5327
Erastus Brainerd papers
Inventory
Accession No: 4624-001
Special Collections Division
University of Washington Libraries
Box 352900
Seattle, Washington, 98195-2900
USA
(206) 543-1929
This document forms part of the Preliminary Guide to the Erastus Brainerd Papers. To find out more about the history,
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Erastus Brainerd Papers
Accession No. 4624-1
GUIDE
BIOGRAPHY
Erastus Brainerd, journalist, editor, politician, and civic leader, acted as lobbyist for the Seattle
Chamber of Commerce during and after the Klondike gold rush and as editor of the Seattle PostIntelligencer from 1904 to 1911. Brainerd was born in Middletown, Connecticut, on February 25,
1855. In 1870 he graduated from the Phillips Exeter Academy and entered Harvard, from which he
received his A.B. in 1874. From October 1874 to April 1878, he worked for Boston publisher James
R. Osgood and Company. Brainerd traveled to Europe in 1878; the next year he returned to America
and began his newspaper career.
Before moving to Seattle, Brainerd served on the editorial staffs of the New York World, the
Philadelphia Press, and the Atlanta Constitution, where he was working when he married Mary Bella
Beale of Richmond, Virginia, on May 30, 1882. (The Brainerds had three daughters: the first, Mary
Beale, died in infancy; the second was also named Mary Beale; and the third, Elizabeth.) Brainerd
also served as editor-in-chief of the Atlanta Star, as well as editor and co-owner of the Philadelphia
Daily News. After he and his family moved to Seattle in 1890, Brainerd edited the Seattle Press, which
bought out another evening newspaper, the Times, in 1891 to become the Seattle Press-Times under
Brainerd’s editorship. Brainerd left his post at the Press Times in 1893 to become a member of the
Board of State Land Commissioners, a position he held until the Fusionists came to power in 1897.
Shortly after Brainerd’s term as land commissioner ended, news of gold in the Klondike reached
Seattle. Brainerd was appointed secretary of the Seattle Chamber of Commerce’s newly formed
Bureau of Information. As secretary he carried out an international advertising campaign, promoting
Seattle as the gateway to Alaska. He sometimes acted as lobbyist in Washington D.C. for the Chamber
and other Seattle businesses from 1897 to 1903. One of his successful lobbying campaigns was
convincing Congress to assign Seattle a government assay office. During the same period, Brainerd
also spent some time traveling in Alaska, where he worked as a mining consultant, having received
investment capital from Philadelphia streetcar magnates, Elkins and Hivener, and from his cousin,
Frank Brainerd. In December of 1901, Erastus Brainerd was sent to Washington, D.C. to represent
Seattle throughout the Congressional session. During the session, he played a key role in getting a
federal appropriation for the construction of the Lake Washington Canal.
Brainerd was active in Republican party politics. While he was essentially a Taft Republican, a Taft
Republican was frequently a McKinley Republican somewhat chastened by the municipal reformers,
populist agitators, the muckrakers' exposures of the corrupt associations of business and politics, and
the Rooseveltian disruption of standpatism within the Party. He believed the political influence of the
railroad interests in the state was unfortunate. Brainerd served as a delegate to the Republican
National Convention in 1904 and represented Washington at other conferences, including the
Conference of Governors in 1908 and the National Convention of the American Academy of Political
and Social Science in 1912.
As editor of the Post-Intelligencer, Brainerd infused the newspaper with a "reform vigor" which
revoked the newspaper's past. "Reform" was conservative, not radical; Brainerd believed in a
stewardship doctrine of politics, and with many of his contemporaries, believed that stewardship was
justifiable only if politics was purged of vicious and corrupt elements. When corruption became
evident in the Seattle police department under Police Chief C. W. Wappenstein and Mayor Hiram Gill,
a committee of church people was formed who, led by the Rev. Mark A. Matthews of the First
Presbyterian Church, urged Brainerd to oppose Mayor Gill. Brainerd acceded to the demands and
using P-I editorials, led one of the nation's first recall campaigns. Gill, who was elected in 1910, was
removed from office in 1911. (He was, however, reelected in 1914 and 1916.) Wappenstein was fired
and indicted for accepting bribes. In addition, Brainerd has been credited with initiating impeachment
proceedings against Judge Cornelius H. Hanford. Impeachment hearings were held in 1912 and
Hanford resigned. (In addition to speaking out against public figures, Brainerd also later campaigned
against prohibition for the Anti-Prohibition Association on the grounds that such legislation would
encourage "secret vice and law-breaking.")
