the last years of his life David McKenzie’s occupation was listed as real estate investor. He may have intended to live in retirement supported by rental income from the new McKenzie Building.

A long-time tenant of the McKenzie Building was the Costas Opa Greek restaurant, which operated from 1981 to 2012. A Chase Bank branch later opened in the McKenzie Building. At this writing in February 2025 the ground floor of the McKenzie Building is vacant.

Hotel Dixon at 3400 Fremont Avenue North

Posted on by Valarie

Walter A. Shorey was one of the enterprising young men who came to Seattle to get in on its opportunities for growth. He arrived just in time for the opening of a new neighborhood, Fremont, in 1888. Shorey obtained a prime site at the main intersection of North 34th Street & Fremont Avenue, to build a large hotel/boarding house. Fremont’s founders had planned ahead to establish resources for the community, so they had already set up a lumber mill which provided jobs and materials to build houses. A boarding house was needed for temporary residents or single men like the sawmill workers.

After about ten years Walter Shorey sold the hotel to Samuel Dixon, another early Fremont businessman. Shorey continued to live in the area and listed himself as a real estate agent. Perhaps Shorey sold the boarding house business because he’d had to slow down due to poor health, as he died in 1903.

In the 1901 photo shown here, people on the veranda of Hotel Dixon are standing with their bicycles. The reason for this might be because hotel proprietor Samuel Dixon also owned a bicycle shop, right across the street. During his years as a businessman in Fremont, Dixon juggled several enterprises, including insurance, banking and real estate developments.

Hotel Dixon stood on this site, northeast corner of 34th & Fremont Avenue North, until 1927 when it was replaced by the McKenzie Building.

3400 Phinney Avenue North: the original trolley car barn

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The red-brick trolley car barn in Fremont was built in 1905 as a home base for the five lines which traveled around the Fremont, Ballard, Phinney, and Greenlake areas. The parking area had pits below, used by mechanics who repaired the underworking of the cars. On the east side of the building was a yard with a wash tower for cleaning the cars.

The building was the first major streetcar service facility to be built in north Seattle, and it represented the heyday of trolley service under Stone & Webster ownership. The trolley era came to a sudden end in 1941 when the City of Seattle abandoned the system and converted to gas-powered buses. The last streetcar to operate in the City of Seattle stopped at the Fremont Car Barn on April 13, 1941.

During World War Two in the 1940s, the car barn was taken over by the Army and was used as storage space. After the war, the building was used by the Seattle Disposal Company to house garbage trucks.

In 1988 the car barn became the home of Redhook Ale Brewery, with the Trolleyman pub on the northwest corner of the building. From 2006-2025 the car barn was the production facility and retail store outlet of Theo Chocolate.

The Fremont Trolley Car Barn received historic designation in 1989 under the City of Seattle Historic Preservation Program. At this writing in February 2025 we await the next use of this landmark building in Fremont.