Pioneer Square is a neighborhood in the southwest corner of Downtown Seattle, Washington, US. It was once the heart of the city: Seattle’s founders settled there in 1852, following a brief six-month settlement at Alki Point on the far side of Elliott Bay. The neighborhood’s early structures were primarily wooden; nearly all burned in the Great Seattle Fire of 1889. By the end of 1890, dozens of bricks and stone buildings had been erected in their stead; to this day, the neighborhood’s architectural character derives from these late 19th century buildings, primarily examples of Richardsonian Romanesque.
The neighborhood comes from a small triangular plaza near First Avenue and Yesler Way, known initially as Pioneer Place. The Pioneer Square–Skid Road Historic District, a historic district including that plaza and several surrounding blocks, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Like virtually all Seattle, WA neighborhoods, the Pioneer Square neighborhood lacks definitive borders. It is bounded roughly by Alaskan Way S. on the west, beyond which are the docks of Elliott Bay; by S. King Street on the south, beyond which is SoDo; by 5th Avenue S. on the east, beyond which is the International District; and it extends between one and two blocks north of Yesler Way, beyond which is the rest of Downtown. Because Yesler Way marks the boundary between two different plats, the street grid north of Yesler does not line up with the neighborhood’s other streets (nor with the compass), so the northern border of the district zigzags along numerous streets. Bed Bug Exterminator Seattle
Early History
The settlement’s importance was guaranteed in 1852, when Henry Yesler chose the site for his lumber mill, which was located on Elliott Bay at the foot of what is now Yesler Way, right on the border between the land claimed (and soon after that platted) by David Swinson “Doc” Maynard (to the south) and that platted by Arthur Denny and Carson Boren.
Much of the neighborhood is on landfill: in pioneer times, the area roughly between First and Second Avenue, bounded on the south by Jackson Street and extending north almost to Yesler Way (about two-and-a-half city blocks), was a low-lying offshore island. The mainland shore roughly followed what is now Yesler Way to about Fourth Avenue, then ran southeast, at an angle of about 45 degrees to the current shoreline. Slightly inland were steep bluffs, largely smoothed primarily by regrading in the late 19th and early 20th century.
Fallen Firefighters Memorial
Each spring since 1989, on the weekend nearest June 6, the city has celebrated the Pioneer Square Fire Festival with a parade and display of antique and modern fire apparatus, demonstrations of fire fighter skills, food and craft booths, and a party. On June 6, 1998, the anniversary of the 1889 fire fell on a Saturday. This year the festival took on additional meaning when the Fallen Fire Fighter Memorial was dedicated. Thanks to the work of Battalion Chief Wes Goss and his Memorial Committee, the bronze sculpture was now in place. On a granite block is inscribed the name of each Seattle firefighter who died in the line of duty.
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