A bit of history…

posted in: Old Town | 0

Throwing Mud Gallery is located in the Old Town Business District of Tacoma.

Old Town owes its name to the fact that it was the location of the earliest settlement by persons of European descent. Job Carr came from Iowa to Puget Sound in 1864. On Christmas Day 1864, he was fishing on Commencement Bay with some friends, when he saw the place he knew would be his home – low-bank waterfront property in what is now called Old Town, the birthplace of Tacoma (called “Tacobet” by the Puyallup Indians at that time). Job staked his claim and began to build Tacoma’s first house, which he completed in 1865. A replica of his cabin is built a few hundred yards south of its original site. (The Job Carr Cabin Museum)

Carr staked a claim on land he hoped would be the terminus of the Northern Pacific Railroad, and became mayor of what then was called Tacoma City. But Carr missed the mark slightly, and the rail line ended two miles east in what became “New Tacoma.” Old Town was originally a community separate from what is now downtown Tacoma, sustained in the early days by fishing and lumber mills. “Old Tacoma” and “New Tacoma” merged into the City of Tacoma.