| Historic Name: |
Fire Station No. 13 |
Common Name: |
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| Style: |
Other, Spanish - Mission |
Neighborhood: |
North Beacon Hill |
| Built By: |
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Year Built: |
1928 |
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| Significance |
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In the opinion of the survey, this property appears to meet the criteria of the National Register of Historic Places. |
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In the opinion of the survey, this property appears to meet the criteria of the Seattle Landmarks Preservation Ordinance. |
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Completed in 1928, this small fire station, which serves the Beacon Hill neighborhood, was one of three constructed based on an original design by the prominent Seattle Architect Daniel R. Huntington. This one-story reinforced concrete building features a mixture of Mission/Spanish Colonial Revival and Neo-Classical Revival stylistic features, more typically found on larger industrial buildings of that era. There is also an early Moderne quality to the design of the building. Other fire stations built with a similar design include No. 16, completed the same year in the Green Lake neighborhood, and No. 38, completed two years later in the Bryant neighborhood. This fire station replaced a 1904 two-story wood frame building located at the far northern end of Beacon Hill on 14th Avenue South and South Atlantic Street. This earlier station was one of nine fire stations that were built between 1894 and 1908 using a similar design. At the time of its construction, this earlier station was in the heart of Beacon Hill’s residential neighborhood. Over the next twenty years, residential and commercial development shifted further to the south, necessitating a more centralized fire station for Beacon Hill.
When the Fire Department decided to build a new station, they chose a site located at the southwest corner of Beacon Avenue South and South Spokane Street, which was already owned by the city. In 1911, the Seattle Water Department had completed two large reservoirs with a combined capacity of 110,000,000 gallons on a 235-acre parcel of land acquired from the state over ten years earlier. These Beacon Hill reservoirs were constructed as part of the Cedar River Water System No. 2, which added a second supply pipeline from the city’s watershed and four more reservoirs within the city. Situated to the east of the reservoirs’ site, the route of both Cedar River pipelines became Beacon Avenue. The pipeline alignment straightened an existing meandering road along the ridge of Beacon Hill and split the large site into two roughly equal halves. In 1909, the City decided to transfer the 137 acres not used for the reservoir and pipeline facilities to the jurisdiction of the Parks Department, which later purchased the property and developed most of the land into the Jefferson Park Golf Course. While the Olmsted Brothers firm prepared the plans for the new park, the Beacon Hill reservoirs were not integrated into the park design as were the reservoirs at Lincoln and Volunteer Parks. In 1928, the fire station was built at the northwest corner of the western half of the park, which is dominated by the two reservoirs.
Born in Newark, New Jersey in 1871, Daniel R. Huntington practiced in Denver and New York before his arrival in Seattle in 1904 or 1905. Over the course of his career, Huntington worked in private practice and in partnership with several other prominent Seattle architects, including James H. Schack, Carl F. Gould, and Arthur L. Loveless, in addition to his position as Seattle City Architect from 1912 to 1921. During his career as city architect and later, Huntington designed more than ten fire stations and possibly as many as twenty. After the onset of the Depression in the 1930s, Huntington apparently left active practice, although he was known to have been in the employ of Washington State University from 1944 to 1946. Well regarded by his business associates and professional colleagues for his straightforward and elegantly detailed commissions, Huntington designed a wide variety of civic, commercial, residential and institutional buildings during his prolific career. In 1987, a substantial renovation and rehabilitation of the building added a new wing on the south elevation. This fire station is significant for its design and for its associations with the development of the Seattle Fire Department and the Beacon Hill neighborhood.
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| Appearance |
| Completed in 1928, this one-story reinforced concrete building is located at the southwest corner of Beacon Avenue South and South Spokane Street. The site is part of a larger parcel of City-owned property located on either side of Beacon Avenue South. The Beacon Hill North and South Reservoirs and the Jefferson Park Golf Course occupy the majority of the property. However, other City facilities include the Jefferson Community Center, Jefferson Park Lawn Bowling, and the Parks Department Horticulture Facility. Originally, the flat roof building was comprised of three sections, creating a rectangular footprint, measuring 50 feet by 65 feet. A 1986-87 renovation project added the L-shaped wing, which extends from the rear western end of the south elevation. This project also resulted in the replacement of most of the original windows. A taller engine bay occupies the southeast corner of the building and adjoins a small one-story office occupying the northeast corner. The remaining one-story L-shaped portion, which wraps around the northwest corner, contains crew quarters with a basement level accessible by a stairwell on the west elevation. The newer south wing houses additional living quarters. A smooth stucco exterior covers both the original building and the sympathetically designed later addition. Both portions rest on a wide concrete plinth and share similar Mission/Spanish Colonial Revival and Neo-Classical Revival stylistic features.
On the principal east elevation, the engine bay has a gentle arch in the parapet wall above a large arched opening with an elaborate surround. This opening contains a pair of overhead metal doors below a multi-paned arched transom. A concrete pier separates the two modern doors, which replaced the original pairs of double doors. Narrow concrete capitals wrap the corners of the engine bay and give the impression of pilasters. This detail is repeated with plain concrete bands on the building’s other corners, including the corners of the small hose tower situated at the rear of the engine bay, as well as along the north elevation. On the northern end of the elevation, a large picture window is situated adjacent to a recessed entrance door embellished with a simple cornice and wide surround. Five window openings set with multi-paned sash line the eastern end of the north elevation. The engine bay also has a series of small multi-paned windows along its north elevation, which extends above the lower roof of the adjoining office. The rear west elevation presents a mostly blank wall except for a large multi-paned window at the center and a single entrance door adjacent to the south. Enclosed by a metal railing, the stairwell to the basement level is situated below the large window. On the south elevation of the engine bay, four narrow arched window openings contain multi-paned sash. The later south wing has a large Palladian-style window centered on the east elevation, a bay window set within the recessed southwest corner, and a single entrance door on the rear west elevation. Despite the alterations noted above, this distinctive building retains good physical integrity. |
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