Alaska Trade Building


The Alaska Trade Building, also known as the Union Record Building and the Steele Building, is a historic building in Seattle, Washington located on First Avenue near the Pike Place Market. Built in 1909, it was one of the first reinforced steel, concrete and brick buildings in the area and was advertised as being completely fireproof. The building is historically associated with the country's only Union-owned daily newspaper, The Seattle Union Record and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Butterworth Building, another National Register property, neighbors it to the north.

History

The Alaska Trade Building was built by contractor James Steele in 1909 replacing a two-story wooden building known as the 'Rose Block' that pre-dated the Great Seattle fire. It was designed by Seattle architect J.C. Taft in a very utilitarian style with almost no ornamentation. Original plans for the building published in the Seattle Times called for an eight-story building trimmed in Granite and Terra cotta that would cost $135,000 to build but only the first four floors were ever built. In late 1910, the unfinished building was purchased from Steele by Portland, Oregon developers J.O. Storey and Thomas Lavake. The building was purchased by the Central Labor Council and the local Trade Union in 1915.
The Seattle Union Record was established as a weekly paper in 1910 by the Central Labor Council. The council's secretary, E.B. "Harry" Ault, became editor in 1912 and would expand the paper to a daily in 1918. Under Ault's leadership, the paper grew from a circulation of 3,000 to 50,000 to over 112,000 in 1919. Seeking larger quarters, the paper was moved into the Alaska Trade Building in 1921.
When Dave Beck took control of the Central Labor Council, he sold the paper to Ault in 1924. The paper ceased publication in 1928 but would see a brief resurrection during the Seattle Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer strikes in 2000.
The building's third floor is currently home to the office of Ecotope, Inc.