De Danaan and McKinley, Olympia’s Gay and Lesbian History
Llyn De Danaan and Carol McKinley have created a walking tour exploring Olympia’s Gay and Lesbian History. Thank you to them for permitting us to post this on our website.…
Foutch: Origins of the Olympia Historical Society: part 4
Mark Foutch For the remainder of 2002, the Olympia Historical Society continued the process of “standing up” its permanent organization while performing its mission and responding to opportunities. Members elected…
Kilgannon: Temple Beth Hatfiloh is 75!
Anne Kilgannon, with thanks to Beth Dubey for background information. Louis Bettman arrived in Olympia and set up a general merchandise store in 1853. Within a year, two other establishments with…
Echtle, A Brief History of the South Sound Country
by Edward Echtle The Olympia area presents numerous opportunities to learn about the people and places of our past. In rural areas, many historic places survive relatively unchanged from the…
Derricott: Personal Reflections of a Former Newsletter Editor
By Mark Derricott, former editor of the OHS Newsletter I recently re-read a couple of my favorite books: The Histories by Herodotus and Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov.Aside from realizing that I was much…
Foutch: Origins of the Olympia Historical Society, part 2
By Mark Foutch, President Incorporation, Bylaws and Progress (If the exploratory and organizational meetings of 2001 could be considered “conception” and “birth,” then early in 2002 the Olympia Historical Society…
O’Connell: Olympia in Minor League Baseball
By Emmett O’Connell In 1903 John P. Fink, a newspaper man and promoter, had an idea for a baseball league. Fink seemed to be a jack-of-all-trades sort of promoter in…
Foutch: Origins of the Olympia Historical Society, part 1
Background: For many decades Olympia was content to depend on the State Capital Museum for its local history venue and a place to store many of its important historical assets. …
Miller and O’Connell: Revisiting Capitol Lake
The previous two newsletters contained articles on the history of Capitol Lake, whose authors maintain divergent conclusions. As our newsletter policies maintain, the Olympia Historical Society welcomes submissions on any…
Derricott: Judge Lee Creighton
Mark Derricott, Editor Introduction Does Aristotle’s theory of the whole can become greater than the sum of its parts hold true if we apply it to our community? Can something…
Derricott, Applied Historiography: Olympia’s Capital Lake
Mark Derricott* The excellent recent piece about Capitol Lake by Mr. Allen Miller and a formidable rejoinder in this quarter’s newsletter by Mr. Emmett O’Connell reveals a rich dialogue about…
O’Connell: The Myth of Connection Between Wilder and White and Capitol Lake
This article originally appeared on the Squaxin Island Tribe’s Natural Resource Department Weblog and was reprinted here as another view of the history of the development of Capitol Lake. The…
Derricott: Bush Prairie Farm, Then and Now
Bush Prairie Farm, Then and Now By Mark Derricott, Editor It is not often that the present so starkly meets the past, but it is actually happening this year. Two…
Miller: Centennial of the Wilder and White Plan
Centennial of the Wilder and White Plan for Capitol Campus By: Allen Miller with assistance from Professor Emeritus Norman J. Johnston, Ralph Munro, and Leavitt White A century ago, on both coasts…
Weir: Olympia, The Capital
Olympia, the Capital of the State of Washington By Allen Weir The Washington Historian, 2:3 (April, 1901), 107-111. Some one has said that “God made the country and man made…
Rainey: Short History of Manufacturing
A Short History of Industry and Manufacturing in Thurston County, Washington by Thomas Rainey Mirror of page http://www.wa.gov/esd/lmea/labrmrkt/eco/thureco.htm The following history is largely excerpted from “A Short History of Industry…
Newell: So Fair a Dwelling Place
Scanned version “So Fair a Dwelling Place”: A History of Olympia and Thurston County Washington By Gordon Newell Olympia: Olympia News Publishing, 1950. Electronically Transcribed 2001. By Edward Echtle Note:…
Ingham: Early Doctors of Olympia
SOME OF THE EARLY DOCTORS OF OLYMPIA by Dr. T.R. Ingham (Used with permission from Thurston County Historic Commission) 1994 CHARLES McARTHUR Charles E. McArthur was born…
Olsen and Fenske: The History and Memories of Priest Point Park
By Winnifred Olsen and Lois Fenske History Priest Point Park, located about a mile north of downtown Olympia, has a colorful history. The forested area and beach were once…