There is a glorious magnolia tree in front of the First Lutheran Church at 524 South “I” Street, Tacoma, WA. The church was founded in 1882 and their current building was finished in 1929. The church’s original mission was to support Swedish immigrants. There website is here.
The First Evangelical Lutheran Church was designed by Heath, Gove & Bell, arch. The Gothic design is tapestry brick with Tenino stone trim and an oak interior. An addition was added in 1957.
Ubiquitous Journey at 2607 Sixth Avenue opened on March 15th. They have a plentiful selection of spices, herbs and teas, as well as a grill and espresso bar. I’d love to come back and try the grilled cheese! Each of the spices and herbs had tester containers to sniff. I walked away with some amazing garlic salt and some dried onion, which is nice to have around for when I run out of fresh onion. I wish them the best of luck in this, their second location. For more information, go here.
Their motto is “Because you deserve the best flavors the world has to offer. Find them at Ubi’s!”
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Sears is located at the Tacoma Mall at 4502 S Steele St #100, Tacoma. Information about Sears is here. Tacoma Public Library’s Northwest Room says that the mall’s original four anchors were J.C. Penney, the Bon Marche, Nordstrom and Rhodes Department Store. I was a little surprised that Sears wasn’t on the list. The Bon was Tacoma Mall’s first tenant.
Tacoma Public Library has a wonderful photo of Tacoma’s original Sears at the corner of South 13th Street and Broadway circa 1950. It can be seen here.
Tacoma’s Urban Exchange at 1983 Pacific Avenue in the University of Washington Tacoma Branch area is pretty cool. I didn’t have much time to look, but they had some really cute clothes and shoes at dynamite prices. The space is in the McDonald Smith Building which was constructed in 1890.
Ben Gilbert Park, located where St. Helen’s and Market Street in Tacoma is a relatively large pocket park. The park is pretty cool with native vegetation carefully planted and labeled, a fun owl mural and a stupendous mural showing a gathering of baseball fans in 1926 Tacoma. The fans were there to watch the results of the seventh game of the World Series between the New York Yankees (Lou Gehrig) and the St. Louis Cardinals (Babe Ruth). The park was dedicated on August 14, 2010. The interesting history of the park can be found here http://www.tacomahistory.org/SpecialProjects/Ben_Gilbert_Park.html#
The Florence Apartments at 414 and 422 Tacoma Avenue South is an imposing building constructed in 1923. The building was William T. Post and he named the property after his oldest daughter.
Valhalla Coffee at 3918 6th Avenue is a wholesale and retail coffee roaster. I stopped in after work to brace myself for a long meeting that turned into a short meeting (and now I won’t sleep!). But it was darned good coffee and while there isn’t any food available, there is a nice reading selection. They roast their coffee on the premises in the fine roaster pictured below. Their client list includes other places I’ve made my new place of the day including Corina Bakery, The Grand Cinema, Metro Market, Puget Sound Pizza, Rosewood Cafe, Tacoma Food Co-Op, Tacoma Boys, The Spar, Indochine and Northern Pacific Coffee Company.
Back in August 2010 I used the UPS on South 38th Street. Shortly after that they moved to their “new” location at 2602A S 38th St, Tacoma, WA 98408. This time we were using UPS’s services to mail off college applications. Hummmmm.
Bing Crosby was born at this private home at 1112 North J Street in Tacoma on May 3, 1903. He only lived there until 1906 and then his family moved to Spokane. Bing’s most famous song is White Christmas, which has sold over 100 million copies. Although I tend to think of him as a singer, Wikipedia tells me “With 1,077,900,000 movie tickets sold, Crosby is by that measure the third most popular actor of all time, behind Clark Gable and John Wayne.”
Old Town Dock at 2123 Schuster Pkwy, Tacoma, WA 98402 is currently being renovated. I had stopped at Great Northern Fish to pick up some Valentine’s dinner and in the six minutes it took them to fry my fish, I walked over to the dock and captured this photo. Per the Metro Park’s website, the renovation includes replacing the piles, deck and pavilion, adding handrails, security and moorage floats. The dock will reopen in the summer of 2013.
The original dock was constructed in 1873 and served fishing boats and then as public space. The dock was closed in 2008 when an engineering study indicated that it was unsafe. The renovation comes at a cost of $2 million dollars. The photo below isn’t of the Old Town Dock, but instead is over the property next to that.
