David Denny - 1853 Land Claim

1853 Land Claim

The Dennys' 1853 land claim—640 acres (2.6 km2), standard for a married couple—ran from what is now the Seattle Center grounds (the area where they first settled) east to South Lake Union; its south boundary was present-day Denny Way. In 1882, the Lake Union and Lumber Company established a sawmill (the city's largest) on this land near the southwest corner of Lake Union; Denny bought the mill in 1884, renaming it the Western Mill. The following year, he cut a weir from Portage Bay at the northeast corner of the lake to Lake Washington. This allowed logs to be floated from that larger lake to Lake Union, so that the entire area of Lake Washington became a catchment for his mill. Denny operated the Western Mill until 1895; his employees and their families were among the first settlers of the South Lake Union area.

Seattle's first cemetery (1861) was on Denny's land. In 1876, the bodies were relocated to Washelli Cemetery, which is off of Aurora Avenue North in north Seattle and part of the Evergree-Washelli Cemetery. The Dennys donated what became Lake View Cemetery), on Seattle's Capitol Hill, and the Dennys donated the more central 5-acre (20,000 m2) tract as the site of the city's first park, now called Denny Park in their honor. Another donation to the city became the site of the Civic Auditorium (later remodeled as the Opera House and now McCaw Hall) and several other buildings that now form part of Seattle Center.