CONTEXT
Constructed 1901 for Arthur Bougett, the highly intact Bourgett Block is one of the most architecturally distinctive and significant historic buildings within the Ballard Avenue Landmark District. The Ballard Avenue Landmark District encompasses a particularly well preserved section of one of several successful small towns that flourished around the perimeter of Seattle in the late nineteenth century and would be subsequently incorporated into the metropolis. Ballard Avenue is lined with an intact collection of modest scale commercial buildings that reflect the development of the community’s main commercial street between 1890 and 1930. The character of this distinctive historic streetscape was primarily preserved because it was by-passed by Post-War era development that instead occurred along modern arterials - Market Street and 15th Avenue, to the north and east. In 1976, the Ballard Avenue Landmark District was formally designated a local historic district by the City of Seattle and was also listed in the National Register of Historic Places (Ballard Avenue Historic District).
This historic property is directly associated with a crucial era in the commercial and industrial development of Ballard (1900-1907) when the commercial district along Ballard Avenue was fully established and a significant number of permanent buildings were constructed. By the early 1900s Ballard became known as the “Shingle Capital of the World” with approximately twenty lumber and shingle mills in full operation. In addition to the mill operations the industrialized shoreline included iron foundries, machine shops, paint manufactures, shipyards, pipe making plants and boiler works. Substantial commercial buildings were constructed along Ballard Avenue as the local population grew to over 10,000 residents (including 3,400+ school age children) by 1904. During this era Ballard Avenue functioned as a full service commercial street populated by numerous boarding houses, hotels and lodging houses, clothing merchants, banks, hardware dealers, druggists, dry good stores, laundry businesses, meat markets, restaurants, theaters and saloons. Gradually, the earliest wood-frame structures were replaced by more permanent – often architect designed – commercial buildings. Among the distinctive masonry and stone buildings that date from this era and most of which continue to characterize the streetscape are the G.B. Sanborn Block (1901, Portland Building (1901), Felt Block/Jones Building (1901, demolished), St. Charles Hotel (1902), Deep Sea Fisherman’s Building (1902), Scandinavian American Bank (1902), Matthes Block (1903), Kelsey Block (1903), Junction/Lombardini Block (1904), Kutzner Block (1904), Barthelemy Bros. Hardware Building (c.1904), Ernst Brothers Hardware Building (1904, demolished), A.L. Palmer Building (1905), Theisen Block (1905), Ballard Hardware Supply (1905), Peterson Hardware Co. (c.1905), Markussen Building (1905), and the Enquist Block (1906). In late 1906 Ballard residents approved annexation and the town became part of the City of Seattle on January 1, 1907. The boom era of major commercial construction began to lessen after the annexation.
HISTORY
Efforts to identify the architect and/or builder associated with the construction of this highly distinctive commercial building have been unsuccessful. It was built in 1901 for Arthur Bourgett the president of the Motor Shingle Company and originally housed the Motor Bar, which he owned until his death in 1905. The historic address was 271 Ballard Avenue. According to the 1905 Sanborn insurance map the building also housed a barber and offices on the second floor. Leland Salinger operated a men’s furnishings store here from 1907 until 1910. In 1912, the Bartell Drug Store #4 moved to this location with Ballard pioneer pharmacist Arthur Preston as the store manager (His previous business location had been 237 Ballard Avenue/5311 Ballard Avenue). The original Bartell’s Ballard store, established c.1910, was located across the street at 5344 Ballard Avenue. After relocating to the Bourgett Block the store remained here until in 1929 when the business was relocated to 2225 NW Market Street. It remained there until the late 1950s when they moved to their fourth Ballard site at 5605 22nd Ave NW. Tax records indicate that by 1937 the storefront level of the subject building was part of the Bowie Electric business (with main shop located across the street at 5348 Ballard Avenue NW) and a dentist office (Dr. Mathews) occupied the upper floor level. Tax records also note that the building was remodeled in 1943; it appears that the second floor was adapted to 3 two-room apartments at that time. At some point an original entry that was located at the apex of the triangular building footprint was enclosed/eliminated. Tax records also indicate that it functioned as a sporting goods store (Dalsbo’s Sport Shop) by the late 1930s.
SOURCES OF INFORMATION
Pheasant-Albright, Julie D. Early Ballard (Images of America), Arcadia Publishing, 2007.
----------. Passport to Ballard, Ballard News Tribune, 1988.
Property Record Cards (1937-1972). Washington State Regional Archives, Puget Sound Regional Branch, Bellevue, WA.
“Ballard Avenue Historic District” National Register of Historic Places – Nomination Form (Prepared by Elisabeth Walton Potter, OAHP, April 1976.)
Ballard Historical Society, Ballard Avenue Landmark District Plaque Project records.
Baist’s Real Estate Atlas of Surveys of Seattle, Wash. Philadelphia: W.G. Baist, 1905, 1912.
Sanborn Insurance Maps, 1884-1951. Digital versions available via Seattle Public Library - www.spl.org.
