Kalama | |
---|---|
Kalama, Washington | |
Coordinates: 45°59′51″N122°50′12″W / 45.99750°N 122.83667°W | |
Country | United States |
State | Washington |
County | Cowlitz |
Area | |
• Total | 3.83 sq mi (9.91 km2) |
• Land | 3.57 sq mi (9.25 km2) |
• Water | 0.26 sq mi (0.67 km2) |
Elevation | 420 ft (130 m) |
Population | |
• Total | 2,959 |
• Density | 783.75/sq mi (302.60/km2) |
Time zone | UTC-8 (Pacific (PST)) |
• Summer (DST) | UTC-7 (PDT) |
ZIP code | 98625 |
Area code | 360 |
FIPS code | 53-34645 |
GNIS feature ID | 2410160 [2] |
Website | cityofkalama.com |
Kalama (ka-LAM-ma) is a city in Cowlitz County, Washington, United States. It is part of the Longview, Washington Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 2,959 as of the 2020 census. [3]
James W. Phillips' Washington State Place Names states, "General John W. Sprague of the Northern Pacific Railroad named the town in 1871 for the Indian word calama, meaning "pretty maiden." [4] There is an additional story: The name "Kalama" was first mentioned in 1806 in the Lewis and Clark Journals ("Cath la haws Creek", "CalamsRiver", and "Calamas") in their reference to what is now known as the Kalama River [5] (this story predates all of the others). Gabriel Franchère, in 1811, wrote of the Indian village at the mouth of the Kalama River, adding that it was called "Thlakalamah" . [6]
Kalama was first settled by Native Americans, particularly members of the Cowlitz Indian Tribes. Others maintain that the town name is associated with John Kalama (c. 1814 – c. 1870), [5] a carpenter from the Hawaiian island of Maui who came to the Pacific Northwest on a fur-trading vessel in the 1830s. (The name "Kalama" also originates in the Hawaiian language and means "tree of ebony" or "the torch") [7] John Kalama married a Nisqually tribe woman, Mary Martin, and worked on a farm repairing fish barrels, among other jobs. Mary died early and John remarried; he had a daughter about whom little is known and a son called Peter (1864–1947).
The first white settler recorded was in 1853. That first settler was Ezra Meeker and his family. Only one year later, Meeker moved to north Puyallup, Washington, but he sold his Donation Land Claim to a Mr. John Davenport, [5] who, with a few others, permanently settled in the Kalama area. In early 1870, Northern Pacific Railway scouts came to Cowlitz County to find an ideal terminus along the Columbia River. After a failed negotiation for a Donation Land Claim in Martin's Bluff, 4 miles (6.4 km) south of Kalama, Northern Pacific officials purchased 700 acres (280 ha) in Kalama for the terminus of the new railroad as well as a new headquarters. The population swelled with employees of the Northern Pacific Railway. [8]
Kalama was entirely a Northern Pacific railroad creation. It was unofficially born in May 1870 when the Northern Pacific railroad turned the first shovel of dirt. Northern Pacific built a dock, a sawmill, a car shop, a roundhouse, a turntable, hotels, a hospital, stores, homes. In just a few months in 1870, the working population skyrocketed to approximately 3,500 and the town had added tents, saloons, a brewery, and a gambling hall. Soon the town had a motto: "Rail Meets Sail". Recruiters went to San Francisco and recruited Chinese labor, who moved to their own Chinatown in a part of Kalama now called China Gardens. [9] The population of Kalama peaked at 5,000 people, but in early 1874, the railroad moved its headquarters to Tacoma, and by 1877, only 700 people remained in Kalama. [8]
Kalama was unofficially incorporated on November 29, 1871. It served as the county seat of Cowlitz County from 1872 to 1922. Kalama was the northern terminus of a railroad ferry operated by the Northern Pacific Railway from Goble, Oregon. This was a critical link in rail service between 1883 when the service began until 1909 when the major rail bridges near Portland across the Columbia and Willamette rivers were completed. [10]
Kalama originated with a stake driven by Gen. John W. Sprague of the Northern Pacific Railway who in March 1870 selected a spot near the mouth of the Kalama river to mark the beginning point of Northern Pacific's Pacific Division. [11] From that stake, the Northern Pacific began building north to Puget Sound, ultimately reaching Commencement Bay at what was to become Tacoma before going bankrupt. Construction began in April 1871 with a crew of 800 men, with the official 'first spike' being driven in May 1871 [11] Scheduled service from Tacoma to Kalama began on January 5, 1874. [11] The Portland-Hunters rail line in Oregon across the Columbia River from Kalama was completed in 1883 by Northern Pacific, [12] about the same time that the ceremonial spike was driven at a site west of Helena, Montana to mark the completion of the transcontinental Northern Pacific Railroad in the fall of 1883. The following year in October 1884, a 3 track, 360-foot (110 m) long railroad ferry, Tacoma, marked the beginning of about 25 years of ferry service across the Columbia River. [11] Hunters [13] was located near the south end of Sandy Island about a mile south of Goble. However the crossing times were excessive when the Tacoma had to work against the tide, and the ferry slip was soon moved to Goble at the north end of Sandy Island and directly across from Kalama. The ferry could handle 12 passenger cars or 27 freight cars. [11]
St. Joseph's Catholic Parish was built in 1874, around the same time the railroad between Kalama and Tacoma first became operational. This was the first and only Catholic parish in Kalama.
