Underground Tour
Description
Bill Speidel's Underground Tour guides you through tunnels beneath Pioneer Square, Seattle's historic heart. You walk through brick corridors and abandoned storefronts from the late 1800s, seeing old sidewalks and shop entrances that show how people once lived and worked.
History
The Great Fire of 1889 destroyed much of downtown and prompted the city to rebuild at an elevated level. The original streets and buildings were buried beneath new ones, later forming a network of tunnels and passages.
Culture
The name comes from Bill Speidel, a historian and journalist who rediscovered these hidden passages in the late 1960s and opened them to the public. Today, visitors use this place to experience Seattle's early history in a personal way and understand how the city rebuilt itself after the fire.
Practical
The tour lasts about 75 minutes and starts at Doc Maynard's Public House in Pioneer Square, where you meet your guide. The tunnels are dark and narrow, so wear comfortable shoes and take time to read the details in the passages.
Did you know?
A curious detail is the glass skylights on the modern streets above the tunnels, which let light into the original passages below. These small square tiles connect the buried city directly to the modern one overhead, creating a tangible link between two eras.
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