THE PLACE: Seattle is a major coastal seaport and the seat of King County, in the U.S. state of Washington. With 620,778 residents as of 2011, Seattle is the largest city in the Pacific Northwest region of North America and the largest city on the West Coast north of San Francisco. The Seattle metropolitan area of around 4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the United States. The city is situated on a narrow isthmus between Puget Sound (an inlet of the Pacific Ocean) and Lake Washington, about 100 miles (160 km) south of the Canada–United States border, but farther north than Toronto. A major gateway for trade with Asia, Seattle is the 8th largest port in the United States and 9th largest in North America in terms of container handling.
The Seattle area had been inhabited by Native Americans for at least 4,000 years before the first permanent white settlers. Arthur A. Denny and his group of travelers, subsequently known as the Denny Party, arrived at Alki Point on November 13, 1851. The settlement was moved to its current site and named "Seattle" in 1853, after Chief Si'ahl of the local Duwamish and Suquamish tribes.
Visitors to the triangular shaped square (or plaza) known as Tilikum Place will see a life-like statue representation of Chief Seattle, chief of the Suquamish and for which this city is named after. This statue sits at a perfect location in downtown Seattle for the reason that this area incorporates the very first plats of land and homes to be built here, where Seattle began its explosive growth in the mid-1800s to become what it represents today. It was sculpted by local artist, James Wehn and officially dedicated in 1912. There is a bronze plaque that sits on the front of the statue and reads:
SEATTLE
CHIEF OF THE SUQUAMISH
A FIRM FRIEND OF THE WHITES
FOR HIM THE CITY OF SEATTLE
WAS NAMED BY ITS FOUNDERS
1908 |
The following text taken from the Smithsonian Art Inventory datasheet
description:
The artist based this statue on the only known photo of Chief Seattle (ca. 1790-1867), chief of the Suquamish tribe. This statue of the city's namesake was the first statue commissioned by the City of Seattle, and is located significantly at the historic juncture of the original land claims of three Seattle pioneers, Carson Boren, William Bell, and Arthur Denny. Funds for the statue came from the street improvement budget.
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THE PERSON:
Chief Seattle converted to Catholicism and was baptized in the church. I'm sure his willingness to accept Christianity as his new religion combined with the acceptance of the white man and the willingness to do business with the first settlers who arrived contributed to the city's eagerness to commemorate his likeness posthumously with a statue. The following excerpts from HistoryLink.org say this about Chief Seattle's life:
Chief Seattle, or si?al in his native Lushootseed language, led the Duwamish and Suquamish Tribes as the first Euro-American settlers arrived in the greater Seattle area in the 1850s. Baptized Noah by Catholic missionaries, Seattle was regarded as a "firm friend of the Whites," who named the region's future central city in his honor. He was a respected leader among Salish tribes, signing the Point Elliott (Mukilteo) Treaty of 1855, which relinquished tribal claims to most of the area, and opposing Native American attempts to dislodge settlers during the "Indian Wars" of 1855-1856. Chief Seattle retired to the Suquamish Reservation at Port Madison, and died there on June 7, 1866.
There is some additional information on Chief Seattle here and here.