Dispatches from Ravenna, a neighborhood in Northeast Seattle
A neighbor across the street from the house fire in north Ravenna on Thursday night has shared some pictures he took from that evening (click on the pictures for a larger version):
Thank you to neighbor and picture-taker John and Four and 20 Blackbirds’ Wendy for sending these pictures on.
This is part of the essay “Ravenna Park (Seattle)“, appearing here thanks to HistoryLink.org and author Peter Blecha, under a Creative Commons license.
[If you’re new to the series, you can start with Part 1 here.]
At the turn of the century the park was also, at times, marketed as Big Tree Park, a name that highlighted its towering treasures. In 1904 the most girthsome tree — 274 feet tall and 44 feet in circumference — was given the moniker “Roosevelt Tree” in honor of the popular and nature-loving president, Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt (1858-1919). Roosevelt’s famous political quip about walking softly but carrying a “big stick” led to that tree also being called “The Big Stick.”
That same year the Becks offered, for the first of a few times, to sell their park to the City. The City rejected their asking price of $150,000.
Meanwhile, a British immigrant named Charles Cowen (1869-1926) arrived here in 1900 and purchased 40 acres adjacent to Ravenna Park, including the westernmost end of the Beck’s property, where the creek running from Green Lake wound its way down to the ravine.
Cowan stepped up with a generous offer. He divided up most of that land into residential lots and sold them via his Sylvester-Cowen Investment Company. But he deemed 12 of the lots that sank down toward the ravine as unusable for that purpose and in 1907 gifted that parcel to the city. This became Cowen Park. The border (along 15th Avenue NE at 60th Street) between the now conjoined Cowen and Ravenna parks was marked by a high and long double-decker wooden bridge that spanned the ravine and thrilled pedestrians.
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Sources:
W. W. Beck, Ravenna Park – ‘Im Walde,’ (1903), Peter Blecha collection, Seattle; W. W. Beck, Ravenna Park – ‘Im Walde,’ 16-page postcard booklet, undated, in Peter Blecha collection; W. W. Beck, Ravenna Park (ca. 1909), Peter Blecha collection; “Ravenna Park Guide,†brochure, 1909, Peter Blecha collection; “Ravenna Or Big Tree Park: It is Famous = “Nature’s Exposition,†postcard, 1909, Peter Blecha collection; Harvey Manning, Winter Walks and Hikes (Seattle: Mountaineers Books, 2002), 42; Betty McDonald, Anybody Can Do Anything (Philadelphia / New York: J. B. Lippincott Co, 1950), 129-130; Paula Becker, “Time Traveling The Roosevelt District With Betty Macdonald,†Seattlepress.com website accessed July 13, 2010 (http://seattlepress.com/article-9455.html); “One of Ravenna’s Giant Trees Christened ‘Paderewski,’†Interlaken, February 8, 1908, p. 1; Sophie Frye Bass, When Seattle Was A Village (Seattle: Lowman & Hanford Co., 1947), 106-108: David Buerge, “Indian Lake Washington,†Seattle Weekly, August 1-7, 1984; Seattle Polk City Directory (1901-1934); Directory of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution (Washington D.C.: Memorial Continental Hall, 1911), 1340; “Mrs. L. C. Beck Funeral To Be Held Today: Woman Widely Known In Musical and Club Circles Is Mourned By Seattle Friends,†Seattle Post-Intelligencer, July 9, 1928, p. 13; Kate C. Duncan 1001 Curious Things: Tales from Ye Olde Curiosity Shop (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2000), 73-78; Andrea Casadio, email to Peter Blecha, January 30, 2008; “No Finer Site: The University of Washington’s Early Years On Union Bay,â€Â Web exhibition, University of Washington Libraries website accessed August 19, 2010 (http://lib.washington.edu/exhibits/site/); HistoryLink.org Online Encyclopedia of Washington State History, “Seattle’s Ravenna Park Bridge is constructed in 1913″ (by Priscilla Long), and “WPA builds Cowen Park Bridge in Seattle’s Ravenna neighborhood in 1936″ (by Priscilla Long), and “John Olmsted arrives in Seattle to design city parks on April 30, 1903″ (by David Williams and Walt Crowley), and “David Thomas Denny (1832-1903)†(by David Wilma), http://www.historylink.org/ (accessed August 1, 2010); Esther Campbell, Bagpipes in the Woodwind Section (Seattle: Seattle Symphony Women’s Association, 1978), 9; William Arnold, “The Great Mystery of Ravenna Park,†Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Northwest Today section, December 17, 1972, pp. 8-9; Steve Cronin, “Ravenna Park’s Famous Trees Vanished Furtively,†UW Daily, May 25, 1977, p. 3; James Bush, “Remembering William W. Beck: The Father of Ravenna Park,†The Seattle Sun, August 2003, The Seattle Sun website accessed August 25, 2010 (http://parkprojects.com/2003news/0308aug/hisbeck.html); Mary R. Watson, travel diary (handwritten), 1910, portion accessed on eBay, December 2006, copy in possession of Peter Blecha; Russ Hanbey, “1916 Seattle was a Hotbed of Sin When 2 Officers Were Killed,†The Seattle Times, February 6, 2010 (http://seattletimes.nwsource.com); and Peter Blecha archives.