Brainerd fully exploited the potential afforded by his associations with local men of prestige, position,
and power. Many such people accredited the Direct Primary Law to Brainerd. Frank Fitts, Brainerd’s
secretary at the P-I, witnessed Brainerd's summoning of Samuel Cosgrove, a Seattle lawyer, out of a
sickbed, to be coerced by Brainerd into becoming the Republican candidate for Governor. In addition
to choosing candidates, Brainerd kept himself well-informed concerning the activities of men already
in office; for example, he was able to keep close tabs on Governor Mead through Ashmun N. Brown,
private secretary to Mead and former employee of the P-I.
Brainerd also worked closely with men who were intimately involved in the advancement of the state's
farm economy. He cooperated with William H. Paulhamus when Paulhamus was speaker of the Senate
during Governor Mead's administration. Brainerd also cooperated with Wilbur W. Robertson,
publisher of the Yakima Republic, on behalf of eastern Washington farmers, particularly those in the
Wenatchee and Yakima valleys.
In 1911 W. W. Chapin, general manager of the Post-lntelligencer, brought in Scott Bone to replace
Brainerd, who, long discontented with the management, had offered his resignation in 1910 but did not
actually leave the paper until Bone was hired. In 1913, Chapin was managing a San Francisco
newspaper, the Call, and despite their previous differences, hired Brainerd as editor. He edited the
Call for six months, but the newspaper was suffering financial problems and was sold. Brainerd
returned to his home at Richmond Beach, a short distance from Seattle.
Brainerd served as president of the Board of Seattle Park Commissioners from 1914-1916, and during
World War I, he became Assistant Federal Food Administrator for Western Washington (1917). In
1919 he served as Northwest consul for Paraguay, having previously represented Paraguay in
Philadelphia during President Cleveland’s administration. He died at the Western State Hospital in
Steilacoom, WA, on December 25, 1922.
SCOPE AND CONTENT
The papers, measuring 2.52 cubic feet, are composed mainly of letters to Brainerd which span his
career from ca. 1880 to 1919; however, some aspects of his career and the events of his time are
reflected more adequately than others. Most abundant are letters for 1904 to 1911, when he was editor
of the Post-lntelligencer. About one-third of the incoming letters are concentrated in this period. There
are also letters relating to matters in which Brainerd was concerned but to which he was not directly a
party; e.g., copies of letters recommending Brainerd for various positions, and letters enclosed with
those expressly addressed to him. Letters from Brainerd to other parties are also in the collection.
Brainerd's life after he left the Post-lntelligencer is sparsely represented by the papers. Two of the three
documents included are petitions to President McKinley on behalf of Brainerd's unsuccessful
candidacy for the position of Alaskan consulate. The third document is Brainerd's argument before the
Washington Board of State Land Commissioners in Sanderson vs. Winsor concerning the purchase of
Ballard tidelands. The papers also contain memorabilia and a few photocopies of Post-Intelligencer
articles.
Included in the papers covering Brainerd’s term on the Board of State Land Commissioners is material
on the development of the Seattle harbor and the private speculation corporation headed by Eugene
Semple. Also included is material on Brainerd’s trips to Alaska and his work in Washington D.C. for
the Seattle Chamber of Commerce and other Seattle businesses. In the papers concerning his lobbying
efforts in Washington D.C. are materials on his work to obtain support for the Lake Washington ship
canal, a naval basin, the Lawton infantry post, and development of Alaska. The material covering
Brainerd’s Post-Intelligencer editorship includes discussions of municipal, state and national politics.
