Alki Beach Park

Along Alki Beach Native tribes regularly camped and Seattle’s first Anglo settlers stepped ashore in 1851. In 1910, the City acquired 3,400 feet of the salt water shoreline to “give Seattle a public bathing beach second to none on the coast and … to equip it with modern bath-houses, recreation piers, natatorium, etc.” In 1910-11 the firm provided design advice on site improvements and bath-house configuration. Besides providing aquatic facilities, Alki Point Bathing Beach exemplified Olmsted’s emphasis on parks with a “command of fine distant views, and association with extensive water.”

The correspondence for this job includes a 1925 letter from B.W. Baker (job 03871) who owned Rose Lodge resort on the south side of Alki Point. He was asking about how to address beach erosion issues on the south side of Alki Point.