Historic Tacoma

Reasons To Visit Tacoma During The Summer

admin — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Tacoma Washington is a beautiful place to visit. Although, the winter months aren’t always an enjoyable time to travel there, unless you like winter weather and lots of it. The best time to visit the city is in the summertime.

Tacoma offers a wide range of summer festivals each year. There are lots of ethnic festivals that will open your eyes to the different cultures within the city. There are also a few farmers markets to pick up fresh, local produce and sample items you may not see in your hometown. Since Tacoma has a large arts district, you are sure to come across an arts festival or two in the summer.

Speaking of arts, there are many different artistic landmarks and museums to visit in Tacoma. Union Station,
Freight House Square and antique row are just a few of the must-see art stops in the city. Tacoma is also home to many different beautiful city parks. Visit Ruston Way waterfront for a relaxing walk along the water. Or the 702-acre Point Defiance park, complete with a zoo and walking, hiking and biking trails. No matter what your interests include, Tacoma in the summertime is sure to have something that you will enjoy.

Why Visit Tacoma, Washington Off Season

admin — Tue, 31 May 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Tacoma, Washington attracts many visitors every year. It’s location on the Puget Sound and its close proximity to Seattle entices visitors to come year round. Most tourists visit the area during the summer and sometimes in the fall while the leaves are changing. Why visit Tacoma, Washington off season? Because the winter months have a few benefits rewarding the tourists willing to come.
As with most destinations, visiting Tacoma in the off season will allow you to take advantage of lower air fare and lower rates at the hotels. Some attractions vary throughout the year like the Mt. Rainier Scenic train. During November and December you can take you and your children on a scenic ride through the foothills of Mt. Rainier with Santa Claus.
Winter isn’t the best time to do sight-seeing on foot due to the cold temperatures but this doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of other things to see and do. The area is home to many museums, including the Washington State History Museum, and isn’t too far of a drive from the Space Needle.
The best part about visiting any city during the off season is the chance to get away from the tourist crowds. Many tourist activities that are usually crowded will have a lot less visitors and you can enjoy them at a more peaceful and relaxed pace.

Tacoma What You Can Do While Visiting

admin — Tue, 10 May 2011 00:00:00 +0000

There are many things to do when visiting the city of Tacoma, Washington, especially for those more interested in the arts. Located on Washington’s Puget Sound, south of Seattle, Tacoma is home to the a lively Museum District and an exceptional performing arts theater, making the town a great attraction for any art lover.

The most widely known structure in Tacoma is the Thea Foss Waterway, which is a glass installation associated with the Museum of Glass. Tacoma is home to one of the best glass artists in the world, Dale Chihuly, and so the museum was created to celebrate all artistic visions which use glass, https://www.writeonglass.com/ as a medium.

The Tacoma Art Museum also resides in the Museum District. This museum offers an amazing collection of art from all over the world, yet still provides prominence to local artists’ artwork.

In Tacoma’s Theater District, the Broadway Center for Performing Arts plays host to professional Broadway plays, astonishing ballets, heart-stopping opera singers, and divinely inspired orchestras. There are three theaters located within this performing arts center to keep everyone entertained all day long.

The northwest town of Tacoma boasts one of the greatest art districts in its region, perfect for art critics and the casual observer.

Get a closer look at the Tacoma Museum of Glass

www.historictacoma.net — Thu, 23 Dec 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Founded in 2002, the Museum of Glass is a great tourist attraction for visitors looking to see a modern side of Tacoma. The museum showcases a wide variety of glass artworks, particularly those of the Contemporary and Pacific Northwest movements.Within the museum, you can see installations by Cappy Thompson (Gathering the Light, which tells the story of glass blowing through the ages) and Martin Blank (Fluent Steps, a glass representation of the properties of water). Howard Ben Tre’s Water Forest, an interactive exhibit inspired by the tides, is located on the Main Plaza. In addition, a number of exhibits travel through the museum. You’ll have to visit the website (www.museumofglass.org) to find out what’s on site at the time of your visit. The exhibits are so entrancing that wireless internet users may find themselves outside the museum doors before they know it.The choice to situate the museum in Tacoma was not random. Famed glass sculptor Dale Chihuly was born in the city in 1941 and attended college at the University of Washington in Seattle. He made several notable contributions to the museum, including the 500-foot Bridge of Glass (co-designed with architect Arthur Andersson) which links the museum to the downtown area. Chihuly described the Bridge as “something unique in the world, something that has a lot of color, a joyous experience, night or day.” The bridge rises 70 feet off the ground and a portion of it is covered by a glass walkway, making for a wonderful photo opportunity.

