Washington: A Historical Timeline

PRIOR TO 1592 PRE-EUROPEAN EXPLORATION
Circa 14,000 BCE	A group of nomadic hunters crosses the frozen Bering Strait from Siberia into present-day Alaska, eventually moving south into the Pacific Northwest. Distinct communities develop over time, and most of the groups rely heavily on fishing. Another distinctive feature of these groups is their building of totem poles, which tell the stories of their families, clans, and notable individuals.
Circa 9,000 BCE	After massive flooding of the Columbia River creates the Columbia Gorge, humans begin to inhabit the Olympic peninsula.
1543 CE	Spain claims the Pacific Northwest without exploring or charting the region.
1550	Mount St. Helens begins almost nonstop eruptions that continue for a century.
1592–1799 EARLY EUROPEAN EXPLORATION AND SETTLEMENT
1592	Juan de Fuca, a Greek sailing for Spain, sails into a strait that becomes the border between Canada’s Vancouver Island and the Olympic Peninsula of Washington. The waterway is later named the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
1774	Juan Perez commands the first Spanish expedition to explore the Northwest coast and sees the Olympic Mountains.
1775	Bruno de Hezeta lands on the Washington coast and claims the land for Spain. On his return south, he sees the mouth of the Columbia River.
1778	British explorer Captain James Cook explores and charts the Northwest coast. He sees Cape Flattery in Washington and begins trading furs on the coast.
1792	American sea captain Robert Gray discovers the Columbia River and names it after his ship, the Columbia. He also names Gray’s Harbor. British captain George Vancouver explores and names Puget Sound and Mount Rainier. He claims Puget Sound for Britain. Mexican and Spanish settlers, commanded by Salvador Fidalgo, establish the first non-Native American settlement in Washington at Neah Bay near the northern tip of the Olympic Peninsula.
1800–1849 EUROPEAN SETTLEMENT
1800s	Anthropologists estimate that there are 125 distinct Northwest tribes and 50 dialects in existence before Europeans settle in the region. The Chinook, Nisqually, Quinault, and Puyallup hunt deer and fish for salmon and clams. The Cayuse, Colville, Spokane, and Nez Percé live east of the Cascades in the plains and valleys. Eager to trade, Chief Seattle, a member of the Suquamish people and the namesake of Washington’s largest city, first welcomes the European traders and settlers. Eventually European settlers virtually destroy Seattle’s people and he dies on a reservation.
1805	(November 18) Sent by President Thomas Jefferson in an expedition to explore the Louisiana Purchase, Merriwether Lewis and William Clark reach the Pacific Ocean. The Lewis and Clark expedition builds their winter fort at Fort Clatsop, exploring the Columbia River area of what is now Washington for the next year.
1807–11	English-Canadian surveyor David Thompson navigates the entire length the Columbia River.
1811	John Jacob Astor builds Fort Astoria at the mouth of the Columbia River as part of his Pacific Fur Company.
1825	The Hudson’s Bay Company plants grapes at Fort Vancouver in present-day Washington.
1834	The Whitman Party, including Dr. Marcus Whitman and his wife Narcissa, establish a mission at the junction of the Columbia and Snake Rivers. In 1843 Dr. Whitman leads approximately 1,000 pioneers west across the Oregon Trail.
1839	Father Pierre-Jean DeSmet arrives among the Flatheads in the Bitterroot Valley. He and his staff set up a number of Jesuit missions in the region.
1842	John C. Fremont leads an Army Topographical Corps’ Expedition to the Rocky Mountains and witnesses the eruption of Mount St. Helens. His maps of the expedition are printed by the government and used by pioneers heading west.
1843	(November 13) Mount Rainier erupts. It experiences subsequent slight eruptions in 1854, 1858, and 1870.
1846	The U.S. and Great Britain sign a treaty setting the 49th parallel as the boundary between the U.S. and Canada. The two powers agree on joint occupancy of the Oregon Territory.
1847	(November 29) The Whitman Massacre. Cayuse and Umatilla Native Americans murder Dr. Marcus Whitman and his wife, along 13 others, at the Whitman Mission in Walla Walla. The act begins the Cayuse War, which takes place from 1847 to 1855 while the U.S. Army battles Native Americans east of the Cascades.
1850–1899 THE STATE OF WASHINGTON
1851	The first settlers land on the site of present-day Seattle. Andrew Jackson Pope and Frederic Talbot of Maine build their first sawmill on Puget Sound. Pope & Talbot soon ship lumber around the world.
1853	The Washington Territory is created, encompassing the land east to the Rocky Mountains (Idaho and part of Montana) and north of the Columbia River to the 49th parallel. Farmers living north of the Columbus River successfully lobby Congress to name the region Washington Territory. Olympia is established as the capital of the Washington Territory.
1855	Nez Percé elders agree to sell most of their land to the U.S. government. They retain 10,000 square miles as a reservation in the area where Washington, Oregon, and Idaho meet. When gold is discovered in the area soon after, the U.S. government calls for a new deal.
1856	(January 26) The Battle of Seattle. Native Americans attack the Seattle settlement. Backed by artillery fire and supported by Marines anchored in Elliott bay, the settlers ward them off, discouraging subsequent attacks.
1855	The Yakama Indian War begins. Gold is discovered on the recently established Yakama reservation over the course of three years, and conflict erupts between encroaching white miners and the tribes. U.S. troops fight back against the Native tribes, and 25 chiefs are hanged or shot. The Yakama tribe is subsequently put on a reservation south of present-day Yakima.
1858	The first Northwest railroad, built by the Cascade Railroad Company, begins operation in the Columbia River Gorge.
1859	(June 15) A confrontation between American and British authorities over the boundary between the United States and British North America erupts in the Pig War. The specific area of dispute is in the San Juan Islands, between Vancouver Island and the mainland. The war is so named because it is triggered by an American farmer who shoot and kills a Berkshire boar. The pig is the only "casualty" of the war, and the conflict is resolved when Kaiser Wilhelm I of Germany awards the islands to the U.S. in October.
1860s	Gold and silver are discovered in the Okanogan River. By 1910 the precious metal boom has ended and many of the mining towns in the area are abandoned.
1863	Land is split from the Dakota and Washington Territories to form the Idaho Territory.
1864	The Montana Territory is formed after it splits from the Washington Territory.
1870	Hazard Stevens and P.B. Trump make the first successful ascent of Mount Rainier.
1875	(November 4) The SS Pacific, carrying 275 passengers and crew en route to San Francisco from Victoria, British Columbia, collides with the SV Orpheus off Cape Flattery. ThePacific founders within 20 minutes and only two people survive. It is among the worst maritime calamities ever recorded on the Pacific Coast.
1883	Women are given full voting rights in the Washington Territory. The Northern Pacific Railroad reaches Tacoma, linking Washington to the East.
1885	(November 3) Vigilantes in Tacoma drive out Chinese residents and burn their homes and businesses. The mob, led by the mayor and backed by the police, marches the residents of Chinatown to the railroad station and loads them on a train to Portland.
1886	After an attempt to expel all Chinese from Seattle is quashed, President Grover Cleveland declares a state of emergency there due to anti-Chinese violence and hysteria.
1887	The Supreme Court voids the law giving women the vote in Washington Territory.
1889	(November 11) Washington becomes the 42nd state. Seattle-based Washington Mutual is founded. During the economic crisis in 2008, it becomes the largest ever U.S. bank to fail.
1897	The Klondike Gold Rush establishes Seattle’s growth as a jump-off point for people heading to the gold fields of Canada and Alaska.
1900–1929 EARLY 20TH CENTURY
1902	The Reclamation Service begins an irrigation project in the Yakima and Okanogan valleys to facilitate farming. (September 12) The Yacolt Burn destroys over 238,000 acres in Oregon and Washington and kills 38 people. It is the worst forest fire in the history of Washington state.
1907	(August 28) Two Seattle teenagers begin the American Messenger Company, a telephone message service that grows to become the United Parcel Service (UPS).
1909	The Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition is held in Seattle to showcase the Northwest’s setting and bounty of natural resources.
1910	Women gain the right to vote in Washington State. (June 19) The first Father’s Day is celebrated in Spokane by Mrs. John Bruce Dodd as a way to honor her father, who had raised her as a single parent. In 1924 the holiday is approved by President Calvin Coolidge, and in 1972 President Richard Nixon officially recognizes the third Sunday in June as Father’s Day.
1911	In Tacoma, Frank C. Mars begins his candy company with a circle of chocolate covered with a crunchy coating. His son, Forrest, creates M&Ms in 1940.
1916	The Boeing Company, originally known as Pacific Aero Products, is founded in Seattle by William Boeing. In 1969 the Boeing 747, the world’s largest airplane, makes its first commercial flight.
1919	(February 6) The first day of a five-day Seattle general strike takes effect, marking the first citywide labor action in America. During this time, Washington is a center for the Industrial Workers of the World, known as the "Wobblies." The labor conflict leads off a tumultuous era of massive strikes that shut down the nation’s steel, coal, and meatpacking industries in a dozen cities.
1920	(March 22) Washington is the 35th state to ratify the 19th Amendment, granting women nationwide the right to vote.
1930–1949 THE GREAT DEPRESSION AND WORLD WAR II
1933	Washington state unemployment peaks at more than 25 percent during the Great Depression. President Franklin D. Roosevelt begins New Deal programs, one of which is the building of the Grand Coulee Dam, a hydroelectric gravity dam on the Columbia River. Completed in 1941, the Grand Coulee Dam is the largest electric power-producing facility and the largest concrete structure in the U.S.
1937	The U.S. Supreme Court upholds Washington State’s minimum wage laws for women.
1938	Based in Kent, Recreational Equipment Inc. (REI) is founded as a basement co-op by Seattle-area mountain-climbers. By 2006 it has 82 stores and is a billion-dollar business.
1943	The Hanford Engineer Works is constructed for the Manhattan Project to produce plutonium for the World War II bomb "Little Boy" (the codename for the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945). It is the first atomic bomb to be used as a weapon.
1950–PRESENT MODERN WASHINGTON
1962	After construction begins in 1961, Seattle’s Space Needle is completed. The structure, built for the 1962 World’s Fair, is 605 feet high and 138 feet wide at its widest point. When it is completed, it is the tallest structure west of the Mississippi River. Today it is the most recognized structure in the city skyline, and a major tourist attraction.
1971	Washington becomes the first U.S. state to ban gender discrimination. Former University of San Francisco students open a Starbucks in Seattle as a single coffee shop. The company goes public in 1992, and by 2006 there are 10,500 locations around the world.
1973	The Picardo Farm P-Patch is established north of the University of Washington, coining the term for a local community garden.
1975	Bill Gates and Paul Allen found Microsoft. Headquartered in Redmond, it’s the first major producer of computer software. Microsoft dominates the home computer operating system market beginning with MS-DOS in the 1980s and continuing with the ubiquitous Windows OS.
1980	(May 18) At 8:32a.m. Mount Saint Helens erupts, resulting in 57 deaths and billions of dollars in damage. The mountain loses over 1,300 feet of elevation and gains a two-mile-long and one-mile-wide crater. The volcano continues to erupt sporadically through October.
1996	Gary Locke is elected governor, becoming the first Chinese-American governor in the history of the U.S. A 9,200 year-old skeleton is found by the Columbia River in Kennewick. It becomes known as the "Kennewick Man."
1998	(February 6) Washington becomes the 27th state to ban same-sex marriages.
1999	(November 29) In what becomes known as the modern-day "Battle in Seattle," as many as 50,000 protestors gather in the city to oppose corporate globalization, forcing the World Trade Organization to cancel the opening session of a three-day summit meeting.
2000	(February 9) In Renton, 17,000 Boeing engineers and technical workers go on strike in one of the biggest white-collar work actions in U.S. history. After 38 days of striking, Boeing agrees to settle. In 2001 the company announces plans to move its headquarters out of Seattle.
2004	Seattle mayor Greg Nichols says the city will begin recognizing the marriages of gay couples wed elsewhere, although the city will not conduct its own same-sex weddings.
2006	The Washington State Supreme Court upholds the ban on gay marriage, ruling lawmakers have the power to restrict marriage to unions between a man and woman.
2008	(November 4) Washington becomes the second state after Oregon to legalize assisted suicide.