The Seattle Fire Department responded to a house fire on the 7300 block of 23rd Avenue NE at around 10:40 PM on Thursday evening.
No one was injured in the fire.
The cause of the fire is as yet undetermined, but I will update this story when I have more information.
UPDATE (8:29 AM): I’ve heard back from Seattle Fire Department spokeswoman Helen Fitzpatrick (via email):
The house fire at 7340 23rd Avenue Northeast was an accidental fire caused by a malfunctioning heater in a bedroom. There were no injuries. The estimated damage to the home and contents is $250,000.
View of the rear of the house, taken from the alley
As I arrived at the house this morning to take pictures, Engine 40 and her staff were on scene, watching the house.
Fire department staff will stay on scene until the cause of the fire has been determined. This is to both ensure that the building stays secure (“continuity of evidence” in case of an arson finding), and to make sure that the fire does not rekindle.
As I write this, there have already been three fire watch shift changes.
North side of the house
Fourteen fire department vehicles were dispatched to the house last night, which is considered to be a typical response for an incident like this one. The “extra” staff is on hand to provide support to those who are actively fighting the fire.
Correction: The vandalism occurred between the evening of Tuesday, March 1st and the morning of Wednesday, March 2nd. We regret the error.
Local Italian restaurant (and Ravenna Blog advertiser) Casa D’Italia Market & Cafe (2615 NE 65th Street)Â was vandalized sometime between Monday the night of Tuesday, March 1st (after the cook went home), and Tuesday Wednesday morning, March 2nd, when an alert neighbor noticed the damage and called 911.
From an email with Casa D’Italia owner Angeli Donatone:
[W]e were vandalized [
TuesdayWednesday] am. A neighbor called 911 to report the damage early (6am-ish) [that] morning. Our large front window had a cinder block thrown thru it, as did a basement window. The front door was shattered, although had safety glass. One of the large wine barrels on 27th was tipped over. What a mess!
If anyone happened to be around the restaurant at the time the damage occurred, and has any information to share, contact the restaurant or call the Seattle Police Department’s non-emergency number (625-5011).
Broken pane of glass replaced by plexiglass temporarily.
Lots of community meetings this week which you may have interest/be a stakeholder in:
Roosevelt Neighborhood Association Land Use Committee Meeting
Monday, February 28, 7 PM
Calvary Christian Assembly, 6801 Roosevelt Way NE
Topics include the latest developments on the Roosevelt Development Group/Sisley project (which people particularly in northwest Ravenna should be paying attention to), and the Roosevelt neighborhood rezone.
Ravenna Bryant Community Association Board Meeting
Tuesday, March 1, 7 PM
Ravenna-Eckstein Community Center, 6535 Ravenna Avenue NE
Monthly RBCA board meetings (first Tuesdays) are always open for residents to attend. No official agenda out yet, but there will likely be a recap of the previous evening’s RNA Land Use meeting.
Northeast District Council Meeting
(Tentatively) Thursday, March 3, 7 PM
Wedgwood Presbyterian Church, 8008 35th Avenue NE
The NEDC generally meets on the first Thursday of the month, and the agenda often includes a speaker from city or county government (last month’s was City Council President Richard Conlin). Each active neighborhood council in the Northeast district of Seattle sends a representative to this meeting.
