10 Who Shaped Seattle: David Denny beat founders to Elliott Bay

The city founders who landed at Alki Point 150 years ago completed their demanding journey thanks to the hard work and physical suffering of one young man, David Denny.

And in the first decades of Seattle's existence, he continued to work hard -- sometimes prospering along with the new city, but ultimately suffering dismal failure.

David Denny was 19 when the Denny and Boren families began their covered wagon journey from Knox County, Ill., to the Willamette Valley of Oregon, in April 1851.

David Denny drove a four-horse team and wagon, hunted wild game for their menu and collected wood and buffalo chips for fires. Cheerful and hard-working, he was well liked, especially by Louisa Boren, daughter of David's stepmother.

On Aug. 17, the exhausted party arrived in Portland.

David Denny agreed to help John Low herd cattle to winter pasture on the Cowlitz River, and his older brother, Arthur Denny, asked them to continue north to inspect the Puget Sound country.

On Sept. 10, the two ferried Low's cattle across the Columbia at Fort Vancouver and then herded them to Cowlitz Valley pastures. From there, they hiked to the tiny village of Olympia where they met Captain R.C. Fay and Lee Terry, who invited them to ride in their sailboat to the Duwamish River.

They arrived on Elliott Bay on Sept. 25 and spent the night under a huge cedar tree -- becoming the first of Seattle's founders to seek shelter on Elliott Bay.

The next day, they hired two young Indians to paddle them up the Duwamish River. The men liked what they found, and David wrote a note suggesting that Arthur bring the entire Denny party to at once. He sent the message to Portland with John Low.

Terry and David Denny remained to build a cabin for the Low family. A few days later, Lee Terry headed for Fort Nisqually to borrow a tool needed to shave shakes from a cedar stump, leaving young Denny alone.

For three weeks, curious but friendly natives watched and occasionally helped as Denny labored on the cabin. His work came to a halt, however, after he accidentally cut his foot with his axe.

One evening, suffering chills, he drank a cup of hot tea, crawled onto a fir bough mattress in a corner of the roofless cabin and covered himself with blankets. At daybreak he was awakened by clanking anchor chains and arose to the sight of the schooner Exact unloading the Denny Party.

The date was Nov. 13, 1851: Seattle's founders had arrived.

Emily Inez Denny, David's daughter, later described the scene:

"It was a gloomy rainy time and the prospect for comfort was so poor that the women sat down on a log on the beach and wept bitter tears of discouragement."

But the settlers persevered.

The following spring several of them selected land claims on the east shore of Elliott Bay. David Denny built a cabin in the woods near where present Denny Way meets the bay. Then on Jan. 23, 1853, in his brother Arthur's cabin, he and Louisa Boren were married.

Emily Inez explained: "In order to fulfil law and custom, David had made a trip to Olympia and back in a canoe to obtain a marriage license, but was told that no one there had authority to issue one, so undaunted he returned to proceed without it."

No minister was available to perform the ceremony, but Dr. David Maynard, who was justice of the peace, successfully tied the knot in Seattle's first wedding.

"The young couple moved their worldly possessions to their cabin in an Indian canoe," Inez recorded. "Among their few gifts were a hen and rooster from Doc Maynard. Now they began years of toil, struggle, progress and heartbreak that characterized life in pioneer Seattle."

Adept at learning languages, David soon was able to communicate in simple terms and taught the Indians some English words.

Three years later, when Indians from east of the Cascades attacked the settlement, David Denny, a member of the volunteer forces protecting the settlers, led patrols of the area. The local natives appreciated the friendship of David and Louisa Denny and persuaded attacking warriors not to burn the Denny cabin.

When asked why, they replied, "Old Denny might need it."

The Indian unrest slowed Seattle's growth for a time, but soon newcomers began arriving again. Land values began to escalate and business increased.

Emily Inez in her book, "Blazing the Way," wrote:

"When the needs of the town became those of a big city, David Denny helped supply them. His mill on the shores of Lake Union was the largest in the city for years. The establishment of an electric light plant and a water supply for part of the city were among the enterprises he headed.

"The cable and horse car roads were consolidated into a company headed by D.T. Denny in the early 1880s. In the effort to supply the company with the necessary funding Mr. Denny attempted to convert much of his property into cash. At that time a personal friend estimated his resources exceeded three million dollars."

As his income improved, so did his housing. In the early 1870s, as their children matured, they lived in a large home at Dexter and Republican Streets. Then in 1890, they built a mansion at the foot of Queen Anne Hill. Three years later the 1893 depression struck with disastrous results described by Gordon Newell in "Westward to Alki," a biography of the Dennys:

"In the seven years from 1888 to 1895 David and Louisa suffered more tragedy than most families experience in a lifetime. Two of their children were taken by death. The beautiful home on Queen Anne Hill was gone, along with all the enterprises David Denny and his sons had founded. Almost overnight the man who was said to be one of Seattle's wealthiest citizens became one of its poorest.

"The so-called 'Deficiency Judgment' authorized by laws of that time permitted creditors to take over all the assets of the debtor, with no provision for return of any surplus that might be left after the property was disposed of and the debt liquidated."

Newell mentions that Seattle was a far different place in 1895 that it had been in the 1850s.

"This change was brought home bitterly to David Denny when the banking firm of Dexter Horton and Company, of which his brother Arthur was senior vice president, joined the other creditors to force his bankruptcy."

David and Louisa Denny retreated to a Licton Springs property that in happier days they had given to their daughter Emily.

In 1899, a destitute 67-year-old David Denny was hired to oversee improvements on the Snoqualmie Pass road, supervising construction of bridges and new roadway. When a worker cut David's head with a careless backswing of his ax, the old man bandaged the wound and returned to work. The next summer found him camping at Lake Keechelus near Snoqualmie Pass helping a mining company look for gold and enjoying a bit of fishing.

On the evening of Nov. 25, 1903, he passed away at age 71 in the tiny Licton Springs home north of Green Lake. He was buried at Washelli, a cemetery he had owned until creditors seized the property.

His wife survived to witness the Smith Tower rise taller than the forest giants it replaced. In August 1916 she died at age 89 and was buried beside David Denny at Washelli.

(James R. Warren was a Seattle historian and former director of the Museum of History and Industry.)