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Salmon Bay () is a portion of the
Salmon Bay () is a portion of the Lake Washington Ship Canal
The Lake Washington Ship Canal is a canal that runs through the city of Seattle and connects the fresh water body of Lake Washington to the salt water inland sea of Puget Sound. The Hiram M. Chittenden Locks accommodate the approximately diff ...
, which passes through the city of Seattle
Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...
, linking Lake Washington
Lake Washington () is a large freshwater lake adjacent to the city of Seattle, Washington, United States.
It is the largest lake in King County, Washington, King County and the second largest natural lake in the state of Washington (state), Was ...
to Puget Sound
Puget Sound ( ; ) is a complex estuary, estuarine system of interconnected Marine habitat, marine waterways and basins located on the northwest coast of the U.S. state of Washington (state), Washington. As a part of the Salish Sea, the sound ...
, lying west of the Fremont Cut. It is the westernmost section of the canal and empties into Puget Sound's Shilshole Bay. Because of the Hiram M. Chittenden Locks, the smaller, western half of the bay is salt water, and the eastern half is fresh water (though not without saline contamination: see Lake Union).
History
Before the construction of the Ship Canal, Salmon Bay was entirely salt water and subject to the tides. The bay was the permanent home of the Shilshole people, a Lushootseed-speaking people closely related to the Duwamish. The Lushootseed name of the bay is , which is the origin of the name of the Shilshole people (). Along the north side of the bay was a village (also called ) of the Shilshole, which by the late 19th century, had twolonghouses
A longhouse or long house is a type of long, proportionately narrow, single-room building for communal dwelling. It has been built in various parts of the world including Asia, Europe, and North America.
Many were built from timber and often re ...
(each 60'x120') and a larger potlatch
A potlatch is a gift-giving feast practiced by Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast of Canada and the United States,Harkin, Michael E., 2001, Potlatch in Anthropology, International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Scienc ...
house. At this time, the headman of the village was Shilshole Curly. Although much of the population left the village, a community still remained living in the village until the early 1900s. The village was destroyed in the 1910s and the residents removed. Some assimilated into the local community while others moved to local reservations. The last remaining resident of the village was Salmon Bay Charlie until he was evicted and removed to the Port Madison Reservation.
Beginning in 1916, the level of the bay was raised by as the Ballard Locks formed a dam. East of the locks, Salmon Bay is spanned by the Ballard Bridge
The Ballard Bridge, also known as the 15th Avenue Bridge, is a double-leaf bascule bridge in Seattle, Washington. It carries 15th Avenue NW over Seattle's Salmon Bay between Ballard to the north and Interbay to the south. The Ballard Bridge ...
, a bascule bridge
A bascule bridge (also referred to as a drawbridge or a lifting bridge) is a moveable bridge with a counterweight that continuously balances a span, or leaf, throughout its upward swing to provide clearance for boat traffic. It may be single- o ...
that carries 15th Avenue traffic between Ballard and Interbay; its predecessor was built across the bay in 1891. West of the locks, it is spanned by the Salmon Bay Bridge that carries the BNSF Railway
BNSF Railway is the largest freight railroad in the United States. One of six North American Class I railroads, BNSF has 36,000 employees, of track in 28 states, and over 8,000 locomotives. It has three Transcontinental railroad, transcontine ...
railroad tracks between Ballard and Magnolia
''Magnolia'' is a large genus of about 210 to 340The number of species in the genus ''Magnolia'' depends on the taxonomic view that one takes up. Recent molecular and morphological research shows that former genera ''Talauma'', ''Dugandiodendr ...
.
In the 1920s, an archaeological dig of the western parts of the site of the former Shilshole village was conducted by A. G. Colley. Archaeologists found many tools, including those made of iron, as a result of the dig.
References
{{Lake Washington Ship Canal Landforms of Seattle Bays of Washington (state) Bays of King County, Washington