For a map of the Northeast District and the neighborhood associations that cover the area (the ones I’ve been able to find the geographical areas of, anyway), check out this map on the Ravenna Bryant Community Association’s website.
This is part of the essay “Ravenna Park (Seattle)“, appearing here thanks to HistoryLink.org and author Peter Blecha, under a Creative Commons license.
[If you missed Part 1, you can find it here.]
The townsite of Ravenna became even more attractive to would-be home buyers a couple years later with the arrival of streetcar service via a route that would skirt the entire length of the park (along its southern border). Seattle pioneer David Denny (1832-1903) was behind the project. Denny had gotten into real estate. After platting the neighborhoods bordering the park — an area still so distant from downtown that the Denny family soon built and then maintained a country “summer home” (6315? NE 63rd Street) there — he helped found the Rainier Power and Railway Company in order to facilitate easy transportation to the nearby Brooklyn neighborhood (today’s University District).
That line was extended to Ravenna Park around 1892 and three years later was reorganized as the Third Street and Suburban Railway, which included a Ravenna Station (near today’s NE 58th Street and 20th Avenue NE). After departing its terminus downtown, the line passed through logged and largely uninhabited terrain until it turned back southward at Ravenna. One writer noted that “Most of the area through the northern part of this system’s route was inhabited only by squirrels and gophers” (Leslie Blanchard quoted in “No Finer Site”).
But it was the sight of critters and the unspoiled nature of the ravine that made it such an attraction. The granddaughter of Denny’s brother Arthur (1822-1899), Sophie Frye Bass (1866-1947), wrote that:
“My first recollection of Ravenna Park was a moonlight excursion in midsummer, when the moon failed to appear, a cool breeze came up, and a chill was in the air. Even so, the large coal-oil lamps shining through the trees lighting the path that ran through the park, and the bobbing and swaying Chinese lanterns made it seem like a land fit for fairies. It was quite a trip to Ravenna in those days, for we took the train at the funny little station at the foot of Columbia Street on the waterfront and rode nine and a half miles to the park … it became a favorite spot for picnickers and a show place for out-of-town visitors (Bass).
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Sources:
W. W. Beck, Ravenna Park — ‘Im Walde,’ (1903), Peter Blecha collection, Seattle; W. W. Beck, Ravenna Park — ‘Im Walde,’ 16-page postcard booklet, undated, in Peter Blecha collection; W. W. Beck, Ravenna Park (ca. 1909), Peter Blecha collection; “Ravenna Park Guide,” brochure, 1909, Peter Blecha collection; “Ravenna Or Big Tree Park: It is Famous = “Nature’s Exposition,” postcard, 1909, Peter Blecha collection; Harvey Manning, Winter Walks and Hikes (Seattle: Mountaineers Books, 2002), 42; Betty McDonald, Anybody Can Do Anything (Philadelphia / New York: J. B. Lippincott Co, 1950), 129-130; Paula Becker, “Time Traveling The Roosevelt District With Betty Macdonald,” Seattlepress.com website accessed July 13, 2010 (http://seattlepress.com/article-9455.html); “One of Ravenna’s Giant Trees Christened ‘Paderewski,'” Interlaken, February 8, 1908, p. 1; Sophie Frye Bass, When Seattle Was A Village (Seattle: Lowman & Hanford Co., 1947), 106-108: David Buerge, “Indian Lake Washington,” Seattle Weekly, August 1-7, 1984; Seattle Polk City Directory (1901-1934); Directory of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution (Washington D.C.: Memorial Continental Hall, 1911), 1340; “Mrs. L. C. Beck Funeral To Be Held Today: Woman Widely Known In Musical and Club Circles Is Mourned By Seattle Friends,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, July 9, 1928, p. 13; Kate C. Duncan 1001 Curious Things: Tales from Ye Olde Curiosity Shop (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2000), 73-78; Andrea Casadio, email to Peter Blecha, January 30, 2008; “No Finer Site: The University of Washington’s Early Years On Union Bay,” Web exhibition, University of Washington Libraries website accessed August 19, 2010 (http://lib.washington.edu/exhibits/site/); HistoryLink.org Online Encyclopedia of Washington State History, “Seattle’s Ravenna Park Bridge is constructed in 1913” (by Priscilla Long), and “WPA builds Cowen Park Bridge in Seattle’s Ravenna neighborhood in 1936” (by Priscilla Long), and “John Olmsted arrives in Seattle to design city parks on April 30, 1903” (by David Williams and Walt Crowley), and “David Thomas Denny (1832-1903)” (by David Wilma), http://www.historylink.org/ (accessed August 1, 2010); Esther Campbell, Bagpipes in the Woodwind Section (Seattle: Seattle Symphony Women’s Association, 1978), 9; William Arnold, “The Great Mystery of Ravenna Park,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Northwest Today section, December 17, 1972, pp. 8-9; Steve Cronin, “Ravenna Park’s Famous Trees Vanished Furtively,” UW Daily, May 25, 1977, p. 3; James Bush, “Remembering William W. Beck: The Father of Ravenna Park,” The Seattle Sun, August 2003, The Seattle Sun website accessed August 25, 2010 (http://parkprojects.com/2003news/0308aug/hisbeck.html); Mary R. Watson, travel diary (handwritten), 1910, portion accessed on eBay, December 2006, copy in possession of Peter Blecha; Russ Hanbey, “1916 Seattle was a Hotbed of Sin When 2 Officers Were Killed,” The Seattle Times, February 6, 2010 (http://seattletimes.nwsource.com); and Peter Blecha archives.
