Pinehurst in Seattle started out as the name for a plat of land on the east side of 15th Ave NE, between NE 115th to 125th Streets.   Many Seattle neighborhoods acquired their names in this way, as a plat which was first named by real estate investors.

Today the 15th Ave NE commercial corridor is the center of Pinehurst, including a Safeway grocery store at the corner of NE 125th Street, and a school at NE 117th Street as anchor points of the neighborhood.

This blog article will tell about the two men who were the inventors and promotors of Pinehurst, beginning in 1926 when the plat map was filed.

Early days and pioneers in Washington Territory

Those who arrived before Washington became a state on November 11, 1889, were considered “pioneers.”    Two young men, both born in 1866, met when they were teaching school in 1889 in rural Washington Territory.  George Spencer, born in Pennsylvania, became the school superintendent in Chehalis, south of Centralia, Lewis County.  William Hartranft, born in Michigan, taught school in Bucoda, just north of Centralia.

George Spencer married in 1893 in Chehalis, but his wife Harriet died only eighteen months later.

In 1900 George Spencer met a teacher, Gertrude Winsor, who was even more of a Washington Territory pioneer than he was.  Gertrude was the daughter of Phillip Winsor, a sawmill operator in Ballard, and she was the niece of Superior Court Judge Richard Winsor.  The Winsor family had arrived in Seattle in 1885 and Gertrude attended the one existing high school at that time.

After George Spencer and Gertrude were married in 1901, the couple moved to Seattle. George advanced from teaching to principalship and then to the post of Deputy King County Superintendent of Schools.  After only a few more years George transitioned into another career: real estate.   He established his own real estate sales company in Seattle in 1907.  Long after he died in 1942, George A. Spencer Real Estate was still in existence because his widow Gertrude obtained a real estate license and ran the company herself. The company slogan was “Realtors Since 1907.”

After going into real estate work in 1907, George Spencer kept up his concern for schools by serving on the Seattle School Board which was an unpaid position at that time.  He served on the School Board alongside his wife’s uncle, Judge Richard Winsor.  This report of the school status in 1915, was written by Clarence Bagley in his History of Seattle:

A report on the status of Seattle schools in 1915

William Grant Hartranft comes to Washington Territory 

Statue in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, commemorating former governor John Hartranft who had served in the Civil War.

Like George Spencer, William Grant Hartranft was born in 1866, but in Michigan, not Pennsylvania, although Pennsylvania was his family’s legacy location.    His great-grandfather had been part of a German-speaking group who immigrated from Europe to Pennsylvania in 1734, in search of religious freedom.  Later generations of Hartranfts began to spread out to live in other states of the USA.

William’s father Daniel, born in 1843 in Pennsylvania, served in the Civil War with a Michigan unit of Union soldiers.

Another Hartranft descendant, John, served as a commanding officer for the Union in the Civil War 1861-1865, and later became governor of Pennsylvania.

William Hartranft came to Washington Territory in 1889 and taught school in Bucoda, south of the state capital of Olympia.  In 1890 Hartranft married Mary Adams, who had her own early American ancestry which traced back to John Quincy Adams of the Revolutionary era.

School superintendent of King County

William & Mary Hartranft moved to Seattle in 1893 and William worked his way up through school principalships. In 1900 he was elected Superintendent of King County Schools.  At that time, places such as Georgetown, Columbia City, Ballard, Ravenna and Yesler/Laurelhurst had not yet come within the Seattle City Limits. These independent school districts were part of the King County system of schools, not the City of Seattle.

In the 1890s north Seattle was still outside of the City Limits. Small schools like Yesler School were in the King County system.

William Hartranft was active in visiting the schools of outlying areas and he conducted seminars for teachers.   He organized the schools of King County into five districts and held teachers association meetings once per month.  Papers were read and addresses delivered on methods of teaching.  These had the effect of improving the quality of teaching and raising the morale of teachers as they felt the superintendent was interested in their work and was trying to help them.

