Seattle’s Pike’s Place Market, Part l

Today this market is Seattle, Washington’s most popular tourist attraction. It sits in an historic district in downtown Seattle overlooking Puget Sound.

What most tourists are not aware of is this market is one of Seattle’s most haunted. Locals and vendors openly share tales about the ghosts that remain in the market.

Pike’s Place is in a rustic, long multi-level building with uneven floors and wooden columns. Steps or steep ramps take tourists from one level to the next.

Fresh produce and flowers.

Fish market.

The upper level or street level is used to sell an impressive assortment of farm fresh fruits and vegetables. In one corner of this level is the famous fish market where strong young men throw or torpedo fish to paying customers.

The lower levels have vendors and permanent stores that sell a variety of handmade goods and antiques. On any given day over 600 vendors are selling at the market.

A public market has been located on this 4-block boardwalk since 1907. The original vendors displayed their wares in the open air. Seattle residents flocked to the spot in search of fair priced food.

Market in 1911

By November of 1907 Frank Goodwin, who became rich from Klondike Gold, built the first structure on the spot.

In the 1930s, during the Great Depression Pike Place Market still offered the freshest and cheapest food in town. The market was still going strong during World War ll. But with more automobiles and the creation of supermarkets Pike’s Place drastically declined.

In the 1970s the area was a hippie hangout and was about to be torn down when a concerned architect led a movement to “Save the market” campaign.

It worked, for local voters approved the area as a 17-acre historic district and they undertook a rehabilitation of the market. This decision needless to say was a lucrative one.

View of Puget Sound from Market.

So Pike’s Market does not need a haunting to draw tourists in but it has several resident ghosts. One is a princess who has been seen many times over the years.

In Part ll, Seattle’s Pike’s Place Market the story of the Market’s most well known ghost is shared.