736 results for: Transportation
Photograph
Packers ascending summit of Chilkoot Pass, 1898
The gold seekers climbed over 1,200 steps to reach the top of Chilkoot Pass where they crossed the border into Canada. The angle of climb was about 30 degrees, and the line could only move as fast as the slowest climber. Anyone who stopped to rest might wait hours to get back in line. The Northwest Mounted Police required that…
ID Number:SHS2246
Date:1898
Photograph
Crowd with steamship "Australia" at Seattle pier, circa 1898
Gold seekers streamed to Seattle by the thousands, eager to board ships bound for the Klondike gold fields. Seattle's shipping industry and waterfront businesses boomed during the gold rush. In March 1897, before the news of the Klondike gold finds reached Seattle, port records show that only 18 ships sailed to or from Seattle. In March 1898, with the gold…
ID Number:SHS2504
Date:Circa 1898
Photograph
Steamship "Australia" loading at Seattle pier, circa 1898
The United States was in the grip of a nationwide economic depression in the 1890s. When the steamer "Portland" arrived in Seattle in July 1897 with more than a ton of Klondike gold, the city's depression ended. Pacific Northwest shipping companies were eager to profit from the gold rush. They scrambled to provide passenger and freight service to the Alaskan…
ID Number:SHS2506
Date:Circa 1898
Photograph
Sailing ship "Lucile" loading at Seattle pier, 1898
In 1897 and 1898 so many people wanted to go north to the Klondike gold fields that all kinds of ships were pressed into service. Some were sailing ships which had carried passengers, coal, lumber, or salmon up and down the west coast of the United States.This 1898 photo shows the wooden sailing ship "Lucile" loaded with gold miners and…
ID Number:SHS2551
Date:1898
Photograph
View of Lake Union from the Lake Washington Bicycle Path, Seattle, circa 1902
Between about 1894-1904, after the horse and before the automobile, bicycles were the hottest new form of do-it-yourself urban transportation in Seattle. The region's many cycling groups regularly sponsored outings along the twenty-five miles of urban bicycle trails which were built, funded, and maintained with the aid of city engineers. Bike cops enforced cyclist speed limits, safety, and dealt with…
ID Number:SHS2964
Date:Circa 1902
Photograph
Two women on Lake Washington cycling path, circa 1901
The 1890s boom in bicycling hit Seattle and the rest of the country. Public and private money built a network of bicycle paths in Seattle and out into the wooded countryside. Four tracks were built for bike racing. As the city grew, many of the trails became streets and lost their use as bike paths. This photo shows two women…
ID Number:SHS2968
Date:Circa 1901
Photograph
West-facing view of Queen Anne Hill, Seattle, circa 1905
This image of Seattle's Queen Anne Hill neighborhood was taken facing west from Queen Anne Avenue up West Highland Drive. The cable car visible on West Highland Drive is probably part of the northern segment of the Front Street Cable Railway, which ran north along Second Avenue North from the cable car power house at Denny Way, turned west at…
ID Number:SHS3127
Date:Circa 1905
Photograph
Cars on the Alaskan Way Viaduct, Seattle, 1967
The Alaskan Way Viaduct was an elevated highway in Seattle which was completed in 1966 after 16 years of construction and decades of planning. The double-decked highway ran along the Elliott Bay waterfront above the surface street, Alaskan Way, following previously existing railroad lines. The viaduct provided Seattle with its first bypass route around the downtown business district. The viaduct…
ID Number:SHS5152
Date:1967
Photograph
Trackless trolley or electric bus, Seattle, circa 1943
As the 1940s approached, Seattle began to modernize its transportation system, replacing its aging trolleys and streetcars with motorized buses and “trackless trolleys” (electric buses powered via overhead lines). In 1941, the last Seattle streetcar made its final run. Streets were repaved as the streetcar tracks throughout the city were torn up and sold as scrap. This image, likely taken…
ID Number:SHS5566
Date:Circa 1943
Photograph
Railroad construction workers and locomotive at the Green River crossing, 1885
In the 1880s, Chinese laborers were recruited by railroad companies because they worked for lower pay than whites. Chinese men were often assigned to such dangerous tasks as blasting through rock and laying tracks in tunnels or on river bluffs. Of the 20,000 men that built the Northern Pacific branch line between Pasco and Tacoma, 15,000 were Chinese.This 1885 photo…
ID Number:SHS5907
Date:1885