Fremont | |
|---|---|
 TheFremont Cut of theLake Washington Ship Canal, seen from the grounds of theSt. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral complex, acrossLake Union | |
 Fremont's location in Seattle | |
| Coordinates:47°39′02″N122°21′00″W / 47.6505°N 122.3499°W /47.6505; -122.3499 | |
| Country | United States |
| State | Washington |
| City | Seattle |
| City Council | District 6 |
| Neighborhood Council | Lake Union District |
| Police District | North Precinct, B2 |
| Legislative District | 43rd |
| Established[1] | May 8, 1888 (first plat)[2] Annexed to Seattle on May 3, 1891 |
| Founded by | Edward and Carrie Blewett[2] |
| Named after | Fremont, Nebraska |
| Area | |
• Total | 0.89 sq mi (2.3 km2) |
| Population | |
• Total | 11,345 |
| • Density | 13,000/sq mi (4,900/km2) |
| ZIP Code | 98103, 98107 |
Fremont is aneighborhood in the North Central District ofSeattle, Washington, United States. Originally a separate city, it was annexed to Seattle in 1891. It is named afterFremont, Nebraska, the hometown of two of its founders: Luther H. Griffith andEdward Blewett.[4]
Fremont is situated along theFremont Cut of theLake Washington Ship Canal to the north ofQueen Anne, the east ofBallard, the south ofPhinney Ridge, and the southwest ofWallingford. Its boundaries are not formally fixed, but they can be thought of as consisting of the Ship Canal to the south, Stone Way N. to the east, N. 50th Street to the north, and 8th Avenue N.W. to the west.
The neighborhood's main thoroughfares are Fremont and Aurora Avenues N. (north- and southbound) and N. 46th, 45th, 36th, and 34th Streets (east- and westbound). TheAurora Bridge (George Washington Memorial Bridge) carries Aurora Avenue (State Route 99) over the Ship Canal to the top of Queen Anne Hill, and theFremont Bridge carries Fremont Avenue over the canal to the hill's base. A major shopping district is centered on Fremont Avenue N. just north of the bridge.
Fremont is sometimes referred to as "The People's Republic of Fremont"[5] or "The Artists' Republic of Fremont,"[6][7] and was at one time a center ofcounterculture; however, the neighborhood has become somewhatgentrified since the 1990s.[8][9] It remains home toa controversial statue ofVladimir Lenin salvaged fromSlovakia by an art lover from Washington state who was teaching in the area at the time. After the 1989 fall of theCommunist government, he brought the statue to Fremont with money raised through a mortgage on his house.[7] TheFremont Troll is an 18-foot-tall (5 m)concretesculpture of atroll crushing aVolkswagen Beetle in its left hand, created in 1990 and situated under the north end of the Aurora Bridge.[10] The street running under the bridge and ending at the Troll was renamed Troll Avenue N. in 2005.[11]
The neighborhood also features various signs giving advice such as "set your watch back five minutes," "set your watch forward five minutes," and "throw your watch away."[12] Other landmarks include theFremont Rocket, aFairchild C-119 tail boom modified to resemble a missile,[13] and the outdoor sculptureWaiting for the Interurban.[14]
Since the early 1970s some Fremont residents have been referring to their neighborhood as "The Center of the Universe"[15] (which also appears on a large "Welcome" sign).[16] An unofficial motto "De Libertas Quirkas" ("Freedom to be Peculiar" inmock Latin) appears in brochures and websites about the area.[13]
TheFremont Arts Council sponsors several highly attended annual events in Fremont. TheSummer Solstice Parade & Pageant has made Fremont famous for itsnudeSolstice Cyclists. Another event is Troll-a-ween.
Also important to Fremont is the large block on Linden Avenue N. that contains theB.F. Day Elementary School and B.F. Day Playground, two separate entities. B.F. Day is the longest continually operating school in theSeattle school district, having been founded in 1892.[17]
Another longstanding institution is the Fremont branch of theSeattle Public Library. An informal library predated the 1891 annexation of Fremont to Seattle, and annexation made it the city's first branch library.[18] The present structure dates from 1921.
Besides the B.F. Day playfield, Fremont has three small public parks,Fremont Peak Park just south of N. 45th Street, Ross Park and Playground at 3rd Avenue NW and NW 43rd Street, and A.B. Ernst Park next to the library. Ernst Park was named for Ambrose Ernst, a Fremont resident. He was known as the "Father of City Playfields". He served on the Board of Park Commissioners from 1906 to 1913 and helped implement Seattle's Olmsted parks plan.[19]
TheBurke–Gilman Trail passes through Fremont just north of theLake Washington Ship Canal. The largeGas Works Park is just east of Fremont on the north shore ofLake Union.
Theo Chocolate'sfactory and store, golf and daywear labelCutter & Buck's corporate headquarters, andBrooks Sports' headquarters are located here. Fremont has several breweries includingHale's Ales brewery andFremont Brewing. The originalRedhook breweries were located in Fremont until their closures in 1988 and 2002, respectively.Google opened offices here in 2006, and the parent company ofGeocaching.com is headquartered in Fremont.
A growing number of technology companies have offices in Fremont, includingAdobe Systems, theAllen Institute for Brain Science,SDL PLC,Groundspeak,Impinj,Sporcle, andTableau Software. Most of these offices are along theLake Washington Ship Canal.
The neighborhood is home to a number of nonprofit organizations, including Literacy Source and Provail, a provider of social services to people with disabilities and an affiliate of theUnited Cerebral Palsy network.
A wedge-shaped building on Leary Way, a diagonal street cutting across Fremont from the adjacent Ballard neighborhood, once housed the legendary Seattle producerJack Endino's Reciprocal Recording studio, where he recorded (among many other records)Nirvana's first demos and the band's debut onSub Pop records,Bleach.
