12/26/2021 – Sylvester Mansion
Throughout 2021 we have been featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The cityscape project portrays what Sylvester Park and Olympia might…
12/12/21 – Hazard Stevens
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Pictured in the 1874 cityscape is Hazard Stevens. He was the son of…
11/28/21 – Mary Ann Bigelow
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 2001 cityscape includes Mary Ann Bigelow. Mrs. Bigelow, an artist and author,…
Dixy Lee Ray – 11/21/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1972 cityscape features Dixy Lee Ray, who was elected in 1978 as…
Amanda Benek Smith – 11/14/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Pictured in the 1950 cityscape is Amanda Benek Smith. In 1953, Smith was…
Belle Reeves – 11/7/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from artist Robert Chamberlain’s Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Pictured in the 1933 cityscape is Washington Secretary of State Belle…
Thurston County Courthouse (Old State Capitol) – 10/31/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1899 cityscape features the beautiful building that graces…
Spring 2022 Printing of Thurston County: Water, Woods and Prairies Now Available
Produced by the Thurston County Board of Commissioners and the Thurston County Historic Commission, and distributed by the Olympia Historical Society & Bigelow House Museum, Thurston County: Water, Woods and…
Bigelow House Photograph Collection
Thanks to a generous grant from the Pendleton & Elisabeth Carey Miller Charitable Foundation., we have been able to scan over 200 items from the Bigelow House‘s collection of family…
Friends and Neighbors
In addition to family photos, the Bigelow family collected dozens of photographs of friends and neighbors in the form of “cartes de visite,” a type of photographic calling card popular…
Korean Girls’ Seminary, Hawaii
In 1916 and 1917, Margaret Bigelow went to Honolulu, Hawaii by boat to teach at the Korean Girls’ Seminary, established by Syngman Rhee in 1916 in the Puunui area on…
Pastimes – Camping
Many Olympia families took to campsites in the summertime for fun, recreation, and get-togethers. The images on this page show a beachfront shack that the Bigelows repaired to in the…
Pastimes – Boating
Living close to Budd Inlet and Priest Point Park, the Bigelow family enjoyed waterfront activities. These images are iconic snapshots of water sports that many families around Olympia enjoyed during…
Pastimes – Fun with friends
The Bigelow children enjoyed a wide variety of friends and social activities. The images on this page show some of the many get-togethers they experienced as young adults in the…
Bigelow Garden
Daniel R. Bigelow claimed and was granted 160 acres under the Oregon Donation Land Law. The property included a spring which remains flowing on the property. Daniel and his wife…
Bigelow House
The Bigelow House, listed on local, state and national registers of historic places, was built by 1860 and is a fine example of the Carpenter Gothic style. The house, which…
The White Family
Margaret Stewart was born in Ohio in 1819, the daughter of Ann McLaughlin (1795-1847) and Reverend William Stewart (1794-1885). Margaret married William Nathan White in Illinois in 1835. William Nathan…
Mary Ann Campbell Bigelow
Mary Ann Campbell Bigelow 1913-2005 Mary Ann Campbell married Daniel Sylvester Bigelow in 1935 and moved into the Bigelow House sharing it first with Margaret and then for many years…
Daniel Sylvester Bigelow
Daniel Sylvester Bigelow 1911-2005 Daniel Bigelow was the oldest child of George Royal and Edith Sylvester Bigelow. He followed in the family tradition of law, graduating from the University of…
George Royal Bigelow
George Royal Bigelow 1881-1961 The youngest of the D. R. and Ann Elizabeth White Bigelow family attended Tacoma High School (with Margaret) and Ohio Wesleyan University before graduating from the…
Richardson Lee (Ray) Bigelow
Richardson Lee (Ray) Bigelow 1873-1967 Ray Bigelow married Belle Knox (1878-1927) in 1900. They had one child. Ray was working as a dairyman in 1910 and he worked at Sloan…
Ruth Bigelow
Ruth Bigelow 1860-1950 Ruth worked at the Territorial Legislature as a “Messenger” in 1879 and was attending Union Academy also in 1879. She passed teacher exam that same year. It…
Duncan Jotham Bigelow
Duncan Jotham Bigelow 1871-1945 Duncan Bigelow attended the Olympia Collegiate Institute, graduating in 1892. He later owned a large dairy farm on land near Bigelow Lake where he had an…
Margaret Bigelow
Margaret Bigelow 1878 -1937 Margaret was the youngest of the Bigelow daughters. She graduated from Tacoma High School and taught in several schools locally. She later graduated from Ellensburg Normal…
Evaline Bigelow
Evaline Bigelow 1858-1959 Evaline attended the Union Academy and taught in schools in several areas of western Washington before her marriage to William Bonney (1856-1945) in 1882. Both William and…
Tirzah Bigelow
Tirzah Bigelow 1855-1927 Tirzah was the oldest of the Bigelow children. She attended Union Academy, founded by Daniel Bigelow, and taught in the Olympia and Tacoma area. She married the…
Daniel Richardson Bigelow
Daniel Richardson Bigelow 1824-1905 Daniel Bigelow was born in New York and graduated from Union College in Schenectady, New York and read law at Harvard before coming west in 1851…
The Bigelow Family
The Bigelow Family After their marriage in 1854, Daniel Richardson and Ann Elizabeth White Bigelow raised a large family at the Bigelow House. Click on individual pages in the Bigelow…
Ann Elizabeth Bigelow
Ann Elizabeth White Bigelow 1836-1926 Born 1836 in Springfield, Illinois, Ann Elizabeth White traveled with her family over the Oregon Trail in 1851. After teaching for a number of years,…
10/24/21 – Marshville Bridge
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1874 cityscape includes the Marshville Bridge, built in 1869 to connect downtown…
10/10/21 – Farmer’s Market
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 2001 cityscape features the Olympia Farmers Market, near the northern tip of…
October 3, 2021 – Robert Chamberlain
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from artist Robert Chamberlain’s Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Many interesting and charming surprises are included in each cityscape. In…
Margaret McKenny – 9/26/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1950 cityscape depicts Margaret McKenny in conversation with a young man who…
Josephine Corliss Preston – 9/19/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. In the 1933 cityscape we see the Old State Capitol Building, which had…
Olympia Opera House – 9/12/2021
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. At the far right of the 1899 cityscape is the Olympia Opera House,…
Capitol Center building – 9/5/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Shown in the distance of the 1972 cityscape is the Capitol Center Building,…
Mother Joseph – 8/29/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1899 cityscape includes an elderly Mother Joseph visiting St. Peter’s Hospital, one…
Isaac Ellis – 8/22/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1874 cityscape includes Isaac (Ike) Ellis. Ellis was a noted and successful…
George Bush – 8/15/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1856 cityscape includes George Bush, early American settler. He and the Simmons…
Heritage Fountain – 8/8/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 2001 cityscape includes the popular Heritage Fountain, between Fourth and Fifth Avenues.…
Joyce Simmons Cheeka – 8/1/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1972 cityscape includes Joyce Simmons Cheeka, Squaxin Island Tribe activist. Mrs. Cheeka…
5th Avenue dam construction – 7/24/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1950 cityscape features construction of the Fifth Avenue dam and bridge to…
Hotel Olympian – 7/18/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. When the state acquired the Old State Capitol Building and moved the seat of government…
S.S. Beaver – 7/11/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The S.S. Beaver, pictured in the 1856 cityscape, was the first steam-operated vessel…
Bicycles – 7/4/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1899 cityscape features a bicycle parade around the grounds of Sylvester Park.…
Bertha Eugley – 6/27/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. In the 1899 cityscape we see Bertha Eugley in front of her millinery…
Anna Conner Hartsuck – 6/20/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1874 cityscape includes Anna Conner Hartsuck, a so-called “Mercer Girl,” brought to…
Clara Sylvester – 6/13/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1856 cityscape depicts Clara Pottle Sylvester with her husband, Olympia’s co-founder Edmund…
Bulletin – 6/1/21
June 1, 2021 To all our very valued Bulletin recipients, Due to increasing personal time constraints, I am reluctantly stepping away from writing the Bulletin. My association with OHS-BHM…
Barbara O’Neill – 6/6/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Barbara O’Neill, pictured in the 2001 cityscape, was a commanding presence in our…
Memorial Clinic – 5/23/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1950 cityscape begins to include some of downtown Olympia’s iconic mid-Century architecture.…
Security Building – 5/16/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The Security Building on Fourth Avenue, pictured in the 1933 cityscape, was Olympia’s first “skyscraper,”…
Trolleys – 5/9/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1899 cityscape shows one of Olympia’s five yellow trolleys proceeding southward on…
First Congregational Church – 5/2/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Religious communities have always played an important role in the life of our…
Washington Center – 4/18/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The site of the Washington Center for the Performing Arts has been an…
Governor Hotel – 4/11/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The 1972 cityscape pictures The Governor Hotel at the corner of 7th and…
Lower Main Street – 4/4/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. In its early decades, as seen in the 1856 cityscape, Olympia’s commercial core…
3/28/21 – Miller’s
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. The Miller’s Department Store building was erected at Legion Way and Capitol Way…
Washington Veneer – 3/21/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. With the completion of the Carlyon Fill in 1911, the port area of…
3/14/21 – Sylvester Park with 7th Avenue “lid”
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. This photo, taken from the Old State Capitol building, shows Sylvester Park around…
3/7/21 – Washington Standard
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. John Miller Murphy, prolific, opinionated, long-lived editor of the Washington Standard, came to Olympia…
2/28/21 – Leschi
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Leschi, a member of the Nisqually tribe, was designated a leader of the…
2/21/21 – Procession of the Species
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. In 1995, Earthbound Productions founder Eli Sterling spearheaded the Procession of the Species,…
2/14/21 – KGY
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Radio station KGY is one of the oldest on the Pacific Coast, licensed…
2/7/2021- Centennial Parade
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. In May 1950, Olympia held a week-long celebration of our city’s centennial. The…
Little Hollywood – 1/31/21
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. A neighborhood known as Little Hollywood had existed for many years along the…
Sylvester Park – 1/25/2021
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. After the construction of the magnificent Thurston County Courthouse, now the Office of…
Columbia Hall – 1/17/2021
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. Columbia Hall, pictured in the 1874 cityscape, was built in 1869 on 4th…
Konrad Schneider – 1/10/2021
Throughout 2021 we are featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. In 1856, Olympia’s cofounder Edmund Sylvester was overseeing construction of his Italianate mansion,…
Charles Wilkes – 1/3/2021
Throughout 2021 we will be featuring events and people from the Sylvester’s Window cityscape project, now available online. In 1838, an American naval officer, Charles Wilkes, was given command of…
Admittance Day – 12/27/2020
In this image from November 1939, a group of Cub Scouts participates in a parade celebrating the Golden Anniversary of Washington’s admittance as a state into the Union. The float,…
GP Tester – 12/20/2020
Manufacturing giant Georgia Pacific took over the Washington Veneer plywood plant in Olympia and built its headquarters in the Port area, a building noted for its modern architecture demonstrating the…
Jean Wilkinson
Jean Wilkinson is a Puget Sound native. She was born and grew up in Bellingham, and moved to Tacoma to attend the University of Puget Sound where she earned a…
Cheryl Bayle
Cheryl is a long time resident of Olympia, having moved here with her family as an elementary school student. She graduated from Olympia High School and attended the University of…
2418 Otis
Location: 2418 Otis Street SE Local Register 2418 Otis House, 1940 Thurston County Assessor, Washington State Archives 2418 Otis House today (2011), photo courtesy Department of Archaeology and Historic Preservation…
Dalquest-Gallagher House
Location: 2420 Capitol Way S Local Register, South Capitol National Historic Neighborhood Dalquest House, Thurston County Assessor, Washington State Archives Dalquest House today (2021), photo by Deb Ross This Craftsman…
Howard Point
Location: East Bay Drive, across from Meyer-Riddle House Diversity: African-Americans Detail from Whitham and Page map, 1890, Washington State Archives View of Howard Point from East Bay Drive…