Hotel Seattle , also known as Seattle Hotel and the Collins Block , was located in Pioneer Square in a triangular block bound by James Street to the north, Yesler Way to the south, and 2nd Avenue to the east, just steps away from the Pioneer Building . It succeeded two prior hotels, a wooden and then a masonry Occidental Hotel.
41-696: It was built in 1890 after the Great Seattle Fire and served as a hotel until early in the 20th century. By the time neighboring Smith Tower was completed in 1914, the Seattle Hotel had become an office building. It was demolished in the early 1960s and the site is now home to the Sinking Ship , a parking garage . Before the Seattle Hotel rose in 1890, there was the Occidental Hotel. The first Occidental, which opened in 1861,
82-508: A joint operating agreement (JOA) whereby advertising , production , marketing , and circulation were run for both papers by The Seattle Times company. They maintained separate news and editorial departments. The papers published a combined Sunday edition, although the Times handled the majority of the editorial content while the P-I only provided a small editorial/opinions section. The JOA
123-421: A 1947 readers' contest to determine a new symbol for the paper. Out of 350 entrants, the winner was Jack (known as Jakk) C. Corsaw, a University of Washington art student. The globe was manufactured in 1948 and was placed atop the paper's then-new headquarters building at 6th Avenue and Wall Street (now City University of Seattle ). When the newspaper moved its headquarters again in 1986 to its current location on
164-756: A city ordinance that had been passed by the Seattle City Council on December 17, 2015, that designated the globe as an official city landmark. In March 2012, the globe was donated to the Museum of History and Industry , which planned to refurbish and relocate it, but as of 2018 , this had not occurred. Notable employees of the P-I have included two-time Pulitzer Prize winning editorial cartoonist and commentator David Horsey , two-time Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter Eric Nalder , Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and author Timothy Egan , journalist and author Darrell Bob Houston ("King of
205-532: A result of a power outage caused by the December 2006 Pacific Northwest storms . It was the first time in 70 years that publication had been suspended. On January 9, 2009, the Hearst Corporation announced that after losing money on it every year since 2000, Hearst was putting the P-I up for sale. The paper would be put on the market for 60 days, and if a buyer could not be found within that time,
246-599: A revival of the Pioneer Square district. By 1970, with its buildings refurbished, a historic district area including the Square was listed on the National Register of Historic Places . Great Seattle Fire The Great Seattle Fire was a fire that destroyed the entire central business district of Seattle , Washington , on June 6, 1889. The conflagration lasted for less than a day, burning through
287-449: Is now the state of Washington . After spending a miserable winter on the western shores of Elliott Bay , the party relocated to the eastern shores and established the settlement that would become Seattle. Early Seattle was dominated by the logging industry. The combination of a safe bay and an abundance of coniferous trees made Seattle the perfect location for shipping lumber to California. In 1852, Henry Yesler began construction of
328-693: The Seattle P-I , the Post-Intelligencer , or simply the P-I ) is an online newspaper and former print newspaper based in Seattle , Washington , United States. The newspaper was founded in 1863 as the weekly Seattle Gazette , and was later published daily in broadsheet format. It was long one of the city's two daily newspapers, along with The Seattle Times , until it became an online-only publication on March 18, 2009. J.R. Watson founded
369-693: The Intelligencer . In 1881, the Intelligencer merged with the Seattle Post . The names were combined to form the present-day name. In 1886, Indiana businessman Leigh S. J. Hunt came to Seattle and purchased the Seattle Post-Intelligencer , which he owned and published until he was forced to sell in the Panic of 1893 . At this point the newspaper was acquired by attorney and real estate developer James D. Hoge under whom it
410-660: The Seattle Gazette , Seattle's first newspaper, on December 10, 1863. The paper failed after a few years and was renamed the Weekly Intelligencer in 1867 by new owner Sam Maxwell. In 1878, after publishing the Intelligencer as a morning daily, printer Thaddeus Hanford bought the Daily Intelligencer for $ 8,000. Hanford also acquired Beriah Brown 's daily Puget Sound Dispatch and the weekly Pacific Tribune and folded both papers into
