Rob Ketcherside has begun submitting neighborhood landmarks to online databases.
The historic marker committee is acting on a goal to raise awareness of our neighborhood’s historic assets. While the project moves forward to alter the physical world, we can quickly modify the digital world along the way.
Rob has submitted four known existing historical plaques to hmdb.org and readtheplaque.com databases. If you see a historic marker or plaque just take a photo and send it to CHHS via Twitter, Facebook or email and Rob can add those in as well.
The Ward House (Belmont and Denny Way) has two plaques on it already. They are straight-forward descriptions of its inclusion in the National Register of Historic Places and that it is a Seattle Landmark. Rob submitted photos and transcripts of the plaques to the Historic Marker Database, and the Ward House page was accepted and published at the beginning of April. The HMDB was one of two databases used for Pokemon Go -- so providing good data can really make a difference for awareness.
Pantages House (Harvard and Denny Way) and Broadway High (Broadway and Pine, courtyard in front of performance hall) have also both been published to readtheplaque.com and are in editorial review on hmdb.org.
Also the first in a series of Auto Row plaques has been placed on the Chrysler Building.
Rob will be submitting landmarks location data to Google and to OpenStreetMap.
As of April 30, the following landmarks appear on Google Maps with the landmark icon castle or rook:
Ward House Pantages House First Church of Christ (changed icon type to landmark) 1014 East Roy (in database but not appearing on map yet) Eldridge Tire Company (appears on map with search, but not by default) J. W. Bullock House P. P. Ferry House Eliza Ferry Leary House St. Nicholas School (in database but not on map) San Remo Hillcrest
This is how they appear on the map:
Ward House and Pantages House edits have been made to OpenStreetMap, and their names show up at the first level that building names and numbers are displayed:
OpenStreetMap is quite busy at this level. It has per-property queryable information, which Rob edited as well, providing details about the National Register of Historic Places categorization:
