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Category: Seattle History

Fremont’s Grand Union Streetcar Switch

Posted on by Valarie

One of the reasons why Fremont was long regarded as the Center of the Universe was because of its convergence of streetcar lines. At the north end of the Fremont Bridge, in the spot where there is now the Waiting for the Interurban sculpture, there was a Grand Union track layout for streetcars to turn or go straight ahead, accommodating all the lines that passed through. The car barn for maintenance was located just west of here, at 34th & Phinney, providing even more reason for streetcars of different routes to make their way through Fremont.

Sadly, the Seattle streetcar system deteriorated, and the decision was made to convert to a bus system. The last streetcar went to the Fremont Car Barn on April 13, 1941.

In 1940 an article in the Seattle Times told of the coming shut-down of the streetcar system, with this photo of the four-way switch:

“Once the pride of the Municipal Street Railway and the only one of its kind west of Chicago, the four-way streetcar switch at North 34th Street and Fremont Avenue, at the north end of the Fremont Bridge, will be removed as part of the city’s change from streetcars to buses and trackless trolleys. Called a “Grand Union Track Layout,” it cost $48,000 to build and install in 1923, a streetcar entering from any direction may turn either way or go straight ahead. The switch was so complicated the Bethlehem Steel Works assembled it first at the steel mill to see if it would work, before sending it here.” (Seattle Daily Times, February 15, 1940, page 4).

For further reference: “Street Railways in Seattle,” HistoryLink Essay #2707 by Walt Crowley, 2000.

Fremont and Seattle’s Ship Canal

Posted on by Valarie

Looking west in Fremont during the ship canal construction in 1912. Photo courtesy of MOHAI 83.10.69.32

Seattle’s earliest white settlers saw immediately that it would be possible to connect its freshwater lakes to the saltwater Puget Sound by means of a canal.  At a Fourth of July picnic in 1854, Thomas Mercer proposed the name of Lake Union because that body of water was in the middle between Lake Washington to the east and Puget Sound to the west.

Seattle settlers of the 1850s Thomas Mercer and David Denny took land claims at the south end of Lake Union near today’s Seattle Center.  Two single men, John Ross and William Strickler, searched out the land and in 1853-1854 they took claims at the northwest corner of Lake Union, which today is the Fremont neighborhood.  It was not until 1911-1917 that a ship canal was constructed which was large enough for industrial use.

From those earliest times in the 1850s Seattle settlers thought to build a ship canal but little did they know that it would take more than sixty years to come to fruition.  Finally in 1911 all of the needed legislation, financing and public support came together to start construction to create the Lake Washington Ship Canal. 

Continue reading “Fremont and Seattle’s Ship Canal”

The Fremont Bridge

Posted on by Valarie

Not every neighborhood has a bridge, and the Fremont Bridge has been the defining characteristic of the neighborhood since its founding in 1888.

At first there was only a stream, called The Outlet, flowing westward from Lake Union out towards Puget Sound, with a small wooden bridge to span it. Early in neighborhood history, Fremont’s boosters arranged for streetcars to come to Fremont and for this reason a more substantial trestle bridge had to be built, though it was also of wood construction.

Street railway historian Leslie Blanchard described the approach to Fremont in 1902: “then along Westlake Avenue to the foot of the old Fremont Bridge, where streetcar passengers beheld a scene bearing little resemblance to that which greets the traveler on that thoroughfare today. A rickety wooden bridge of antediluvian ancestry spanned a turbid and sluggish stream, from which small boys of the Fremont area snared salmon with bent pins fastened to broomsticks.”

The Fremont Bridge was rebuilt several times. As the stream was widened to improve access for boat traffic, the elevation of the bridge had to be increased until its span reached North 34th Street as it does today. During the ship canal construction in 1914 the bridge was washed out by a dam break. A temporary Stone Way bridge was built to use until the ship canal was finished.

Upon completion of the Lake Washington Ship Canal project, the present bascule Fremont Bridge opened to traffic on June 15, 1917. This rebuilding included capacity for auto traffic in addition to streetcar tracks. The streetcar era in Seattle ended in 1941 but today, cars, buses, pedestrians and bicycles cross over the Fremont Bridge.

The Fremont Bridge was designated as a City of Seattle Historic Landmark in 1980, as characterized by its prominence of spatial location and its easily identifiable visual feature of the neighborhood. The Bridge contributes to the distinctive identity of Fremont.

Sources:

Leslie F. Blanchard, Street Railway Era in Seattle: A Chronicle of Six Decades, 1968.

Caroline Tobin, Fremont Historic Context Statement, 2009.

$40,000 Loss from Bursting Fremont Dam.” Seattle Daily Times, March 14, 1914, pages 1, 5, and 12.

“Building permits, Carl Signor, 2944 Westlake Avenue, build two-story frame store building.”  Seattle Daily Times, August 18, 1904, page 7.

“Dam bursts on Lake Union… March 13, 1914.”  HistoryLink Essay #20222 by David B. Williams, 2016.

Fremont Bridge — National Register of Historic Places.

Seattle Municipal Archives, photo number 2787, Signor grocery building.

“Wood trestle spans canal and connects Seattle’s Fremont neighborhood with the foot of Queen Anne Hill in 1892.”  HistoryLink Essay #3309 by Priscilla Long.

