Founders

Photo & Text Copyright 2008 Seattle Daily Photo. All rights reserved, including reproduction or republishing.

I hope you will indulge me for the long text today, but I thought it might interest you. I'm a big history buff and have spent a lot of time poking about in cemeteries. I'm usually researching my own family history, and sometimes I come across historic names familiar to me more from street signs or parks. This is the scene I came across yesterday in the snow. Members of the Denny and Boren families left Cherry Hill, Knox County, Illinois in April of 1851 to stake claims in Oregon Territory. They were convinced along the trail that going north to Puget Sound would offer better opportunities. They arrived in Portland in August where Arthur Denny and his wife Mary Boren stayed on to recover from illness and give birth to a daughter in September. Brother David Denny went north with John Low and Lee Terry, and they were guided by the founder of Tumwater, WA to locate at Alki Point in current day West Seattle. The Duwamish people living at Alki helped David start building a cabin, and he was joined by Arthur and Mary in November. Terry and Low had already staked claims for Alki, so the Denny's and others of their party sought other claims, eventually settling across Elliott Bay in what is now known as Pioneer Square in Seattle. Arthur and Mary Denny and some of their extended family rest in Lakeview Cemetery atop Capitol Hill, overlooking what became of their families' pioneer venture so long ago.