At his talks at the teachers seminars, Hartranft would display errors in the textbooks they were having to use, and he talked about the suitability of textbooks for each age level.   Hartranft fought with the textbook publisher to try to get out of the contract with the school district.  Rand McNally took the case to court, and it came down to the contractual obligation to use the books.  (RAND, McNALLY & Co., Appellant vs. W. G. HARTRANFT et al., Respondents No. 469 SUPREME COURT OF WASHINGTON, 32 Wash. 378, 73 P. 401, July 29, 1903, Decided)

Lake City started its own school in 1912 on the present site of the library, NE 125th Street and 28th Ave NE.

Hartranft sent in reports which were published in Seattle newspapers almost weekly, about school attendance statistics and the population growth of King County.  One of the issues he highlighted was Washington State’s compulsory attendance law which legislated that children must attend school at least through the age of fourteen.

Working together with Assistant Superintendent George Spencer, in 1904 Hartranft hauled forty sets of parents into court because they had not responded to previous contacts as to why their children were not in school.  Appearing before a judge, some twenty-seven families had sons as young as age ten who were working in the shingle mills in Ballard instead of attending school.  One father from Black Diamond said he kept his two eldest daughters out of school because they were needed at home to help with housework.

Other parents tried to say that their son or daughter was already fifteen years old and therefore exempt, but Spencer & Hartranft had come to court prepared with birth records which showed the child’s true age.

Hartranft & Spencer performed their duties at a high level but with all the stresses, perhaps it is not surprising that they didn’t stay in school superintendency very long.  In 1907 George Spencer left to become a real estate agent.  Because of William Hartranft’s concerns about the poor quality of textbooks, in 1905 Hartranft left the school system to take a job with textbook publisher Silver Burdett.  A few years later, the Hartranfts moved to San Franciso to be at the office of the company.

Transitions in the 1920s

William & Mary Hartranft moved back to the Seattle area where Mary died in 1924.  William’s occupation was now listed as a salesman for New York Life Insurance Company.  William was still in touch with the school systems of Seattle and King County and was a very popular speaker at seminars for teachers.  Perhaps via this network, William found a new wife, Nora, a teacher in Everett.

In 1925-1926 William Hartranft made the decision to develop some land that he owned, today’s Pinehurst.  He and his long-time friend, George Spencer, arranged for water lines & electricity to be extended to the area and then in October 1926 George Spencer began advertising lot sales.  As an experienced real estate agent, it is likely that Mr. Spencer was the one who thought up the name “Pinehurst” for the development.

Pinehurst’s first advertisement in the Seattle Times newspaper, October 3, 1926.

 The Pinehurst plat map

Along with the Hartranfts, other names on the plat map were George & Virginia Soliday of the Orton Investment Company.  The Hartranfts may have gone in together with the Solidays for money to develop Pinehurst.  The Solidays would get return on their investment through lot sales.

Another issue was that in 1926 William Hartranft was about to take his new wife Nora on extended travel overseas.  He may have entrusted his Pinehurst investment to the Solidays’ oversight while the Hartranfts were going to be away.

Nearby developments 

By 1927 real estate ads for Pinehurst began to mention that there would soon be a new municipal golf course just a few blocks to the north.  That area was still outside of the Seattle City Limits and had horseback riding academies accessed from 15th Ave NE at NE 140th Street.  The undeveloped property became Jackson Park Golf Course which opened in 1930.

Erwin S. Goodwin, developer of Victory Heights

Adjacent to Pinehurst on the east was the Victory Heights real estate development which had been started by E.S. Goodwin in 1920.  The “Victory” name referred to the ending of “the Great War” (World War One) and to the new Victory Way Highway, today’s Lake City Way NE.

Pinehurst had a direct connection to the Lake City neighborhood via NE 125th Street, and perhaps the vigorous Lake City allowed Pinehurst to depend on its resources such as a school.

