Notes on Seattle

by Richard C. DeArmond

Last night (20 SE 2000) I got caught up watching the history of Seattle baseball teams on the tube (PBS). Not that I am interested in the history of baseball, but in the history of Seattle. There was one shot taken in 1911 of Rainier Ave, location unknown. One would never recognize it as Rainier Ave. In the centre (...er) of the street were the the tracks of the Renton Interurban which was really a local line along Rainier Ave. that went as far as Renton, where the line had more of a suburban feel south of Henderson St. (roughly). The street had on both sides of the tracks wooden planks. Everything in the picture is gone today. Later in the film they were going on about the new baseball stadium that Sick built in 1937, and they showed some scenes of Twin Coaches in downtown Seattle and on Rainier Ave. heading to the Stadium (near McClellan) signed up as "Ballpark". The narrator said something like "Many Seattle residents took the trolley to the ballpark." These shots were in colour, though the date could not have been earlier than 1940, when trolleybuses first started in Seattle. There was a special loop near the ball park. As I recall, the trolleys would turn onto Empire Way (now MLK) turn left cross the main track on Rainier and proceed to the stadium on a special passing wire. Today, all of this gone--the stadium and the loop, which disappeared in 1963 when the Rainier Ave. line went Diseasel. When the trolley returned to Rainier Ave. in 1981, Sicks stadium was gone--hence no need for a loop there.

This page last updated 21 SE 2000