WRITTEN BY PAUL DORPAT

COURTESY OF LARRY HAMILTON

Pioneer Seattle's elegant towered structures line up in this 1890-91 view looking south on Third Avenue across Madison Street. The much newer contemporary structures in the "now" view include a corner, on the far left, of what was called the Seafirst Tower when it was built in 1968. Across Madison, the recently completed IDX Tower fills the block on Third.

	PAUL DORPAT

Directly across Madison is the First Presbyterian Church, built in 1876 and stretched in the late 1880s for what was then — if judged by attendance — the most popular preaching in town. The lighter shade of roofing material marks the inserted section. A block away at Marion Street the spire of First Methodist Church is taller and newer. Built in 1887, it was the second home for the first church established in Seattle. When it moved again to its present home, it was only two blocks east to Fifth Avenue. In between these spires, a section of the conspicuously ornate Stacy Mansion shows just behind the tall utility pole that rises at the center of the scene.

This view features more utility poles than the earlier scene. It also records big changes on Third Avenue: The avenue was widened, taking with it the front lawn of the church and the trees that had lined the street. The photographer also took a few steps back to show a fourth tower, that of the Third Avenue Theatre, on the far left. Opened in 1890, it ran as a family theater with "polite vaudeville," farce and melodrama. No liquor, peanuts, catcalls or stamping was allowed.

Of this distinguished quartet only the Stacy Mansion survived the deep undermining cuts of the 1906-07 Third Avenue regrade. But it was moved 90 degrees to face Marion Street and become eventually the home for the Maison Blanc Restaurant.