“Fremont Bridge.” HistoryLink Essay #20374 by Glenn Drosendahl.  This essay gives the timeline of the series of bridges which were built at Fremont, culminating in the present bridge.

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.

3400 Phinney Avenue North: the original trolley car barn

Posted on by Valarie

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.

3400 Phinney Avenue North: car barn

Posted on by Valarie

After nineteen years in Fremont, the Theo Chocolate Company has announced closure of their store in February 2025, as well as the store in Bellevue.

The Theo Chocolate building at 3400 Phinney Avenue North which had also been used as their factory, was built in 1905 as a car barn for the trolley system. The centrality of Fremont and the convergence of tracks there, helped earn the designation of Fremont as Center of the Universe. The building was officially landmarked for historic preservation in 1989.

Read more at this Wikipedia article about the car barn.

The McMullen Fuel Company

Posted on by Valarie

In 1889 J. S. McMullen, age 55, pulled up stakes and went out West.  He had spent most of his life in Michigan but perhaps he was enticed to start a new life by word of the rich natural resources of the Seattle area.  McMullen brought his wife and four adult children, and the family became business leaders in the Fremont neighborhood.

Continue reading “The McMullen Fuel Company”

Doric Lodge #92, F&AM, Fremont

Posted on by Valarie

In 1891 Fremont, founded as a separate entity, was annexed to the City of Seattle and became a neighborhood. In September 1892 thirteen members of the Masons group met at Fremont Hall to petition for a new lodge, to be known as Doric Lodge. The Grand Lodge of Washington concurred, and a charter was granted in June 1893.

The new lodge met in Fremont Hall (3400 block of Fremont Ave) at first, but as they grew in numbers they sought out a permanent space. They purchased land in the 3500 block of Fremont Avenue and designed the Doric Temple, completing construction in 1909. Their meeting room was on the second floor with ground-floor spaces for commercial tenants, whose lease payments helped support the Lodge. The first businesses in the spaces were a hardware store and a funeral home. Jacob Bleitz of the funeral home, later moved to the south side of the Fremont Bridge where his former building still stands today, now modified to be an office building.

To find the Doric Lodge, start at the Lenin statue and walk northeast on the same block, to where the Doric Lodge entrance is facing North 36th Street.

Ross School in Fremont

Posted on by Valarie

Ross Park on Third Ave NW at NW 43rd Street is the former site of Ross School.  It was named for the family who were the earliest settlers in the western part of Fremont.  

The John Ross family took land in homestead claims on both sides of what is now the ship canal, including the present site of Seattle Pacific University.  Up until the ship canal was created in 1911-1917, there was a stream flowing westward toward Puget Sound. When the Ross family moved to a new house on the north side of the creek, they cooperated with neighbors to build a school for the community’s children at the site of what is now Ross Park.

The school population grew larger until a new building was needed. The building pictured here, was an eight-room schoolhouse which opened in 1903.  The school closed in 1940 and children were then sent to West Woodland Elementary.

The History of Fremont Baptist Church in Seattle

Posted on by Valarie

Fremont Baptist Church, 717 North 36th Street, was organized 132 years ago.

The church group first met in an American Baptist Society Chapel Train Car. Next the church services were held in several different buildings in Fremont, then our first wooden building was opened on this site in 1901. The current brick building opened in 1924.

The story of the founding of Fremont Baptist Church
Mr. and Mrs. A. G. Wooster were the founders of Fremont Baptist Church. After moving to Fremont in the early 1890s, the Woosters began looking for Baptists in the area.  When they found eight other local Baptists, the Woosters first arranged to meet in the Christian Church building on Latona. Then, they arranged for the chapel rail car “Evangel” to come to Fremont.  Mr. Wooster was the first Sunday School Superintendent and the first Church Clerk.

Fremont Baptist Church was established on March 20, 1892, when Rev. E. G. Wheeler and a small group of faithful met in the chapel car Evangel.  The chapel car was provided as a mission tool by the American Baptist Publication Society and was parked on a rail siding between Fremont Fire Station and the railroad depot on Ewing Street (North 34th Street). After the initial organization, the church met in rented storefronts and had eight pastors over the next seven years until Rev. Cairns came in 1899.
 
When Rev. Cairns came there were 28 Fremont Baptist church members at Fremont.  Under Rev. Cairns leadership the congregation bought property and began constructing a building in March of 1900.  The wooden structure was dedicated one year later on March 24, 1901.  When Rev. Cairns retired at the age of 85 in 1909, the church membership had grown to 145.  Over the next 15 years the church continued to grow under the leadership of Pastors Lamoreux, Reading, and Hicks.

By 1924 the congregation was bursting at the seams of the old wooden structure, and it was decided that a new building was needed.  More land was bought, the old wooden structure was demolished, and work on a new brick structure was started.  The present church structure at 717 North 36th Street was finished and dedicated in December of 1924.

The Family Works Food Bank was started in Fremont Baptist Church, originally known as the Fremont Food Bank, with church members volunteering.  Every year at the Fremont Fair, Fremont Baptist Church puts up the Orange Booth as it has for decades to give out free coffee, lemonade and doggie water, with all donations going to Family Works Food Bank. Fremont Baptist Church continues today with involvement in the Fremont community as a beacon of hope.