Some events of note happening in the next couple weeks at the Northeast Library (6801 35th Avenue NE):
Weekly Story Times for toddlers and preschoolers at the Northeast Library are on break until March 1st while Children’s Librarian Erica Delavan is out visiting area schools.
Lucky for us connoisseurs of Story Time, there is a Pajama Story Time this evening, from 7-7:30 PM.
From the Northeast Library events calendar:
It is pajama story time at the Northeast Branch! Bring your preschoolers and toddlers to enjoy stories, rhymes, songs and fun with our children’s librarian, who will be wearing pajamas, too!
Jammify your kids (and yourself) right after dinner, and get ready for a good time.
Another good reason to head to the library this week: There’s a three-day weekend coming up. Do you have enough reading material?!
The Seattle Opera’s next production is Massenet’s Don Quixote (runs February 26 through March 12). You can catch a preview at the Northeast Library from 6:30-7:30 PM on Tuesday, February 22.
Happy Neighbor Appreciation Day, neighbor.
Without you, the Ravenna Blog would not exist! There’d be no one to send in questions and news tips to report on, no one to read the posts, and no one to talk to in the comments. So, thanks for being here.
As a thank you for being my neighbors, I would like to purpose some summer fun: LET’S ALL GO TO A MARINERS GAME TOGETHER.
This is not a fundraiser of any type — it is a community FUN raiser; a chance to hang out with each other and enjoy a baseball game together.
Here’s how it will work:
But before we can reserve a section for our neighborhoods, we have to decide on a date.
Don’t worry about whether or not you are sure you can attend either of these dates: I am looking to find out which of these two dates would work for most people.
The following poll will be open until noon on Monday, February 21st. One vote per household, please.
Have questions? Want to express your love of (or concern for) this idea? Let me know in the comments!
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¹ This is sort of what spawned the whole idea: “MARINERS WELCOME THE NE SEATTLE NEIGHBORHOOD OF RAVENNA.”
² Here’s how I came to choose these particular dates:
This essay, “Ravenna Park (Seattle)“, appears here thanks to HistoryLink.org and author Peter Blecha, under a Creative Commons license.
[If you missed Part 1, you can find it here.]
William N. Bell (1817-1887) and his wife Sarah Ann Bell (1815-1856) selected some acreage north of Union Bay that included the lower end of the creek that emerged from the ravine. In the years prior to Bell’s death the couple sold their land and it reportedly passed through several hands until George and Oltilde Dorffel acquired ownership in 1887, the same year they filed paperwork platting it as Ravenna Springs Park — a name inspired by the famously beautiful pine-tree-forested ravine town of Ravenna, Italy. Soon those 40-some springs bubbling from the ground were being touted for their medicinal properties.
The year 1889 saw another couple — William Wirt Beck and his wife Louise Coman Beck — investing in a huge parcel of 400 acres on the north side of Union Bay including the Dorffels’ park. The Becks were an interesting duo: He was a Presbyterian minister from Kentucky (who would later claim a background as a miner). She was an Athens, Georgia, native who had graduated from the Athens Female College and then studied music in the Northeast. She was well equipped to teach music in Seattle.
