Seattle: 1900-1920 -From Boomtown, Through Urban Turbulence ...

Part Oneemergency and onset of the cold war, steadily eroded the liberal programs launched underthe New Deal and sparked even earlier by the Progressive Movement during the years wewill now survey.Part OneSeattle at the Turn of the CenturyThe arrival of the SS Portland from the Klondike on 17 July 1897, with its “ton ofgold,” launched Seattle’s twentieth-century economy. The city was favorably positioned fordeveloping trade not only with Alaska but also with Asia. James J. Hill’s Great NorthernRailroad (GN) had finally given the city its own transcontinental connection with marketsto the east in 1893—ten years after the Northern Pacific Railroad (NP) had connectedTacoma’s lumber mills with eastern markets. Seattleites never fully forgave the NP forkindling rivalry with its neighbor down the Sound. But the depression of 1893 to 1896 hadput a damper upon Seattle’s early commercial development. With the Portland’s berthing,the city began to throb at the prospect ahead.During previous decades, the nascent city’s merchants had steadily cultivatedtrading relationships with southeast Alaska, British Columbia, and the Puget Soundhinterland. Seattle became the regional jobbing and trading center by the early 1890s.Though the commodities traded were ever so humble, a solid commercial base was beinglaid for subsequent expansion. Most traded were groceries, followed by dry goods, meat,hardware, and machinery. Small vessels, nicknamed the Mosquito Fleet, swarmed over thesound carrying lesser commodities: local farm products, lumber, and fish, all of which wereexchanged for processed foods and farm and household supplies.That the vessel that ignited the goldrush should be named for Seattle’sprinciple commercial rival was anirony no doubt enjoyed by thosehere crowding the waterfront underthe influence of “Gold Fever.” Theexhilarated crowd admires thesteamship Portland resting in itssnug slip between Schwabacher’swharf and the Pike Street Fish Wharf,the present site of Waterfront Park.Puget Sound is considerably closerto the wealth of Alaska than theColumbia River and Seattle exploitedthis advantage. The pioneers werepleased to call Puget Sound the“Mediterranean of the Pacific.” It hadno perils at its entrance like the barat the mouth of the Columbia River.Any passage to Portland was madeunpredictable when passing throughthat “Graveyard of the Pacific.”