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Simeon T. Toby's Bank Building
RVHS Photo 1993.001.0006 This photo of the Toby building was taken about 1930. It was built by Simeon T. Toby in 1903, on the Southeast...
Heater Glove Company
Columbia City has had its share of manufacturing companies over the years. One of the more noteworthy was the Heater Glove Company,...
Columbia City’s Sweetest Places: The Columbia Confectionery
This was the sweetest place in Columbia City in the 1920’s and ‘30s. It was a regular stop for all the school kids on their way to and...
Grading of Rainier Valley's Streets
The location of the grading in progress was on Orcas Street in Hillman City, almost a block west of Rainier Avenue in front of St....
Bill Phalen's Parade
Bill Phalen was an organizer. He was also a professional baseball player, a politician (Columbia City's mayor), and he started Columbia...
Rainier Valley Dairy
Smith M. Wilson started in the dairy business on Beacon Hill in 1916. There were many small dairy farms throughout the sparsely settled...
Modern Woodmen of America
The members of the Modern Woodmen of America drill team are standing at attention, axes in hand, posing for the photographer. They are...
Memories of a Rainier Valley Street Car Operator
Charlie Fletcher was the last surviving motorman from the Rainier Valley Street car line. Before he passed away in October of 1994 at the...
Car #20 in Columbia City
The date is 1902. Car #20 of the Seattle, Renton & Southern RY., traveling southbound, has just crested the hill between Genesee and...
Brighton School
South Seattle has many schools with interesting histories. Our children attend newer, rebuilt schools, such as Muir and Whitworth, or...
Columbia Mill
This photo shows the Columbia Mill that was built in 1890, the same year the streetcar tracks were laid starting at Railroad Avenue on...
Rainier Valley's First Street Cars
The upper, 1891 photo was taken in Columbia City, the year the first lots were sold there and a year after the streetcar line was put in....
Columbia Library Under Construction
It took a lot of lobbying by the local citizenry to convince the downtown officials to build a library in Columbia City. With grants from...
Valley Fuel Company
This photo was taken in 1912. The location was the southeast corner of Rainier and Alaska Street in Columbia City, where the Post Office...
Old Columbia City: City Hall
This photo was taken about 1905 looking North along Rainier Avenue from Hudson Street. The building on the left housed the equipment for...
The Old Columbia School Bell To Ring Again
The Tower at the ‘Columbia School, seen here in 1906, was the original home of the bell that has since been kept in storage at Orca at...
Bill Phalen's Store: W.W. Phalen was a Business and Community Leader
One of Columbia’s most active and civic-minded businessmen was William W. Phalen: grocer, baseball player, and town mayor. Phalen settles...
Goings-on at the cricket club were frowned upon
Residents of Rainier Valley are blessed with many beautiful parks and green spaces in which to play. This area was important to Seattle...
Ralph Nichols: Columbia City Football Star
Several years ago I had the pleasure of listening to a gem of history as I interviewed Ralph Nichols Jr. The history he had to tell was...
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