451-614: The Times from claiming losses in 2000 and 2001 as reason to end the JOA, because they resulted from extraordinary events (in this case, a seven-week newspaper strike ). Each side publicly accused the other of attempting to put its rival out of business. The trial judge granted a summary judgment in Hearst's favor on the force majeure issue. But after two appeals, the Washington State Supreme Court ruled in favor of
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#1732797855701492-515: The Times on June 30, 2005, on the force majeure clause, reversing the trial-court judge. The two papers settled the issue on April 16, 2007. The JOA ended in 2009 with the cessation of the P-I print edition. The P-I was notable for its two-time Pulitzer Prize -winning editorial cartoonist , David Horsey . Investigative reporting on King County Superior Court Judge Gary Little 's out-of-court contact with juvenile defendants revealed accusations that Little molested young boys while he
533-755: The United States Army in April 1943, while Anna stayed at the paper to help keep a liberal voice in the running of the paper. After Boettiger's absence, the paper increasingly turned conservative with Hearst's new acting publisher. Anna left Seattle in December 1943 to live in the White House with her youngest child, Johnny. This effectively ended the Roosevelt-Boettiger ties with the P-I . On December 15, 2006, no copies were printed as
574-498: The U.S. newspaper industry and other newspapers on the market going unsold. Five days before the 60-day deadline, the P-I reported that the Hearst Corporation had given several P-I reporters provisional job offers for an online edition of the P-I . On March 16, 2009, the newspaper posted a headline on its front page, followed shortly after by a short news story, that explained that the following day's edition would be its final one in print. The newspaper's publisher, Roger Oglesby,
615-613: The afternoon and into the night, during the same summer as the Great Spokane Fire and the Great Ellensburg Fire . Seattle quickly rebuilt using brick buildings that sat 20 feet (6.1 m) above the original street level. Its population swelled during reconstruction, becoming the largest city in the newly admitted state of Washington. In the fall of 1851, the Denny Party arrived at Alki Point in what
656-467: The blaze erupted and shortly devoured the entire block. A nearby liquor store exploded, and the alcohol fueled the flames. The fire quickly spread north to the Kenyon block and the nearby Madison and Griffith blocks. Wooden boardwalks carried the flames across streets to ignite other blocks. A combination of ill-preparedness and unfortunate circumstances contributed to the great fire. Seattle's water supply
697-469: The city's rodent problems. A new building ordinance resulted in a downtown of brick and stone buildings, rather than wood. In the year following the fire Seattle's population actually grew by nearly 20,000 to 40,000 inhabitants from the influx of people helping to recreate the city. Supplies and funds came from all over the West Coast to support the relief effort. The population increase made Seattle
738-452: The cleanup process. Over 1 million rodents were killed. Total losses were estimated at nearly $ 20 million ($ 678 million in 2023 dollars). Among the businesses affected were: Despite the magnitude of destruction, the rebuilding effort began quickly. Rather than starting over somewhere else, Seattle's citizens decided to rebuild. Seattle rebuilt from the ashes quickly, and the fire killed many rats and other vermin , thereby eliminating
779-493: The combustible loading. At approximately 2:20 p.m. on June 6, 1889, an accidentally overheated glue pot in a carpentry shop started the most destructive fire in the history of Seattle. The next day, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer , operating out of temporary facilities in the wake of the fire, reported incorrectly that the incident began in "Jim McGough's paint shop, under Smith's boot and shoe store, at
820-632: The corner of Front and Madison streets, in what was known as the Denny block"; a correction two weeks later said that it "actually started in the Clairmont and Company cabinet shop, below McGough's shop in the basement of the Pontius building", but the original error was often repeated, including in Murray Morgan 's bestselling Seattle history book Skid Road (1951). John Back, a 24-year-old Swede,
