Past present: Washington’s oldest town revels in its history and bets big on its future

Washington’s oldest town revels in its history and bets big on its future.

By Tiffany Hill

Six years after the first Oregon Trail settlers reached Puget Sound, Steilacoom— Washington Territory’s first town—was incorporated. Named after the Steilacoom Indigenous peoples who had inhabited the area for millennia, the waterfront settlement quickly boomed as a busy port of call for ships ferrying freshly felled timber to San Francisco. Originally, there were two Steilacooms, both established in 1851. New England sea captain Lafayette Balch founded Port Steilacoom after his proposal to build in nearby Olympia was rejected, and later that year, John Chapman, one of Oregon’s first lawyers, settled an adjacent site he named, in a classic act of one-upmanship, Steilacoom City.

In 1854, the newly formed Washington Territorial Legislature decided only one Steilacoom was needed and merged the two settlements into the Town of Steilacoom.

Today, Steilacoom is a bucolic bedroom community of 6,800, most of whom commute to nearby Tacoma and Joint Base Lewis-McChord. And while Steilacoom never sprawled like Seattle or Tacoma, Mayor Dick Muri says residents appreciate Steilacoom for its slow pace, small size, and rich history.

“We are a historic town and are fortunate to have had leaders in the 1970s who created a historic district,” says Muri, a former state legislator, Steilacoom School Board member, and longtime Pierce County councilmember who was appointed mayor in 2021. “Keeping a historic look and a quaint appearance is very important to our town’s citizens. We have resisted any major commercial development.”

Steilacoom’s historic district encompasses 31 significant homes and sites (including Steilacoom Town Hall) maintained by the Steilacoom Historical Museum Association. The town also celebrates its Indigenous roots at the Steilacoom Tribal Museum, housed in a historic building that’s under restoration with a $1 million state grant managed by the Town of Steilacoom.

“We are a historic town and are fortunate to have had leaders in the 1970s who created a historic district. Keeping a historic look and a quaint appearance is very important to our town’s citizens. We have resisted any major commercial development.”

While Steilacoom may be known as the Town of Firsts—including Washington Territory’s first library and Pierce County’s first school—it’s not stuck in the past. As evidence, Muri points to the environmental progress that’s been made in recent history. In 2023, the town installed eight electric vehicle charging stations and purchased its first electric truck, a Ford Lightning, for city employees. The vehicle will be fêted this fall in the town’s tenth annual electric vehicle festival, a partnership with Plug In America (a national nonprofit promoting the use of electric vehicles).

Steilacoom’s nine-member Parks and Environment Advisory Committee was recently created to help guide the town’s $3.5 million redevelopment of a 71-acre industrial site for housing and open space, including the restoration of a freshwater creek that was shunted into underground culverts more than a century ago.

With funding, allies (like U.S. Rep. Marilyn Strickland, who in late 2022 helped the town secure a $1.5 million federal Community Project Funding grant), and luck, Muri hopes to see the project completed by 2029, the year Steilacoom turns 175—yet another milestone.

For more information: townofsteilacoom.org