Looking Back’s theme for 2025 featured Thurston County area photographers, artists, and their subjects. Little is known about photographer Oscar Sternberg, who established a photographic studio in Olympia in 1902. This photograph by Sternberg, taken in 1905, shows members of the Olympia Police Department posing in front of then-City Hall on Fourth Avenue, currently the location of the Fourth Ave Tav.
Oscar Sternberg photo, 1905, courtesy of State Capital Museum collection, Washington State Historical Society, catalog C1943.1003.10
Text © Deborah Ross and The Olympian 2025