Ironically although Pinehurst was founded by William Hartranft, a former superintendent of rural schools, Pinehurst did not form its own school district in the early years of the development.  Pinehurst children attended school in Lake City until Pinehurst got its own school building in 1950.

Pinehurst’s commercial district 

By the 1930s newspaper ads for Pinehurst listed Mr. Hartranft representing Pinehurst on-site, in the real estate sales office on NE 117th Street, though he did not live in Pinehurst himself.  He was a real “people person” and continued to enjoy networking with groups.  In the 1930s he spoke at Pinehurst Community Club meetings, and he was a featured speaker in 1939 at the annual picnic of the Pioneer Teachers of Washington.

The earliest real estate office in Pinehurst, at the northeast corner of NE 117th Street on 15th Ave NE.

Mr. Hartranft was not a “developer” in the sense of creating a commercial zone within Pinehurst. Pinehurst’s development coincided with the greater development of arterial roads such as 15th Ave NE through north Seattle to reach the new golf course, Jackson at NE 140th Street. When Jackson Golf Course opened in 1930, it stimulated the development of commercial sites such as gas stations along 15th Ave NE.

The next article on this blog will highlight some of the early stores and businesses in Pinehurst along 15th Ave NE.

Sources:

Census, City Directory, genealogy and newspaper listings.

“Seattle Schools in 1915,” page 176, History of Seattle from the Earliest Settlement to the Present Time, Volume 1, by Clarence Bagley, 1916.

Jackson Park Golf Course, Don Sherwood Park History sheets, City of Seattle (see below).

Victory Heights real estate ad in the Seattle Times newspaper, May 1920.

Neighborhood names:  Today we might think of Pinehurst and Victory Heights as part of the greater Lake City or Northgate areas.  This is an example of how names change over time, and how neighborhood identity can be modified around the growth of streets and districts.

Northgate Mall was built in 1950 and in 1968 the road name Northgate Way was established. See:  From Chelsea to Meadowbrook, my article about the evolution of neighborhood names.

See also:  “Petition of Northgate Centers, Inc., and others, to change the name of North Mineral Springs Way, North 110th Street, Northeast 110th Street and Chelsea Place Northeast to Northgate Way.”  Comptroller File 259872, January 2, 1968.  Accessed at Seattle Municipal Archives.

“Parents in Court,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, November 8, 1904, page 5.

“Pinehurst Community Club second anniversary meeting,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, February 10, 1937, page 3.  The Hasenwinkle family hosted the meeting at their house, 11533 20th Ave NE.

Hazel Wolf School at Pinehurst, built 2017.

“Pinehurst K-8 School, Historic Resources/Landmark Nomination Report,” February 2013.  Presented by The Johnson Partnership, architects, at a Landmarks Board meeting, March 20, 2013.  The report contains neighborhood background info and an architectural description of the Pinehurst school building which had been built in 1950 by the Shoreline School District, just a few years before the Seattle City Limits were finally set at NE 145th Street.  The nomination failed, meaning that the Pinehurst school building was deemed not eligible for historic preservation.  The building was torn down.  There is a new school building completed in 2017, Hazel Wolf at Pinehurst, named for a noted environmentalist.  The school has an emphasis on science and environmental studies.

Pinehurst Pocket Park at NE 117th Street & 19th Ave NE

Pinehurst neighborhood info:  PinehurstSeattle.org and Facebook page.

Property records:  Puget Sound Regional Archives, Bellevue, WA.

“Seattle Neighborhoods: Lake City – Thumbnail History,” HistoryLink Essay #3449 by David Wilma, 2001.

“Seattle Public Schools: Pinehurst.” HistoryLink Essay #10575.

“William Grant Hartranft,” A Volume of Memoirs and Genealogy of Representative Citizens of Seattle and King County, Washington, by Clarence Bagley, 1904.  Pages 71-73.

Writes of Way, a blog about Seattle street names.

Jackson Park Golf Course