Roads & Routes

On September 14, 1716, Boston Light became the first lighthouse established in Colonial America. With many ships floundering in the treacherous waters of the Massachusetts harbor, there was a great need for navigational aid. At night and during storms, it was difficult to discern the entrance to the main shipping channel of Nantasket Roads, situated between the Brewster islands and the town of Hull. The ledges had become a graveyard for ships, resulting in great loss to human life and cargo--a deterrent to European colonization efforts. Ship captains and merchants petitioned the colonial government for a lighthouse to be erected on Little Brewster Island as a way of safe passage to the inner harbor. Three hundred years later, Boston Light continues to serve its purpose. Today, the lighthouse is protected by an ever-present Coast Guard civilian keeper and a cadre of specially trained Coast Guard Auxiliary volunteer assistant keepers.

Presiding over the Puget Sound region, Mount Rainier has lured adventurers and entrepreneurs to its slopes since the earliest settlers. Visitors rode packhorses or hiked miles to tent "hotels" at Theosophy Ridge, Indian Henry's Hunting Ground, and Ohanapecosh. James Longmire opened Longmire Springs Hotel near bubbling mineral springs. In 1899, Mount Rainier became a national park, and eventually, a motley array of services was consolidated by the Rainier National Park Company, which built National Park Inn and Paradise Inn. Roads, services, and activities expanded, and guests poured in. Winter activities, such as skiing and tobogganing, increased the park's popularity. The 1936 Winter Olympic Ski Trials and training for World War II ski troops were even hosted there. Visitors today might be surprised to know that many inns, rental cabins, bathhouses, and other buildings have come and gone, leaving some areas more pristine now than for much of the park's history.

The river community of Bothell began with the arrival of Columbus Greenleaf and George Wilson in 1870. They staked claims along the Sammamish River after navigating from Seattle across Lake Washington and then east along the meandering Sammamish. Bothell was first a logging community, with several mills producing boards and shingles. After the forests were harvested, it became a farming community, connected to other settlements by the river and, after 1887, the railroad. In 1909, Bothell incorporated as a city after a contentious campaign. The vote was 79 to 70 in favor of becoming a city. The population of Bothell in 1910 was 599, but many lived outside the two-thirds square mile original city limits. This book tells the story of Bothell as a central hub, with distinct neighborhoods having their own personalities. Bothell's population today is almost 43,000, divided between two counties: King and Snohomish.