Seattle's City Halls
The Third City Hall
 Yesler Building Construction |
"The old city hall has for many years been an unsafe place for the public records, is over-crowded and unsanitary, and no expenditure of money can materially improve it…An effort was made during the past summer to devise plans for the grouping of municipal buildings on some scheme that would furnish an administrative center in their construction, but these labors were practically fruitless, inasmuch as there were no funds available to even provide suitable grounds for such purpose."
Mayor Ballinger, Annual Message, 1906
A new building to house the Health and Police Departments was under construction in 1905 and suggestions were forwarded that it also serve as quarters for City Hall. Some proponents believed it was a possible solution to the City’s space problems. City Engineer R.H. Thomson was one of many who was not in favor of using a building not originally intended as a City Hall for that purpose.
Despite the naysayers, the new building became City Hall in 1909 when it was completed. The building had grown from a two-story building, as originally planned, to a five-story building and as many City offices as could find space moved in.
Now known as the Yesler Building, it is located on the triangle between Fifth Avenue, Yesler Way, and Terrace Street, property originally purchased in 1888 for a City Hall.
 Postcard of Yesler Building |
 Yesler Building |