On May 18, 1980, Mount St. Helens erupted into the Pacific Northwest's most cataclysmic event in recorded history. The blast killed 57, forced thousands to leave their homes and sent a thick cloud of ash across three states; trace amounts were found around the world.

The Herald went to press the next day:

"The explosion early Sunday knocked 1,300 feet off the top of the once pristine 9,677-foot peak, which...

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On Nov. 25, 1999, Thanksgiving Day, fishermen off the coast of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida found a five-year-old boy clinging to an inner tube. His mother and 11 others had drowned while trying to cross into the United States from Cuba.

His name was Elian Gonzalez.

After an overnight hospital stay, he was released into the custody of his uncle and other family members. The Cuban government sent a note on behalf of...

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Just before midnight on April 14, 1912, the liner Titanic — the world's largest steamship at that time — struck an iceberg and began to sink.

The next morning, The Herald published what the world thought they knew about the accident: "TITANIC HITS ICEBERG—IS SINKING—PASSENGERS SAFE"

It said that all passengers aboard the "World's Greatest Ship" had been safely transferred to responding vessels.

"Vice...

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On April 12, 1945, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt died in office of a cerebral hemmorage.

The Herald, then published in the afternoon, snuck this bulletin into the day's edition before going to press that later that day:

"The White House announced late today that President Roosevelt had died of cerebral hemorrhage.

The death occurred this afternoon at Warm...

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On the evening of April 4, 1968, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated on the balcony of a Memphis hotel. He was visiting the city to lead a protest march in support of local sanitation workers.

The next day, The Herald published two articles: One that detailed the events of King's death and the Attorney General's hope to find his murderer, another that relayed President Lyndon B. Johnson's proclamation of the following...

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On the morning of March 30, 1981, President Reagan was wounded in an assassination attempt in Washington, D.C. The Herald, then published in the afternoon, went to press that day as the president's fate remained in doubt. Here's part of the Page 1 story:

Mutual Radio quoted an unnamed hospital doctor as saying the bullet missed the president's heart by an inch. The network quoted the doctor as saying the bullet struck several arteries, filling part of the chest...

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On March 22, 1920, the Washington state legislature voted unanimously to ratify the 19th amendment. The Herald went to press that evening, spreading the news that the nation had finally begun to catch up with the state, which had enacted women's suffrage 10 years prior. Here's an excerpt from the front-page story:

Scores of women leaders were here from all parts of Washington to celebrate the expected ratification.

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Now in its 113th year and counting, the print edition of The Herald has seen a lot of big news. A presidential assassination occurred when the paper wasn't even a year old, and for many years, The Herald was the first word Everett residents heard about major events such...

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One hundred and sixty years ago Saturday, President Millard Fillmore signed an act creating the Washington Territory, what would eventually become the 42nd state.

Before 1853, the land north of the Columbia River was part of the Oregon Territory. But settlers north of the river clamored for their own territory, according to the Secretary of State's office.

Congress obliged, creating what is called the...

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Snohomish County's first glimpse of an airplane was not so much a taste of the future as it was a circus act -- complete with a death-defying ending.

A former racecar driver named Fred Wiseman took his traveling show to Snohomish in May 1911, charging a dollar a head to see his flying machine. This was only eight years after the Wright Brothers' first flight, and airplane manufacturing was a do-it-yourself project. Wiseman's airplane was held...

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President Franklin D. Roosevelt's appearance onstage Saturday in the form of "Ed Asner as FDR" won't be Snohomish County's first brush with the 32nd president.

The real FDR made one brief stop in Snohomish County as president, but he barely stayed long enough for a cup of coffee.

A crowd...

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Originally published Sept. 7, 2010.

EVERETT -- It's easy to walk downtown streets and forget Everett is an old man of a city, with secrets, strange stories and even violence in its past.

President Teddy Roosevelt once spoke to a crowd of 15,000 on Colby Avenue. A newspaper editor shot...

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On some of the big questions of the early 20th century, our state was a little ahead of the curve. Washington passed a dry law before Prohibition, and on Nov. 8, 1910, a decade before national suffrage, the men of Washington state voted overwhelmingly to grant women the right to vote.

Herald reporter Gale Fiege wrote about it near the 100th anniversary of the vote in 2010:

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Higher grades, less work, softer treatment – doesn't that sound like every schoolboy's dream?

It's not a wish list from one of today's slacker kids. Nope, it's a long-ago school superintendent's description of what he believed students wanted at East Stanwood High School.

And 69 years ago this week, the school was the scene of a student revolt.

At noon on Jan. 27, 1944, a Thursday, nearly the entire East Stanwood High student body of 96 kids...

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It's a fair bet that no one is left who can give a first-hand account of the great Everett courthouse fire of 1909, and few can tell you about seeing the national champion Everett High School football team of 1920. Luckily, we can still hear accounts from those who witnessed history.

Historians David Dilgard and Margaret Riddle recorded a series of interviews in the 1970s to preserve people's memories of the early 20th century in Everett. Dozens...

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Everett High School was founded in 1880, but its current location will turn a sprightly young 103 years old on Thursday. We thought we'd celebrate with some photos and a look back at a 2010 Herald story about the centennial of the high school's "A" or Main Building. An excerpt from the story:

It was a momentous time for a gritty mill town. Everett's...

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Wouldn't it be great if you could hop on a quick, modern rail system and ride from Everett to Lynnwood and Seattle? Amazingly, people could do that a century ago, when the Interurban trolley carried passengers through growing communities in north King and south Snohomish counties.

The Interurban operated from 1910 to 1939, when highways and automobiles made it seem obsolete. The trolley cars were unceremoniously dumped, and the rails were mostly...

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We came across this advertisement while combing through our microfilm files. It's from the Nov. 3, 1916, edition of The Herald.

It advertises a tonic that "corrects nervous irritability, exhaustion and other distressing symptoms of the deranged feminine organs." You could buy a trial package by sending 10 cents to a doctor in Buffalo, NY.



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When Everett architect Andy Hall clicked on HeraldNet's new Time Travels blog Tuesday, an image jumped out at him. It wasn't a 1916 snow picture that grabbed Hall's attention. It was the blog's logo – a photo from Herald archives and the Everett Public Library of an old building.

"That's my building," Hall said Wednesday.

Hall is owner of Botesch, Nash...

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If you're lucky, when you're in your 70s you'll be in the same kind of shape as the Deception Pass bridge.

Now in its 78th year of operation, the bridge has never been rebuilt or had a major overhaul. The New Deal project was built by a Seattle company for $304,775. Before that, a ferry took cars across the water, four or five at a time.

"It's an incredibly sturdy bridge that was built on solid rock. As long as...

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Lowland snow wimps have – so far – gotten off easy this winter. While last January's snowstorms blanketed Snohomish County for days and gave kids an extra winter vacation, it's been rain and sun, wind and fog, everything but snow around here this year.

No year in memory or recorded local history compares to the winter of 1916.

"Snohomish County: An Illustrated...

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Welcome to Time Travels, our new blog about local history. We'll use this spot as our very own history channel, where we can tell stories, share photos and look at how The Herald's pages covered historic events. (We've been around since 1901, three years before the photo at right was taken.)

If there's a story or photo you'd like us to look into, please email Julie Muhlstein at

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