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| Title | Alaskan Way sea wall construction showing workers during hydraulic land grading, Seattle, ca. 1935 |
| Photographer | Staff Photographer
Seattle Post-Intelligencer |
| Date | 1935 |
| Caption | In the early 1930s, Seattle' Railroad Avenue was a treacherous waterfront thoroughfare perched above the tides on rotting pilings. The roadway was key to Seattle commerce because it connected wharves, warehouses and railroads. As the road deteriorated, it was harder and harder to move goods in the port. A concrete sea wall, built in 1911-1916 protected the central business district from Washington to Madison Streets. In 1934, work began on the northern stretch of sea wall, between Madison and Broad Streets. Between 1934 and 1936, the newly-protected waterfront was filled in and paved as Alaskan Way.
This image shows a man watching while workmen use a high-pressure stream of water to move fill dirt. The photo seems to have been taken at the northern end of the sea wall. The building to the right was located on Elliott Avenue, between Broad and Clay Streets. |
| Notes | Sign in image reads: Soya Millers Inc.
Handwritten on sleeve: SEATTLE, STREETS, Alaskan Way, construction of sea wall.
Caption information source: Paul Dorpat and Genevieve McCoy, Building Washington: A History of Washington State Public Works. Polk's Seattle City Directory, 1934. |
| Subjects | Sea walls--Washington (State)--Seattle; Construction--Washington (State)--Seattle; Laborers--Washington (State)--Seattle; Water use--Washington (State)--Seattle; Hoses--Washington (State)--Seattle; Bays (Bodies of water)--Washington (State)--Seattle |
| Places | United States--Washington (State)--Seattle
Elliott Bay (Wash.) |
| Digital Collection | Museum of History & Industry Photograph Collection |
| Image Number | 1986.5.12202.1 |
| Ordering Information | To order a reproduction or to inquire about permissions contact photos@mohai.org or phone us at 206-324-1126. Please refer to the Image Number and provide a brief description of the photograph. |
| Credit Line | Seattle Post-Intelligencer Collection, Museum of History & Industry, Seattle; All Rights Reserved |
| Repository | Museum of History & Industry, Seattle (MOHAI) |
| Repository Collection | Seattle Post-Intelligencer Collection |
| Type | Image |
| Physical Description | 1 nitrate negative: b&w; 4 x 5 in. |
| Digital Reproduction Information | Scanned from original negative as a 3000 pixel TIFF image in 8-bit grayscale, resized to 640 pixels in the longest dimension and compressed into JPEG format using Photoshop 6.0 and its JPEG quality measurement 3. |
