Seattle Historical Sites

Summary for 6846 Oswego PL / Parcel ID 9528103550 / Inv # SFD008

Historic Name: Fire Station No. 16 Common Name: Style: Other, Spanish - Mission Neighborhood: Green Lake Built By: Year Built: 1928   Significance In the opinion of the survey, this property appears to meet the criteria of the National Register of Historic Places. In the opinion of the survey, this property appears to meet the criteria of the Seattle Landmarks Preservation Ordinance. Completed in 1928, this small fire station, which serves the Green Lake 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. 13, completed the same year on Beacon Hill, and No. 38, completed two years later in the Bryant neighborhood. This fire station replaced a 1905 two-story wood frame building located several blocks to the southwest on North 64th Street between Corliss and First Avenues North. This earlier station was one of nine fire stations that were built between 1894 and 1908 using a similar design, including the original 1905 Fire Station No. 17 located in the University District. Until the completion of Fire Station No. 38 in 1930, Fire Stations No. 16 and 17 served the entire northeast area of the city. Although the area around Green Lake was annexed by the city in 1891, there was little residential or commercial development in the neighborhood until after the turn of the twentieth century. In 1902, the Seattle School District built the Green Lake School at North 65th Street and Sunnyside Avenue North. Three years later, the Fire Department built its first fire station in the Green Lake area a block to the south of the new school. By the later 1920s, a thriving commercial district had developed on the northeast corner of the lake. The Fire Department chose to relocate its new station nearer to this district and away from the largely residential area occupied by the earlier station. 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. This fire station is significant for its design and for its associations with the development of the Seattle Fire Department and the Green Lake neighborhood.   Appearance Completed in 1928, this one-story reinforced concrete building is located on a corner lot at the intersection of Oswego Place NE and NE 70th Street. The flat roof building is comprised of three sections, creating a rectangular footprint. A taller engine bay occupies the southwest corner of the building and adjoins a small one-story office occupying the northwest corner. The remaining one-story L-shaped portion, which wraps around the northeast corner, contains crew quarters. A smooth stucco exterior covers the building, which rests on a wide concrete plinth and features Mission/Spanish Colonial Revival and Neo-Classical Revival stylistic features. On the principal west 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 west elevation, a large multi-paned window is situated adjacent to a recessed entrance door embellished with a simple cornice and wide surround. Another large window opening and three narrow window openings set with multi-paned sash line the western 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 and crew quarters. On the south elevation of the engine bay, four narrow arched window openings contain multi-paned sash. The rear east elevation presents a mostly blank wall except for a large multi-paned window at the center and a single entrance door and small window adjacent to the south. Well maintained, this distinctive building retains good physical integrity.

Detail for 6846 Oswego PL / Parcel ID 9528103550 / Inv # SFD008

Status: Yes - Inventory Classication: Building District Status: Cladding(s): Concrete, Stucco Foundation(s): Concrete - Poured Roof Type(s): Flat Roof Material(s): Unknown Building Type: Government - Fire Station Plan: Rectangular Structural System: Concrete - Poured No. of Stories: one & ½ Unit Theme(s): Architecture/Landscape Architecture, Politics/Government/Law Integrity Changes to Plan: Intact Changes to Windows: Intact Changes to Original Cladding: Intact Major Bibliographic References City of Seattle DCLU Microfilm Records. King County Property Record Card (c. 1938-1972), Washington State Archives. Seattle Fire Department, Centennial Commemorative, 1889-1989. Portland, OR: Taylor Pub. Co., c1989.

Photo collection for 6846 Oswego PL / Parcel ID 9528103550 / Inv # SFD008

Photo taken Aug 14, 2000