861-449: The fire had burned 25 city blocks, including the entire business district, four of the city's wharves , and its railroad terminals. The fire would be called the most destructive fire in the history of Seattle. Despite the massive destruction of property, few to no deaths occurred. Some claim a young boy named James Goin was killed in the blaze although no reliable records have been found from that time. However, there were fatalities during
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#1732797855701902-518: The first steam-powered mill in the Pacific Northwest. Because of the easy access to lumber, nearly every building was constructed of the affordable, but combustible timber. Additionally, because the area was at or below sea level, the fledgling town was a frequent victim of massive floods, requiring buildings to be built on wooden stilts. The town also used hollowed out scrap logs propped up on wooden braces as sewer and water pipes, increasing
943-470: The junction of James and Yesler. It stood five stories high and for much of its existence bore the inscription "1890" above the fifth-story window, signifying the year it was completed. Designed in the Victorian architectural tradition and clad in white cement, it stood in stark contrast to its dark brick and stone neighbors. Damaged by the 1949 Olympia earthquake and abandoned by 1961, the Seattle Hotel
984-537: The largest city in Washington, making it a leading contender in becoming the terminus of the Great Northern Railway . Seattle made many improvements in response to the fire. The Seattle Fire Department was officially established four months later to replace a volunteer organization with a paid force containing new firehouses and a new chief. The city took control of the water supply, increasing
1025-638: The newspaper had unfairly disparaged the Sheriff's Office. The P-I declined to participate in the proceedings, and opted instead to give a detailed reply on its website. The P-I is known for the 13.5-ton, 30-foot (9.1 m) neon globe atop its headquarters on the Elliott Bay waterfront, which features the words "It's in the P-I" rotating around the globe and an 18-foot (5.5 m) eagle perched atop with wings stretched upwards. The globe originated from
1066-568: The newspaper." The International Brotherhood of Teamsters joined the strike in solidarity. Roger Simpson and William Ames co-wrote their book Unionism or Hearst: the Seattle Post-Intelligencer Strike of 1936 on the topic. Anna Roosevelt Halsted , the daughter of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt , began working as the editor of the women's page at the P-I after her husband Clarence John Boettiger took over as publisher in 1936. Boettiger left Seattle to enter
1107-484: The number of hydrants and adding larger pipes. The advent of brick buildings to downtown Seattle was one of the many architectural improvements the city made in the wake of the fire. New city ordinances set standards for the thickness of walls and required "division walls" between buildings. These changes became principal features of post-fire construction and are still visible in Seattle's Pioneer Square district today,
1148-443: The paper would either be turned into an Internet-only publication with a drastically reduced staff, or closed outright. The news of the paper's impending sale was initially broken by local station KING-TV the night prior to the official announcement, and came as a surprise to the P-I ' s staff and the owners of rival newspaper The Seattle Times . Analysts did not expect a buyer to be found, in view of declining circulation in
1189-474: The present-day location of the fire. At Pioneer Square , guided tours are also available to paying customers. Also at this location, visitors can tour the Seattle Underground , where they can visit the original street level (now basement level) of buildings and storefronts that were built after the fire. Seattle Post-Intelligencer The Seattle Post-Intelligencer (popularly known as
1230-596: The story – and the network of connections that protected Little – are taught in journalism classes, and led to reforms in the way judges are disciplined in Washington state. In 2006 the P-I became the subject of a complaint to the Washington News Council for its reporting on the King County Sheriff's Office . The media watch-dog group ruled against the P-I , agreeing with Sheriff Sue Rahr's complaint that
