Jade D

  • Billy Bloch and the Germania Café

    ~posted by Jade D. Did you know October is Archives month? In a belated nod to German-American Day (October 6) and the various Oktoberfests (and Booktoberfests) happening this month, we decided to highlight some recent German-flavored additions to our digital collection. Now a part of our Seattle Historic Photograph Collection, these photographs depict the life… Continue reading

  • To the Polls! The Municipal News and Historic Seattle Elections

    ~posted by Jade Just in time for election season, we’ve launched our Municipal News Digital Collection featuring nearly 100 years of issues from 1911 to 2010. Produced by the Municipal League of Seattle, the news provides insight on hot button civic issues of the day such as prohibition, dance halls, desegregation, the Alaskan Way Viaduct and… Continue reading

  • Art at the Library: the Public Works of Art Project

    ~posted by Jade D. You may have noticed a few pieces of art when visiting your local library branch, but did you know that the Seattle Public Library has a rich collection of artwork featuring more than 300 pieces from Pacific Northwest artists? The library was one of the first locations in Seattle to offer… Continue reading

  • If Walls Could Talk: The Bussell Family – Part 2

    By Jade D If you missed my first post about the history of the Bussell family and their home, take a look at Part 1 to catch up! So here’s what really happened, as best as I can tell. Charles Bussell and his first wife, Elizabeth, bought their Madrona home in 1900. Despite the stately… Continue reading

  • If Walls Could Talk: The Bussell Family – Part 1

    ~posted by Jade It all began with a picture of a house. I was researching a recent addition to our Seattle Historical Photograph Collection and all I had to go on was the name “Bussell” on the back of the photograph. Quick searches in HistoryLink and the Seattle Times historical newspaper database revealed it to… Continue reading

  • “Doomed from the first”: The Lincoln Hotel Fire

    ~posted by Jade The Lincoln Hotel, Seattle’s first apartment-hotel, was built in 1900 at the northwest corner of Fourth Avenue and Madison Street, across the road from where the Central Library now stands. (In fact, a 1907 hotel brochure from our online collections lists proximity to the Carnegie library as one of the perks of… Continue reading

  • Mark Twain’s Seattle Doppelgänger

    ~posted by Jade D. While looking through the portraits in our Seattle Historical Photograph Collection online, I came upon a photograph of an older man with wild white hair and a moustache and momentarily wondered what we were doing with a photograph of Mark Twain in our collection. After performing this double take, I looked… Continue reading

  • Postmarked with Love

    ~posted by Jade In honor of Valentine’s Day and the spirit of sending messages to loved ones, I’m sharing a couple of fun postcards from our online Historic Seattle Postcard Collection. One of my favorite parts about this collection is finding postcards that include messages between friends and family. These brief notes can reveal some… Continue reading