Tour the landmarks of historic Tacoma

admin — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 17:14:16 +0000

A visitor to Tacoma, Washington could be easily overwhelmed by all of the history surrounding them. Luckily, the National Historic Register has officially recognized the most important historical sites. While you still might not be able to hit all of these the first time through, history buffs can use this guide as an introduction to the best of what Tacoma has to offer.

Engine House No. 9: Built in 1907 as the North End’s fire protection center, the Engine House was recognized as a historical site in 1975. In 1992, the site became the first non-smoking pub in Pierce County, and it now houses a microbrewery with eight local beers.
Stadium High School: This building was originally designed as a hotel in the late 1890s. However, a fire destroyed the building before it was finished, and architect Frederick Heath put forth the designs to turn it into a school, which opened in 1906. The school was the setting for 10 Things I Hate About You.
William Ross Rust House: This 18-room mansion was magnate William Ross Rust’s personal home, and was designed by architect Ambrose J. Russell. Built in 1905, the National Historic Register recognized it in 1985. Today, it’s a popular tourist attraction for its vision of turn-of-the-century opulence.
Pythian Temple: This 1906 building housed the Knights of Pythias, a secret society that was the first to receive a charter from the U.S. Congress. The order is still active today. The building also includes the Broadway Quickstop Deli as well as Seabury Middle School, a private school for gifted children.
Blue Mouse Theatre: John Hamrick opened several Blue Mouse Theatres across the Pacific Northwest. Tacoma’s Blue Mouse, built in 1923, is notable for being the oldest continuously operating theater in the state. Today, it shows second-run films and is supported by community donations.

The tragic fall of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge

admin — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 16:58:59 +0000

Sometimes good things come out of bad, even when it doesn’t seem that way at the time. Such was the case with the collapse of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge on November 7, 1940. While no human life was lost in the collapse (one dog did perish), the footage of the fall demonstrates how cruel nature can be to the works of man.Workers started construction on the bridge in September of 1938, quickly giving the bridge the nickname “Galloping Gertie” for the way in which the deck buckled. The designers had suggested shorter girders (8 feet as opposed to 25 feet) as a means of cheapening the cost of the bridge. While they expected this to stiffen the bridge, the result was an insufficiently secured deck where alternate halves of the bridge would rise and fall independently.Before the collapse, several measures were recommended to control the motion. These included tying the girders down with cables, which eventually snapped; connecting the main cables to the bridge deck, which was ineffective; and installing hydraulic buffers between the towers and floor system, which were damaged when the bridge was sand-blasted. The Washington Toll Bridge Authority was working on a new program of increasing aerodynamics with deflector vanes when the collapse put an end to their plans.The video is available thanks to Barney Elliott, who owned a local camera shop. Today, physics, engineering, and architecture students study this film as an example of forced resonance and aeroelastic flutter. The collapsed portion of the bridge was left in the water to serve as an artificial reef, and a replacement bridge was opened in 1950 after the war, demonstrating once again the ability of Americans to come back from tragedy.