Topics discussed include the Mead-Turner senatorial campaign of 1904; the antagonism between the
Seattle Times and the Post-Intelligencer (which was chiefly antagonism between Brainerd and Times
editor, Colonel Alden J. Blethen); the “municipal-ownership” election in Seattle in 1906; reports of
interviews and analyses of Roosevelt, Taft, and Washington congressmen, the 1908 senatorial
campaign, the Ballinger-Pinchot dispute and general conservation policies; the Wilson-BurkePoindexter senatorial campaign of 1910; and the recall of Mayor Gill in 1911.
Letters from Brainerd’s most prolific correspondents, Ashmun N. Brown and Walter Eli Clark, seem
to touch on a large proportion of people and events that are most significant in the Brainerd papers.
Brown had become private secretary to Governor Mead in 1905 with the help of Brainerd’s influence.
In 1909, at the time of the Ballinger-Pinchot controversy, Brown was sent to Washington, D.C. as the
P-I’s special correspondent. Walter Eli Clark, prior to his appointment as Governor of the Territory of
Alaska in 1909, worked as the P-l’s Washington D.C. correspondent from 1902 to 1909, although he
was primarily associated with the New York Sun and the New York Commercial.
Major correspondents include Richard Achilles Ballinger, Ashmun N. Brown, William Turnbull
Burwell, Stephen James Chadwick, William Wallace Chapin, Walter Eli Clark, J. G. Crowley, Thomas
B. Donaldson, Thomas H. Downing, Marion E. Hay, William E. Humphrey, Wesley L. Jones, John H.
McGraw, Mark Allison Matthews, Albert E. Mead, William H. Paulhamus, Samuel H. Piles, Robert P.
Porter, Wilbur Wade Robertson, Eugene Semple, William M. Sheffield, George Turner, John
Lockwood Wilson, Charles E. Woodruff, and the Seattle Chamber of Commerce.
ARRANGEMENT
In instances when a letter writer acted as agent for another party (corporate or personal) the letter is
placed under the name of the party for whom the author acted as agent. (Authors of a few letters were
not identified; consequently these letters are placed in a separate folder at the end of the incoming letter
file.) Letters for which Brainerd is not directly a party are arranged alphabetically in two folders and
are inventoried as “Enclosures”; some of these letters are filed by the name of the author, others are
filed by the name of the recipient, depending on the probable source from which the enclosures were
received. Brainerd’s outgoing letters are arranged alphabetically by name of addressee.
The inventory of incoming letters is arranged in two groups; (1) an alphabetical list of letters in
individual name folders; (2) an alphabetical list of letters in miscellaneous folders.
RELATED MATERIAL
The Erastus Brainerd Papers, 1886-1898, relating primarily to the promotion of Seattle’s role in
Alaskan trade and in the Klondike gold rush of 1897. Library of Congress Manuscript Division.
Washington D.C.
Erastus Brainerd, [Scrapbooks, 1897-1898], microfilm copy of Brainerd’s official correspondence as
Secretary of the Seattle Chamber of Commerce Information Bureau; and microfilm copy of
[Scrapbook of newspaper cuttings concerning E. Brainerd, 18—], available in Microform and
Newspaper Collections, University of Washington Libraries.
Betty Brainerd Papers, 1895-1963. Dartmouth College Library. New Hampshire. Betty (Elizabeth
Ann Brainerd McClure), Erastus Brainerd’s daughter, was a society columnist and reporter.
Correspondence and manuscripts of both of her parents are included.
Accession no. 4686-1, transcriptions of letters, reports, and documents relating to the Lake
Washington Ship Canal, covering 1892-1905, assembled in 1906 by Horace McClure, a Seattle
journalist. Manuscripts and University Archives, UW Libraries.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Victoria Hartwell Livingston, Erastus Brainerd, the Bankruptcy of Brilliance (U.W. Master’s thesis,
1967). Livingston’s thesis is based largely upon the materials in this accession.
Murray Morgan, Skid Road (Seattle: UW Press, 1982), p. 159-168.
Jeannette P. Nichols, "Advertising and the Klondike." Washington Historical Quarterly, 13, 1922, pp.
20-26.
Kathryn Morse, “The Klondike Gold Rush: Curriculum Materials for the History of the Pacific
Northwest in the Washington Public Schools” (Center for the Study of the Pacific Northwest, UWired
Outreach, 1997). http://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/html/packet.html
6/98-jg