How Much I Love Smith Tower In Seattle
We humans love our person-made* landmarks.
Every city it seems has its landmarks. Paris has the Eiffel Tower. Barcelona has La Familia Sagrada. Heck, even Cawker City has the world’s largest ball of twine. For me, here in Seattle, there is no greater person-made* landmark than Smith Tower.
Yes, the Space Needle is taller and more world famous**. But the Space Needle is only half as old as Smith Tower, and although I admire the Space Needle what purpose does it actually serve other than as a tourist curiosity/beacon?
For me, the Smith Tower is like the Leaning Tower Of Pisa of Seattle. It is tall and majestic. It is fabricated of something shiny and pristine (tera-cotta). It still houses people and businesses. It was built long before I was born and will be here (hopefully) long after I’m gone. Best of all, every time I see it, I am whisked back to my childhood***.
But who built Smith Tower? And why did they build Smith Tower? And what kind of fanfare — if any — did Smith Tower open to?
SMITH TOWER WAS BUILT IN 1914
The Smith Tower opened on July 4, 1914. This was four weeks (to the day) before the start of World War 1 and three years (to the day) before the opening of Seattle’s Ballard Locks. On the day Smith Tower opened, the Tsar of Russia would be in power for still another two years, the British Empire ruled more than 23% of the world’s population, Babe Ruth had never played for the Yankees and the NFL wasn’t even in existence. And it still took nearly a week to travel from New York to Seattle, which is significant considering the people who were responsible for the Smith Tower were based a bazillion miles away in upstate New York (note: it took less time — three days — for astronauts to travel from Earth to the moon in 1969 than it did for a New Yorker to reach Seattle in 1914).
FINANCED BY TYPEWRITERS AND FIREARMS
The Smith Tower was essentially funded by shotguns and typewriters, since its builder made his vast fortune on guns (the popular L.C. Smith Shotguns) and Typewriters (Smith Corona typewriters). The builder was Lyman Cornelius Smith, a New Yorker who had failed in livestock and then in lumber before finding a fortune in firearms and then a second fortune in typewriters. In the 1890s, he began investing some of this fortune in Seattle real-estate sight unseen following Seattle’s burst of popularity during the Klondike Gold Rush. He eventually became one of Seattle’s most important investors and its biggest taxpayer. In 1909, he decided to build a building in Seattle that would help seal his legacy, and eventually a 42-story building was planned.
PROGRESS AND PROSPERITY DAY
Deciding in 1909 to build a skyscraper in distant Seattle wasn’t exactly high risk. Yes, there was no other building like it in the West. And, yes, Seattle wasn’t exactly a metropolis and financial mecca in 1909. But excitement for Seattle was high in the early 20th Century. It had come to fame and attracted a high number of financiers in the 1897 Alaska Gold Rush. There had been a successful World’s Fair in 1909, and a series of Potlatch Festivals beginning in 1911 that promoted Seattle and its projects. And on June 1st of 1911, the city held a Progress And Prosperity day to commemorate a multitude of ambitious projects that were underway: Fisher Flour Mills along the Duwamish River, Hoge Building near Pioneer Square, Bon Marche building near Belltown, the Lake Washington Canal (which would eventually help connect Lake Washington to Puget Sound), and what was known then as the LC Smith Building but which we know today as Smith Tower. There were speeches, ceremonies, banquets and a parade, along with a prominent write up in the next day’s newspapers. Construction on Smith Tower began a few weeks later.
AN AUSPICIOUS OPENING
On July 4th, 1914, after three years of construction, Smith Tower was opened. More than 4,000 Seattle-ites (about 2% of its population at the time, which would be arguably equivalent to 80,000 visitors today) stood in the long lines and paid the 25-cent fee (about an hour’s wage, equivalent to $40 in today’s world based on the median hourly wage) to ride the elevators up to the crowded observation deck high above the city. The Seattle papers commented the next day on the excitement — and acrophobia — of the crowds, who shrugged off the clouds that blocked the view of Mt. Rainier to peer at Lake Union, Lake Washington, Providence Hospital, City Hall and the jail far below. At the time it was built, the 462-foot Smith Tower was the fourth tallest building in the world, and the tallest building west of the Mississippi. It would remain the tallest building on the West coast for another 48 years.
GRATITUDE FOR SMITH TOWER
I’m a lifelong Seattle resident. My parents are both lifelong Seattle residents, as were three of my four grandparents (one grandparent moved from England as a child). Smith Tower, originally called the LC Smith Building, stood largely unchanged 50 years before my birth, has continued to stand for the 50 years I’ve walked the Earth, and by all likelihood will stand for decades more after I’m gone. For me, it is the Leaning Tower equivalent of Seattle, a marvel of engineering for its time, and one that has stood timelessly and regally over Seattle for generations. It is a reminder for me of what Seattle once was, and what it continues to be.
For that I’m most grateful to LC Smith for financing it and also to the brave people who ascended to the heavens to build it.
NOTES
(*) I realize the term is technically “Manmade” but I have out of respect for the women in my life I’m using “Personmade.”
(**) I remember driving Uber for fun during Covid and one of my international passengers let out an exclamation of joy when he saw the Space Needle for the very first time.
(***) I remember being seven years old in 1975 and waiting in loooonnnnggggg lines to see the bicentennial Liberty Train in what is now Lumen Field, and even back then there was the Smith Tower silently standing and watching, just as it stand and watches today and just as it has stood and watched generations upon generations of Seattleites.
- Slug: smith-tower-seattle-history
- Categories: Seattle History, Architecture, Local Reflections
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