On Tuesday, February 13, 1979, about 7 a.m., the western half of the Hood Canal Bridge sinks during a severe storm. For several hours before the Tuesday the 13th catastrophe, a storm has battered the ...
On February 18 and February 19, 1979, police confront unruly crowds of mostly young people, who pelt them with bottles and rocks, during the closing days of the third annual Fat Tuesday festival in Se...
On February 21, 1979, ferry service between Port Townsend, located on the northeast point of the Olympic Peninsula at the entrance to Puget Sound, and Edmonds, located in southern Snohomish County nor...
On February 26, 1979, writer Annie Dillard (b. 1945) and her husband, Gary Clevidence, watch a rare solar eclipse from a hillside in the Yakima Valley. The day before they drove to Eastern Washington ...
In the predawn hours of March 6, 1979, a Burlington Northern train hauling logs from Lake Kapowsin to the St. Regis Paper Company in Tacoma derails at a bridge over the Puyallup River. The train crew ...
On March 26, 1979, Washington Governor Dixy Lee Ray (1914-1994) signs into law a bill titled "Food Donation Program -- Legal Immunity." The new statute allows for donation of food for use by a nonprof...
On April 18, 1979, the M.V. Liu Lin Hai docks at the Port of Seattle's Pier 91 at Smith Cove. The visit, the first in 30 years by a ship from mainland China to the United States, comes one month after...
In May 1979, the first Women in Trades fair opens at Center House at Seattle Center. The fair celebrates and supports women in nontraditional careers such as electrician, construction worker, plumber,...
On May 21, 1979, Robert Murray becomes superintendent of Seattle City Light upon his confirmation by the City Council. The confirmation process was lengthy and contentious when Murray's lack of experi...
On Thursday, May 24, 1979, Artie Ray Baker, an escapee from a California prison, and his companion Marie Ferreboeuf arrive from Canada at the Lynden Port of Entry in Whatcom County. Baker's car is sel...
On June 1, 1979, the Seattle SuperSonics beat the Washington Bullets 97-93 in Landover, Maryland, to win the team's first (and only) National Basketball Association Championship. Guard Gus Williams sc...
On June 2, 1979, The Seattle Times reviews the Seattle Aquarium's OmniRama Theater, which is expected to open within the following week, and says it "eclipses" the Cinerama, which is at the time the m...