Seattle, Washington: Chapter 3: Foundation of Human Activity

Through archaeological excavations, Seattle area has been inhabited by humans for at least 4,000 years. It is said that when the first European explorers came, the people of the Duwamish Tribe occupied at least seventeen villages around Elliott Bay. In 1851, David Denny, his older brother Arthur A. Denny and stepmother Sarah Boren Denny traveled the Oregon Trail to Portland in a party of 50 settlers led by his father, John Denny. While the party waited in Portland, David Denny and John N. Low took the Cowlitz Trail to Olympia. There they joined with Lee Terry and sailed up Puget Sound to look for homesteads. David was the first to make landfall at the mouth of the Duwamish River on September 25, 1851. There they were welcomed by another group of explorers led by Luther Collins, Henry Van Asselt and Jacob and Samuel Mapel, who had filed claims in the Duwamish Valley nearly two weeks earlier. Denny was also greeted by no less than Chief Noah Sealth, leader of the resident Duwamish and Suguamish tribes. The city was named after the chief: Seattle. After spending a harsh winter on the west of the Elliot Bay, they migrated west and made a small establishment where it later became to what we know today as Seattle.