Skykomish A Historic Walking Tour

The upper valley of the South Fork of the Skykomish River was inhabited for centuries by indigenous people who traveled the Cascade mountain passes, with the coming of the Great Northern Railroad in 1893 a permanent settlement was founded at Skykomish.

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Skykomish A Historic Walking Tour

Skykomish, Washington 98288, United States

Created By: Seco Design

Tour Information

In the first half of the 20th century, this community near the upper end of the Skykomish River valley was a booming, brawling, railroad and logging town, remote but filled with activity and jobs.

Gold, silver and copper miners added to the raucous social mix. More optimistic than successful, they left behind such names as Money Creek and Gold Bar.

Today Skykomish is a community of outdoor recreation and tourism. It still has many of the historic buildings of its boom days and appears much the way it did then.

This project is brought to you by the Town of Skykomish, supported in large part by a Port of Seattle Economic Development grant, and implemented by Seco Design. We worked collaboratively with members of the Skykomish Historical Society and the Skykomish Chamber of Commerce to develop the directory.


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What You'll See on the Tour

Skykomish Came with the Railroad... In 1889, James J. Hill decided to extend his railway, The Great Northern, westward across the continent to Seattle to link with the markets of the Orient. In the fall of that year, at age 33, John Maloney... Read more
The Cascadia, originally the Hatley Hotel, was built in 1922 on the site once occupied by Martin’s Boarding House. A fire in 1937 destroyed the second and third floors of the hotel, and only the second story was rebuilt. Today the Cascadi... Read more
King County records indicate this building was constructed in 1939. Local sources say the structure dates from even earlier, and was originally built as a residence and later converted for church use. Remodels in the 1950s and 1990s have gi... Read more
This building was a former Great Northern Railway storage building once located south of the tracks. In the 1930s a part of a WPA project it moved to its current location to serve as Town Hall, Library, and Town Jail, and was refurbished us... Read more
The Olympia was opened in 1897 by Patrick McEvoy, a Great Northern Railway engineer. Legend has it that McEvoy was at the controls when the first passenger train crossed the summit in 1893. The original Building was destroyed in the 1904 fi... Read more
Perhaps Skykomish’s most prominent building, the Skykomish Hotel was built in 1904 on the site of an earlier hotel that burned. A magazine article published shortly after the new hotel was completed described it as “a fine four-story ho... Read more
Built by town founder, John Maloney, in 1904 after an earlier store burned, this building for many years housed the town’s general store, post office and hardware store. With its typical Western Boomtown Façade, the building began as a s... Read more
Now Onemish Lodge This building built in 1908 originally sat alongside the railroad tracks, across the street and slightly west of its present day location. It served as a warehouse for John Maloney’s General Merchandise, with goods bein... Read more
The Manual Training class of the Skykomish School built this building in 1922 as a school project. Formerly located one block west, it was moved to this location when the present day school was built. In 1954 it was purchased by the Town of... Read more
Dating from the 1890s, this modest dwelling is typical of an early Skykomish worker’s cottage. Originally just one room, a kitchen and bathroom were later added to the rear of the house.
Known locally as the Teacher’s Cottage, this circa 1915 residence of Craftsman design originally housed single, female teachers employed by the Skykomish School District. It is now the home of the District’s Superintendent.
The Skykomish School, constructed in 1936, is one of seven schools built in Washington State under President Franklin Roosevelt’s Works Progress Administration. Under the program, the community provided the concrete and lumber from local ... Read more
In November of 1944, the Town of Skykomish became the first municipality in King County to contract with the King County Library System for library services. For the first fifty years the Library was housed in the Town Hall building. It mov... Read more
Still active, the Skykomish Free and Accepted Masons Lodge #259 is the oldest and only surviving fraternal organization in Skykomish. The Hall was built in 1924 with donated labor and local materials, and through the years has been the hub ... Read more
Built in 1898, it was originally located in approximately the current location. During an expansion of the rail yard in 1922, the building was moved to the north side of the tracks and enlarged to 105-feet long including a freight room. In ... Read more

 

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