Seattle is called for an Indian chief. It is the harbor for ships that go to Alaska and Japan and there is no dry farming around here for it rains most all the time and everything is green. It is on the steep shore and the streets are so steep they haul the street cars up and let them down with cables under the tracks. There is one building 42 stories high. It was built by the typewriter man and is called the Smith Building. The Hotel Frye is a fine place and is owned by the Japanese. They told us all the good hotels were owned by them and the farms and truck gardens are all run by them.

We called up Centralia to talk to Bart who had been visiting there for two months. Bart is my young sister and I was anxious to see her. We stayed at Seattle about a week and saw all of the parks and lakes; one of the biggest is Woodland Park where they have a zoological garden where the biggest buffalo in the country is; they had all kinds of bears and deer and caribou. The University grounds and buildings are very fine. The forestry building is built of big trees with the bark on; it looks like Glacier Park Hotel and is used as a museum. All kinds of sea animals and land animals and birds are in it.

They are building a big stadium on the edge of the lake to hold their field and athletic sports in. It will hold about 50,000 people. We went down to see the canal locks and saw the ships pass through it. There are 41 wooden ships tied together in a bunch that the government built for the war and they are trying to sell them but no one will buy them as they are no good.

Seattle is a city over 300,000 and is a fine place to live. Every home is full of roses and evergreens in the yards. They claim it is the best lighted city in the west. The streets are full of electric signs and I saw one of the big pig standing on its hind feet playing a flute. It was "Pig & Whistle" advertisement for candy. We went to the Hudson Bay store and got a totem pole and an Esquimo reindeer coat for Bart. We met Doctor Frobese there who lived in the Arctic regions for 27 years. He told us more about the Arctic animals than you can read in books. He gave us the tooth of a mastodon that he said was the oldest living thing in the world; he said it was living ivory and was a million and a half years old at least; also a whale's ear. It looks like a kind of shell but is bone about the size of my fist. We got a fishing hook and line that is used by the Esquimo for catching seals made of whale baleen and kind of rawhide, and seal spear they use when they go out in their skin canoes. He said a lot of the stuff told in books about the Arctic circle was not true. One story about whales; the books say that whales cannot stay under the water only a few hours. He knew of one where they watched it and it stayed under for nearly two days. He told us about the kadiak [sic] bears which are the largest in the world and all about seal hunting. They have the greatest collection of Arctic things in the country. He told us the legends of the totem poles. How the great northern raven is the sacred bird, called Jag-eel and is the, benefactor of mankind; being all powerful he put the moon and stars in the skies.

There is a totem pole about 60 feet high in center of the street in Seattle, the biggest one there is.

We visited Burdick's, our cousins, who live on Ravenna Boulevard not far from the University, one of the finest parts of the city and had a good time with them. Don Burdick is in the real estate business and goes to school at the University; he was an aviator in the army until he got hurt in a fall.

When we were ready to leave for Tacoma, Don took us over the long state road in his auto to see the Japanese truck farms; they had a lot of hop farms and berry farms but not very good buildings.

I did not see all the places I wanted at Seattle as I wanted to go to Victoria and Mt. Baker but we had to go on as we had so many places to go yet. It was evening when we got to Tacoma and Mr. Virges met us there and took us to his house. Bart came from Centralia and met us there and we all went to the Union Club for supper. Mr. Virges' family went to California to spend the winter and so we had the big house all to ourselves. It is one of the finest homes in that town. He has two or three fine automobiles and his chauffeur took us all over the country.

He took us on a trip to Mount Tacoma [Rainier]. Also out to see the big military camp at American Lake and to the race track where they have the automobile races. It is very interesting. They burn wood in their houses and the front yards were piled full of slab wood, because they don't have alleys in their lots to get it in the back way like we do in the east. They have very pretty homes in Tacoma and flowers in all the yards. They are nearly all bungalows.

There is a big high school where they have a stadium built in the gulch at the edge of the lake that holds about 30,000 people for the games. Governor Cox was to speak there one day but it rained and he didn't get a crowd so he did not give his speech. We drove down to hear him but got left so went down the bay to see the animals in the park. They have a smoke stack at the smelter they told us was 800 feet high. Some smoke pipe I'll say. Bart and I took in the picture shows about every day. One day we went over the long bridge to see the ship yards and the big mills and where they are building docks for the big steamships to come in and load lumber for the ocean voyage. There was a lot of talk about going to the mountain and so one day we all got ready with the big Lozier car and started. They told us to take blankets and lots of heavy clothes along so we did.

It was 65 miles and it rained about every half hour. The clouds were all around so we could not see the mountain. They do not see it for days and weeks at a time in the wet season on account of the clouds, so we decided to drive to it to see it but we didn't see it after all even after we got pretty near to the top of it, and we had to wait for a week and then got nearly a hundred miles away from it to see it. There is no more wonderful trip than a trip to Mount Tacoma. It is the highest mountain in the United States. It is too wonderful for me to describe. You have to see it to understand what it is. I'll tell more about it in the next chapter.