According to Cowlitz County GIS data, the total incorporated area for the city of Kalama is 3.83 square miles (9.9 km2).[ citation needed ]
Highway access to Kalama is provided by Exit 27, Exit 30, and Exit 32 from I-5. The industrial district is along the riverfront while the business district is on the east side of I-5. Residential areas are up the hill to the east and on the cliffs above town, portions of which have dramatic views overlooking the Columbia River. The busy Portland-Seattle rail connection parallels I-5 to the west on double tracks (or more) all the way through town.
This region experiences warm (but not hot) and dry summers, with no average monthly temperatures above 71.6 °F (22.0 °C). According to the Köppen Climate Classification system, Kalama has a warm-summer Mediterranean climate, abbreviated "Csb" on climate maps. [14]
Census | Pop. | Note | %± |
---|---|---|---|
1880 | 129 | — | |
1890 | 325 | 151.9% | |
1900 | 554 | 70.5% | |
1910 | 816 | 47.3% | |
1920 | 1,228 | 50.5% | |
1930 | 940 | −23.5% | |
1940 | 1,028 | 9.4% | |
1950 | 1,121 | 9.0% | |
1960 | 1,088 | −2.9% | |
1970 | 1,106 | 1.7% | |
1980 | 1,216 | 9.9% | |
1990 | 1,210 | −0.5% | |
2000 | 1,783 | 47.4% | |
2010 | 2,344 | 31.5% | |
2020 | 2,959 | 26.2% | |
U.S. Decennial Census [15] 2020 Census [3] |
As of the 2010 census, [16] there were 2,344 people, 967 households, and 665 families residing in the city. The population density was 846.2 inhabitants per square mile (326.7/km2). There were 1,070 housing units at an average density of 386.3 per square mile (149.2/km2). The racial makeup of the city was 91.3% White, 0.6% African American, 1.3% Native American, 1.2% Asian, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 1.8% from other races, and 3.7% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 4.9% of the population.
There were 967 households, of which 31.6% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 52.0% were married couples living together, 11.5% had a female householder with no husband present, 5.3% had a male householder with no wife present, and 31.2% were non-families. 25.4% of all households were made up of individuals, and 10.6% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.42 and the average family size was 2.88.
The median age in the city was 41.4 years. 23.5% of residents were under the age of 18; 6.3% were between the ages of 18 and 24; 24% were from 25 to 44; 29.5% were from 45 to 64; and 16.6% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the city was 48.8% male and 51.2% female.
The Montgomery House Bed and Breakfast is a house built in 1908 on old Cowlitz Indian lands. It was featured in a 2009 feature film documentary Montgomery House: The Perfect Haunting by Danielle Egnew. As of 2013, the house is no longer a bed and breakfast, and is being remodeled.[ citation needed ]
The Pacific Northwest, sometimes referred to as Cascadia, is a geographic region in Western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Though no official boundary exists, the most common conception includes the U.S. states of Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and the Canadian province of British Columbia. Some broader conceptions reach north into Alaska and Yukon, south into northern California, and east into western Montana. Other conceptions may be limited to the coastal areas west of the Cascade and Coast mountains.
Cowlitz County is a county located in the U.S. state of Washington. As of the 2020 census, its population was 110,730. The county seat is Kelso, and its largest city is Longview. The county was formed in April 1854. Its name derives from the anglicized version of the Cowlitz Indian term Cow-e-liske, meaning either 'river of shifting sands' or 'capturing the medicine spirit.' Cowlitz comprises the Longview, WA Metropolitan statistical area, which is also included in the Portland-Vancouver-Salem, OR-WA Combined statistical area.
Midland is a census-designated place (CDP) in Pierce County, Washington. The population was 9,962 at the time of the 2020 census.
The Great Northern Railway was an American Class I railroad. Running from Saint Paul, Minnesota, to Seattle, Washington, it was the creation of 19th-century railroad entrepreneur James J. Hill and was developed from the Saint Paul & Pacific Railroad. The Great Northern's route was the northernmost transcontinental railroad route in the U.S.
