The Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Building, shown here, stood on Fifth Avenue, where the Sound Credit Union is now. Telephone service was available in Olympia by 1889. In 1908, the California conglomerate Pacific Tel &Tel acquired the local telephone franchise from the Sunset Telephone Company. It erected this structure in the 1920s. In the 1930s, Pacific Tel & Tel moved to the so-called Fleetwood building (named after Olympia’s local Fleetwood telephone exchange).
Vibert Jeffers photograph, 1920s, Susan Parish Collection, Southwest Regional Archives
Text © Deborah Ross and The Olympian 2016