Pacific NW 06/17/2007 | Shelter For Sisters

Now & Then Paul Dorpat

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Shelter For Sisters

COURTESY OF MICHAEL CIRELLI

THEN: The scene looks west on Seneca to its northwest corner with Second Avenue, where, depending upon the date, stands either the Suffern residence or Holy Names Academy, the city's first sectarian school.

JEAN SHERRARD

NOW: With the economic confidence gained by the Yukon and Alaska gold rushes of the late 1890s, most of Seattle pioneer residences then still surviving in the central business district were replaced with brick commercial blocks.

by Paul Dorpat

Sometime in the 1870s John Suffern built a sizable home at the northwest corner of Second Avenue and Seneca Street. Not knowing the date of this photograph, I cannot say if the Sufferns were still living there or if it is in the hands of the Roman Catholic Sisterhood of the Holy Names.

Suffern is first known hereabouts for his ironworks and then for building and captaining steamboats on Puget Sound. After Issaquah pioneer Lyman Andrews stumbled upon some exposed coal on his claim in 1863 he carried a few lumps of it in a sack to Seattle, where Suffern tested it and found the Issaquah coal excellent for firing. In 10 years Eastside coal became Seattle's principal export, but by then Suffern had moved on to the drugstore business.

In 1880, the Sisters of Holy Names bought his property for $6,800 and arranged the home for their first Seattle school. The Holy Names official history says the building had two stories and a basement. "In the latter are the kitchen, cellar and pantry. The parlor, music room, office and sisters' refectory are on the first floor, the chapel, community room and a small apartment for the Superioress are on the second floor."

Also in 1880 the sisters built a larger structure on their property to the north of this house. The addition included two large classrooms and a second-floor dormitory for the city's first sectarian school. It opened in January 1881 with 25 pupils and grew so rapidly that in 1884 the sisters built another plant with a landmark spire at Seventh Avenue and Jackson Street. The present academy on Capitol Hill was dedicated in 1908. The Suffern home was replaced in the late 1890s with the sturdy brick structure, now home to a liquor store and a tailor.

Paul Dorpat specializes in historical photography and has published several books on early Seattle.

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