Tacoma sets its sights on the Northern Pacific Railroad

admin — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 16:47:13 +0000

When Job Carr moved to Commencement Bay in 1864, his hope was that the site would be chosen as the terminus of the Transcontinental Railroad. However, even though he built what would become Tacoma’s first permanent residence, he soon sold his claim to developer Morton McCarver. In the end, McCarver was one of those most responsible for the site’s selection.Tacoma was the underdog competitor to Seattle and Portland for the western terminus of the Northern Pacific railroad. When the line was first being constructed in Duluth, Minnesota in 1870, the only requirement for the line’s end was that it should be north of the 45^th degree of latitude, and near Portland. Tacoma’s eventual selection greatly angered Seattle, but it was just what the city needed to spur on its growth. New jobs brought new settlers, who bridged the two mile gap between Carr’s original site and the “New Tacoma” depot.Seattle was not content being ignored, however, and after a few years of clamoring, Henry Villard planned a railroad from Tacoma to Seattle in 1881. The track was about to be completed in 1883 when Villard resigned due to financial troubles, and three miles were left unfinished until the next year. Even with early troubles and lack of service on the railroad, the line was what was necessary to draw traffic away from Tacoma, and Seattle became the western terminus in 1887.Nevertheless, the railroad had done its work well in Tacoma. In 1888, another railroad was built over the Columbia River and through the Cascade Mountains. Tacoma was now firmly situated as a growing western city, and its fortunes would continue to grow over the years.

History in action at Fort Nisqually

admin — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 15:41:26 +0000

While Nicholas Delin was instrumental in attracting settlers to Commencement Bay, a European settlement existed at the Puget Sound as early as 1833. Fort Nisqually was built as an outpost for the Hudson’s Bay Company, the oldest commercial company in North America. Settlers travelled from sites as distant and diverse as Scotland, Hawaii, Canada, and the West Indies to trade for beaver pelts, livestock, and crops. The fort was originally closed in 1869, when the United States government bought the land from HBC for 460,000.In 1930, the fort was rebuilt at Point Defiance Park in Tacoma, primarily to provide new jobs during the Depression. While the only original buildings capable of being moved were the granary and the factor’s house, the Fort Nisqually Granary was named a National Historic Landmark in 1970.Fort Nisqually is one of the more popular tourist attractions because of its “living history” museum. This consists of volunteers dressing in authentic 19^th century clothing, speaking in 19^th century dialogue, demonstrating 19^th century craftsbasically recreating the feel of the Fort at its most bustling time. To add to the effect, recent restorations have reproduced the 1847 fort wall and two 1930s blockhouses, and archaeologists in the late 1980s discovered numerous artifacts from the Fort’s inhabitants.There are special exhibits throughout the year which dig deeper into the specifics of fort life. A showcase of dining and cooking at the fort ended on August 1, with the new “Lock, Stock and Barrel: Fort Nisqually’s Trade Guns” exhibit coming on August 7. That will run through November 28, and on December 4 the exhibit “Illuminating the Past: Lighting of the 19^th Century” will carry the fort into 2011.

Delin’s Mill and the birth of Tacoma

www.historictacoma.net — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 15:20:13 +0000

Nicholas Delin first arrived at the Puget Sound in 1851, after spending the previous year in Portland, and the year before that in Massachusetts. Whatever he was searching for, he seemed to find in Olympia, because it was there that he began to gain recognition for his lumber work. However, Delin was not content to work someone else’s mill for long, and quickly found backers for the construction of a mill at Commencement Bay. The site of that mill is now Tacoma’s Twenty-Fifth and Dock streets. Delin did all of the work himself except for the three days he had the assistance of Sam McCaw, a nearby Irishman who owned a team of oxen. Mr. Delin also built his own house to the south of the mill.Delin’s Mill turned Commencement Bay into a port of call for ships moving down the west coast, even though he only employed a few other helpers, and took six months to make a full shipload. The mill also attracted new settlers who brought him logs in exchange for lumber. In 1853, the first party to make it over the Cascades arrived, with thirty-four wagons and 171 people. Only two wagons had been lost during the passage, when oxen were slaughtered for ropes to lower the other wagons down a cliff.The growing community brought a wife for Delinyoung Gertrude Mellerand the first real European presence on the south side of the bay. Other industries grew up in the wake of the mill, including farming, barrel making, and fish-packing. However, the Indian War of 1855-1856 brought an end to Delin’s Mill and the thriving community around it, when the residents were forced to abandon it. However, the first foothold had been made, and in 1864, postmaster and civil war veteran would return to the area. He later sold it to developer Morton McCarver, who named his new real estate Tacoma City.