1271-524: The waterfront, the globe was relocated to the new building. Over the decades since its first installation, the globe has become a city landmark that, to locals, is as iconic as the Space Needle . A stylized rendering of the globe appeared on the masthead of the newspaper in its latter years and continues to feature on its website. In April 2012, it was designated a Seattle landmark by the city's Landmarks Preservation Board . Mayor Ed Murray signed
Hotel Seattle - Misplaced Pages Continue
1312-586: Was Donald Mackay. The Puget Sound National Bank, which was co-founded by Jacob Furth , was located in the Occidental Hotel. The new hotel lasted just four years, before burning down in the Great Seattle Fire on June 6, 1889. The second Occidental Hotel, like the Seattle Hotel, was also triangular-shaped. The Seattle Hotel was a triangular-shaped building (much like the Flatiron Building in Manhattan , New York ), with its narrow face located at
1353-489: Was a teacher at Seattle's exclusive Lakeside School between 1968 and 1971. It also revealed inappropriate contact between Little and juveniles appearing before him after he became a judge. On August 19, 1988, after reporter Duff Wilson called the judge to advise him the newspaper was publishing the story, Little shot himself in the King County Courthouse . The ethical debates surrounding the publication of
1394-548: Was a wooden building. Twenty years later, on September 26, 1881, it held a memorial service for President James Garfield , who had died five days earlier from injuries sustained when he was shot in July. In 1883, the wooden structure was torn down and John Collins built a bigger, grander one in the same location. Construction bids were accepted in February 1883. Construction for the new hotel began on about May 1, 1883. The architect
1435-633: Was acquired by Hearst in 1921. Circulation stood at 31,000 in 1911. In 1912, editor Eric W. Allen left the paper to found the University of Oregon School of Journalism, which he ran until his death in 1944. William Randolph Hearst took over the paper in 1921, and the Hearst Corporation owns the P-I to this day. In 1936, 35 P-I writers and members of The Newspaper Guild went on three-month strike against "arbitrary dismissals and assignment changes and other 'efficiency' moves by
1476-400: Was heating the glue over a gasoline fire when it boiled over, igniting the wood chips and turpentine covering the floor. Back attempted to douse the fire with water which only served to spread the fire further. The fire department arrived by 2:45, but by that time the area was so smokey that the source of the fire could not be determined. Fed by the shop's timber and an unusually dry summer,
1517-412: Was insufficient in fighting the giant inferno. Fire hydrants were sparsely located on every other street, usually connected to small pipes. There were so many hydrants in use during the fire that the water pressure was too weak to fight such a massive blaze. Seattle was also operated by a volunteer fire department , which was competent but inadequate in extinguishing the fire. By the morning of June 7,
1558-416: Was proposed by Hearst in 1981 due to $ 14 million in cumulative financial losses incurred by the P-I . In 2003 the Times tried to cancel the JOA, citing a clause in it that three consecutive years of losses were cause for cancelling the agreement. Hearst disagreed, and immediately filed suit to prevent the Times from cancelling the agreement. Hearst argued that a force majeure clause prevented
1599-407: Was quoted saying that the P-I would continue as an online-only operation. Print subscribers had their subscriptions automatically transferred to The Seattle Times on March 18. As of 2024 , the P-I continues as an online-only newspaper. In September 2010, the site had an estimated 2.8 million unique visitors and 208,000 visitors per day. From 1983 to 2009, the P-I and The Seattle Times had
1640-578: Was representative of an establishment viewpoint. It was the state's predominant newspaper. Circulation was greatly increased by coverage of the Klondike Gold Rush in 1897. Hoge, who was involved in other business, sought to find a buyer and sold in 1899. The newspaper was acquired with assistance from James J. Hill by John L. Wilson who had first started the Seattle Klondike Information Bureau. The newspaper
1681-401: Was torn down and replaced with a parking garage, derisively called the " Sinking Ship " as part of the initial stages of an urban-renewal plan that would level all the old buildings in the district. That was as far as the plan went. The old hotel's demise kicked off a preservation movement spearheaded by the likes of Alan Black, Victor Steinbrueck and historian/author Bill Speidel which led to