711 E Union St
Seattle, WA, USA

National Register of Historic Places - Phillips House (William B. Phillips House;Heg-Phillips House)

Statement of Significant:

The W. B. Phillips House, built in 1902 is significant as a surviving example of the multiple semi-attached residences which were integral to First Hill's early period of development. It is an excellent remaining example of early Seattle's "Builder's Houses", built by local craftsmen with regional materials who adapted architectural stylistic elements into a re-interpreted local architecture of the period. Its significance has increased as institutional and high-rise residential re-development of First Hill has resulted in the demolition of the vast majority of other similar buildings of the period. For these reasons, the house meets National Register Criterion C.

SEATTLE: 1880-1900
In 1883 a transcontinental railroad finally arrived in Washington Territory opening it to eastern markets and easy migration. In thirty short years the state's population grew a phenomenal 1400 percent. In 1880, Seattle's population was 3,553, booming to 42,837 in 1890, and 80,671 in 1900. As Roger Sale so clearly describes this time in Seattle, in "Seattle - Past to Present": "In 1880 Seattle was still a small place of 3,553 people, but it had already developed a remarkably sophisticated economy. of course Seattle had to rely on San Francisco and Portland and Chicago for a great deal, but every year it was cutting down on its original dependence upon older and larger cities. That was the major impetus for the city's growth people working in a place, seeking and making opportunities, diverse because human beings and human needs are diverse.

From 1880 on Seattle was visibly changing, and while there were significant recessions or depressions in the mid-eighties and again in the mid-nineties, it was coming into its own. Soon a man like Arthur Denny would become not so much a leader of a community of settlers as a leader of a class of people who were Republican, righteous, sober, capitalistic.

Some of the newcomers soon joined that class, but many others were more transient, often recently emigrated from Europe and living according to traditions and habits that a person of limited imagination and tolerance like Denny could not easily understand. This group would include not just artisans and laborers and clerks but people of some means who were more quicksilver than Denny, more speculative or reckless. In the eighties and nineties Seattle was evolving from a hard-won settlement into a booming city."