The Seattle and Walla Walla Railroad was a 3 ft narrow gauge railroad and was the first proper railroad to serve Seattle, Washington, preceded only by horse-drawn rail vehicles and by a coal train making the very short haul from Lake Union to Pike Street. Despite its ambitious name, actual construction never went beyond King County, the county of which Seattle itself is the seat. After being sold to Henry Villard's Oregon Improvement Company in 1880 it was renamed the Columbia and Puget Sound Railroad. In 1916, that became the Pacific Coast Railroad Company.
The Northern Pacific Railway was an important transcontinental railroad that operated across the northern tier of the western United States, from Minnesota to the Pacific Northwest. It was approved and chartered in 1864 by the 38th Congress of the United States in the national / federal capital of Washington, D.C., during the last years of the American Civil War (1861-1865), and given nearly 40 million acres of adjacent land grants, which it used to raise additional money in Europe, for construction funding.
Goble is an unincorporated community in Columbia County, Oregon, United States. It is located on U.S. Route 30 and the Columbia River.
The Spokane, Portland & Seattle Railway was a railroad in the northwest United States. Incorporated in 1905, it was a joint venture by the Great Northern Railway and the Northern Pacific Railway to build a railroad along the north bank of the Columbia River. The railroad later built or acquired other routes in Oregon. The SP&S was merged into the Burlington Northern in March, 1970. Remnants of the line are currently operated by BNSF Railway and the Portland and Western Railroad.
The North Coast Limited was a named passenger train operated by the Northern Pacific Railway between Chicago and Seattle via Bismarck, North Dakota. It started on April 29, 1900, and continued as a Burlington Northern Railroad train after the merger on March 2, 1970 with Great Northern Railway and the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad. The next year, it ceased operations after the trains which left their originating stations on April 30, 1971, the day before Amtrak began service, arrived at their destinations.
Spokane, Portland & Seattle 700 is the oldest and only surviving example of the class "E-1" 4-8-4 "Northern" type steam locomotive and the only surviving "original" Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway steam locomotive. It was built by the Baldwin Locomotive Works in May 1938. Nearly identical to the class "A-3" Northerns built for Northern Pacific Railway, it burns oil instead of coal.
Historic ferries in Oregon are water transport ferries that operated in Oregon Country, Oregon Territory, and the state of Oregon, United States. These ferries allowed people to cross bodies of water, mainly rivers such as the Willamette in the Willamette Valley, and the Columbia, in order to transport goods, move people, and further communications until permanent bridges were built to allow faster crossing of the water. The early ferries were used by wagons and pedestrians, while later ones transported trains and then automobiles. Oregon has a few automobile ferries still in operation.
Burlington Northern Railroad Bridge 9.6 or BNSF Railway Bridge 9.6, also known as the Columbia River Railroad Bridge, is through truss railway bridge across the Columbia River, between Portland, Oregon, and Vancouver, Washington, owned and operated by BNSF Railway. Built by the Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway (SP&S) and completed in 1908, it was the first bridge of any kind to be built across the lower Columbia River, preceding the first road bridge, the nearby Interstate Bridge, by a little more than eight years.
The Port of Longview is a deep-water port authority located in Longview, on the Columbia River in southwest Washington, United States. It was established in 1921 by Washington state law, and operates as a unit of local government. The port is overseen by a locally elected, three-member board of commissioners. Each commissioner is elected for a six-year term and is directly responsible to the voters for port operations.
The Pacific Northwest Corridor or the Pacific Northwest Rail Corridor is one of eleven federally designated higher-speed rail corridors in the United States and Canada. The 466-mile (750 km) corridor extends from Eugene, Oregon, to Vancouver, British Columbia, via Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington, in the Pacific Northwest region. It was designated a high-speed rail corridor on October 20, 1992, as the one of five high-speed corridors in the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 (ISTEA).
Longview is an unincorporated historic community in Benton County, Washington, United States, located approximately three miles west of Umatilla, Oregon on the north bank of the Columbia River, just above Devil's Bend Rapids.
Emma Hayward commonly called the Hayward, was a steamboat that served in the Pacific Northwest. This vessel was once one of the finest and fastest steamboats on the Columbia River and Puget Sound. As newer vessels came into service, Emma Hayward was relegated to secondary roles, and, by 1891, was converted into a Columbia river tow boat.
Wenat was a stern-wheel steamboat that, under the name Swan, was built and operated, briefly, on the Tualatin River, in the state of Oregon. In 1858, Swan was sold, moved to the lower Willamette River, renamed Cowlitz, and placed on a route between Portland, Oregon the Cowlitz River.
Northwest was a steamboat that operated on the Columbia, Cowlitz and lower Willamette rivers from 1889 to 1907. In 1907 Northwest was transferred to Alaska, where it sank on the Skeena River
Joseph Kellogg was a stern-wheel driven steamboat that operated on the Willamette, Columbia, and Cowlitz rivers for the Kellogg Transportation Company. It was named after the company's founder, Joseph Kellogg (1812-1903). The sternwheeler Joseph Kellogg was built in 1881 at Portland, Oregon.