Cathedral of Steam: King Street Station's $55 Million Resurrection
Gather in close, friend, and mind the lamp. Tonight's tale is about a building, and a building that got buried alive and dug back out. You've heard me say how the Great Northern and the Northern Pacific finally shared Seattle's front door in 1906, after the old Tacoma and Seattle quarrel I told you before. Well, this is the door itself: King Street Station.
A Tower Borrowed from Venice
The two roads, both under Jim Hill's hand, built the station between 1904 and 1906 and opened it on May 10, 1906. They hired Reed and Stem of St. Paul, the same firm that stood as associate architects on Grand Central Terminal in New York. For the top of the thing they raised a clock tower 242 feet tall, modeled on the Campanile of St. Mark's in Venice, which had just come tumbling down. In its day it stood the tallest building in Seattle. A section-hand like me would look up at that tower from the yard and feel he worked for somebody.
They built a cathedral for people who only meant to catch a train.
Buried Under Tile
Passenger trains thinned out as the highways filled, and by the sixties the old depot looked tired to the men who owned it. In late 1967 a drop ceiling went in about ten feet below the original, and it hid the hand-carved coffered ceiling overhead. The old fixtures came out too. Little of the grand waiting room stayed in view, save the terrazzo underfoot and a clock on the west wall. For decades travelers waited under plain tile and never knew what rode above their heads.
Ten Dollars and a Long Polish
Amtrak took over the passenger trade in 1971, and the Empire Builder, the Coast Starlight and the Cascades all came to roll in at King Street. In 2008 the city of Seattle signed a deal with BNSF Railway to take the station for ten dollars, signed March 5 of that year. An earlier preliminary figure had been a single dollar, which tells you what the railroad thought the old girl was worth. The city then spent about fifty-five million dollars bringing the building back, uncovering the ceiling and restoring the original fixtures. The station was rededicated on April 24, 2013.
I'll tell you what I think, friend. A railroad that hides its own best room has forgotten what it was for. Seattle remembered.
What Really Happened
King Street Station was built in 1904–1906 by the Great Northern and Northern Pacific railways and opened May 10, 1906. Designed by Reed and Stem of St. Paul (associate architects of Grand Central Terminal), it has a 242-foot clock tower modeled on the Campanile di San Marco in Venice and was Seattle's tallest building when completed. In late 1967 a drop ceiling was installed about ten feet below the original coffered ceiling, and original fixtures were removed. Amtrak began operating the station after its creation in 1971. The City of Seattle bought the station from BNSF Railway for $10, a deal signed March 5, 2008 (an earlier preliminary figure was $1). A $55 million restoration was rededicated April 24, 2013. The lantern-keeper's voice and dialect are storytelling; dates and figures come from the sources below.