Belltown, Seattle, Washington
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Belltown is the most densely populated neighborhood in Seattle, Washington, United States, located on the city's downtown waterfront, on land that was artificially flattened as part of a regrading project. Formerly a low-rent, semi-industrial arts district, in recent decades it has transformed into a neighborhood of trendy restaurants, boutiques, nightclubs, and residential towers as well as warehouses and art galleries. Although many new businesses have eclipsed older ones, some venerated establishments still draw crowds of loyal patrons.
The area is named after William Nathaniel Bell, on whose land claim the neighborhood was built. The neighborhood is bounded on the north by Denny Way, beyond which lies Seattle Center, Uptown, and Queen Anne Hill, on the southwest by Elliott Bay, on the southeast by Virginia Street, beyond which lies the Pike Place Market and the rest of Downtown, and on the northeast by 5th Avenue, beyond which lies the Denny Triangle. All of its northwest- and southeast-bound streets are major thoroughfares (Alaskan Way and Elliott, Western, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Avenues); major northeast- and southwest-bound thoroughfares are Broad, Wall, and Battery Streets. The Battery Street Tunnel runs under Battery Street from Western Avenue to Denny Way and connects the Alaskan Way Viaduct to Aurora Avenue N.
The Olympic Sculpture Park, an eight and a half-acre public sculpture garden adjacent to Myrtle Edwards Park, is located on the northern edge of the Belltown waterfront. The park features contemporary pieces, various ecosystems with plants indigenous to the Pacific Northwest, and a restored beach and seawall. The park's construction was funded entirely with private donations and is operated by the Seattle Art Museum. Unlike other such parks in the United States, the Olympic Sculpture Park is unwalled, and admission is free. Being free however, Olympic Sculpture park is constantly patrolled by security guards that shuffle the usual street bums and homeless population to other parks just down the street in the seedier areas of Belltown. Belltown is also home to The Art Institute of Seattle and Mars Hill Graduate School and RealNetworks Headquarters.
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[edit] "Film Row"
Around 1910, the silent-era "Film Row" began with a film exchange in the Pathe Building 2025 Third Avenue (near Virginia Street, roughly at the southern tip of Belltown); eventually, silent-era film exchanges in Seattle serviced approximately 470 commercial movie theaters throughout Washington, Idaho, Montana and Oregon.[1] Concern about the flammability of nitrocellulose film resulted in the concentration of film exchanges in this single neighborhood, as a zoning issue.[2] Polk's 1923 Seattle City Directory shows 26 listings for "Motion Picture Machines and Supplies". All except the U.S. Army Motion Picture Service are within one block of the corner of Virginia Street and Third Avenue.[3]
From the 1920s into at least the 1960s, Second Avenue in Belltown was home to Seattle's second "Film Row." In 1928, just after the era of talkies began, this was superseded by the terra-cotta-ornamented, art deco Film Exchange Building (FEB, also known as the Canterbury Building) designed by Seattle architect Earl W. Morrison; it covered an entire block on the west side of Second Avenue, from Battery Street to Wall Street. [1] By 1930, Polk lists only 18 Seattle film exchanges; while Kodascope Libraries is at 111 Cherry Street in the Pioneer Square neighborhood, all of the others are on Second Avenue within a block of Battery Street (save only Columbia Pictures at First and Battery).[4] This situation was essentially unchanged in 1948: 19 entries under "Motion Picture Distributors and Film Exchanges", 15 of them in this same two blocks, and two of the others elsewhere in Belltown.[5]
While nothing remains of the FEB (Universal Studios was the last film business to pull out, in 1980. The building closed 1991 and was demolished 1992), the block south of Battery still contains many remnants of the Film Row era. The Jewel Box theater of the Rendezvous bar is the one remaining screening room in the neighborhood, but several other buildings remain. The McGraw-Kittenger-Case building on the southwest corner of Second and Battery was once the MGM building, and just south of it is the former William Tell Hotel, once the film industry favorite, now low income housing. [1] Farther down the block, the former National Theater Building now houses several small businesses.
[edit] See also
[edit] Notes
- ^ a b c Megan Lee, H-wood in B-town: Belltown's Historic Film Row, Belltown Messenger, July 2005.
- ^ "Film Storage Bill Up For Discussion"; in 1915–1920 clipping file in the Seattle Room of the Seattle Central Library. Probably from Seattle Times, c. 1919. A 24 June 1920 story in that paper, "Bar Portable Films", describes a city council decision not to allow portable film projectors in Seattle classrooms, due to similar safety concerns.
- ^ 1923 Seattle City Directory, R.L. Polk, 1923.
- ^ 1930 Seattle City Directory, R.L. Polk, 1930.
- ^ 1948–1949 Seattle City Directory, R.L. Polk, 1949.
[edit] References
- William Arnold, Preservationists and developers clash over Seattle 'star', Seattle Post-Intelligencer, February 10, 1990.
[edit] External links
- http://www.belltownmessenger.com/
- http://www.belltown.org/
- Belltown Bent Neighborhood Blog
[edit] Map It
- Belltown, Seattle, Washington is at coordinates Coordinates:
