Looking Back’s theme for 2026 was Downtown by the Decades. College-educated Emily Olivia Richardson married Unitarian pastor John Calvin Kimball in 1860 and accompanied him to Olympia, Washington Territory in 1872. In 1873, she painted this image of the city, looking north on Main Street (Capitol Way) from around 10th Avenue (about three blocks south of the future site of the first Unitarian church building, which wasn’t erected until 1877).
Painting by Emily O. Kiball, 1873, courtesy State Capital Museum Collection, Washington State Historical Society, catalog C1956.36.1
Text © Deborah Ross and The Olympian 2026