The Becks were ambitious: They envisioned a whole new town, Ravenna, arising on their land and toward that end they quickly platted out town lots southward from the edge of the park and entered the world of real estate sales. The Becks built a large house (at the northeast corner of NE 57th Street and 26th Avenue NE) on 10 acres that also contained their Seattle Female College.
The college enrolled 40 students for the 1890 school year, and soon included the Seattle Conservatory of Music and Ravenna Seminary. In addition they arranged to have a post office (headed by a Lafayette S. Beck) established and founded the Ravenna Flouring Co. Roper’s Grocery soon joined the hamlet. Best of all, the little town would be serviced at a Ravenna Station (at Blakely Street and 25th Avenue NE) by the Seattle, Lake Shore & Eastern railroad, which passed through the area on its route from downtown Seattle (along today’s Burke-Gilman Trail).
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Sources:
W. W. Beck, Ravenna Park — ‘Im Walde,’ (1903), Peter Blecha collection, Seattle; W. W. Beck, Ravenna Park — ‘Im Walde,’ 16-page postcard booklet, undated, in Peter Blecha collection; W. W. Beck, Ravenna Park (ca. 1909), Peter Blecha collection; “Ravenna Park Guide,” brochure, 1909, Peter Blecha collection; “Ravenna Or Big Tree Park: It is Famous = “Nature’s Exposition,” postcard, 1909, Peter Blecha collection; Harvey Manning, Winter Walks and Hikes (Seattle: Mountaineers Books, 2002), 42; Betty McDonald, Anybody Can Do Anything (Philadelphia / New York: J. B. Lippincott Co, 1950), 129-130; Paula Becker, “Time Traveling The Roosevelt District With Betty Macdonald,” Seattlepress.com website accessed July 13, 2010 (http://seattlepress.com/article-9455.html); “One of Ravenna’s Giant Trees Christened ‘Paderewski,'” Interlaken, February 8, 1908, p. 1; Sophie Frye Bass, When Seattle Was A Village (Seattle: Lowman & Hanford Co., 1947), 106-108: David Buerge, “Indian Lake Washington,” Seattle Weekly, August 1-7, 1984; Seattle Polk City Directory (1901-1934); Directory of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution (Washington D.C.: Memorial Continental Hall, 1911), 1340; “Mrs. L. C. Beck Funeral To Be Held Today: Woman Widely Known In Musical and Club Circles Is Mourned By Seattle Friends,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, July 9, 1928, p. 13; Kate C. Duncan 1001 Curious Things: Tales from Ye Olde Curiosity Shop (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2000), 73-78; Andrea Casadio, email to Peter Blecha, January 30, 2008; “No Finer Site: The University of Washington’s Early Years On Union Bay,” Web exhibition, University of Washington Libraries website accessed August 19, 2010 (http://lib.washington.edu/exhibits/site/); HistoryLink.org Online Encyclopedia of Washington State History, “Seattle’s Ravenna Park Bridge is constructed in 1913” (by Priscilla Long), and “WPA builds Cowen Park Bridge in Seattle’s Ravenna neighborhood in 1936” (by Priscilla Long), and “John Olmsted arrives in Seattle to design city parks on April 30, 1903” (by David Williams and Walt Crowley), and “David Thomas Denny (1832-1903)” (by David Wilma), http://www.historylink.org/ (accessed August 1, 2010); Esther Campbell, Bagpipes in the Woodwind Section (Seattle: Seattle Symphony Women’s Association, 1978), 9; William Arnold, “The Great Mystery of Ravenna Park,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Northwest Today section, December 17, 1972, pp. 8-9; Steve Cronin, “Ravenna Park’s Famous Trees Vanished Furtively,” UW Daily, May 25, 1977, p. 3; James Bush, “Remembering William W. Beck: The Father of Ravenna Park,” The Seattle Sun, August 2003, The Seattle Sun website accessed August 25, 2010 (http://parkprojects.com/2003news/0308aug/hisbeck.html); Mary R. Watson, travel diary (handwritten), 1910, portion accessed on eBay, December 2006, copy in possession of Peter Blecha; Russ Hanbey, “1916 Seattle was a Hotbed of Sin When 2 Officers Were Killed,” The Seattle Times, February 6, 2010 (http://seattletimes.nwsource.com); and Peter Blecha archives.
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