Re:Take: Dose of Reality

Re:Take is Seattlest contributor and local history buff Rob Ketcherside's new weekly look at the Emerald City Now and in days of yore. Each week, Rob will bring us a pair of photos - one from Seattle's municipal archives, and one of the same spot as it apears today.

Steps to get to 2010 from 1909...

Drop street level.
Destroy buildings in landslide.
Wait 50 years.
Build huge freeway overpass.
Wait 50 years.
Fill empty lot with skyscraper.
Huzza!

This was home to one C. P. Dose and family, on Yesler just up from Fifth Avenue. Dose bought a bunch of land in the Mount Baker area in 1871 and then was forward thinking enough to father an architect. They proceeded to get rich, one house at a time.

New building courtesy of serial skyscraper Martin Selig. He's most famous for the Columbia Center.

Many more details on the landslide over at Flickr.

(Photo courtesy Seattle Municipal Archives, December 4, 1909.)