Neighborhood History: Queen Anne

The Queen Anne neighborhood is a geographic icon of the Seattle area. Situated on the highest named hill in Seattle, Queen Anne spans across 2.8 miles and currently houses over 28,000 residents.

The Vashon Glacier is responsible for carving out Queen Anne over 13,000 years ago with the first human inhabitants of the area being the Duwamish Tribe in the 13th Century. White settlers then arrived in the area 1851, and then in 1853, David Denny of the ‘Denny Party’ established residence and staked a claim to 320 acres of the land, previously inhabited by the Duwamish, and currently known as Queen Anne.

In 1875, a severe windstorm flattened thousands of trees in the area, making the land much more appealing for settlement, then by 1885, the area was officially named ‘Queen Anne,’ named after the Queen Anne style houses that dominated the settlement.

The many railways, cable cars, ship canal, and bridges made the area much more appealing for outsiders, connected Queen Anne with northern communities, and further encouraged residence and business opportunities for the neighborhood.

Nowadays, Queen Anne is home to many iconic restaurants, businesses, parks and viewpoints, in addition to being a centralized location for many other prominent Seattle neighborhoods.