Pike Place Market Shorts
Description: Who said print is dead? Ok, well maybe it's a little closer to death now that the sun has set on yet another Seattle icon. You could read all about it at this old school Pike Place Market newsstand as they regularly stocked everything from Jazz Times, Surfer Journal, Cigar Aficionado, and Spanish tattoo mags, to Italian gossip tabloids, Russian comics and the ever popular Buddhist Times. First & Pike used to carry 180 different newspapers and over 2,000 magazines, but as things went increasingly digital, those numbers began to dwindle after a solid 40-year run, First & Pike News said their goodbyes just before New Years in 2019.
Description: Today, Seattle’s Pioneer Square is celebrated for its historic charm, but in the early 1900s it was the city’s roughest district, packed with saloons, brothels, gambling dens, and vice. By the 1960s, much of that gritty nightlife had shifted north along First Avenue, where peep shows, tattoo parlors, dive bars, and adult bookstores dominated the strip. At First and Pike stood The Donut House, a 24-hour donut shop opened in 1958 that became a popular late-night hangout. During the 1970s, it gained notoriety for its ties to drugs, prostitution, violence, and runaway teens. After a fatal stabbing and a major criminal investigation, the owner was eventually imprisoned in 1980, bringing an end to one of Seattle’s most infamous institutions.
