SPOKANE  , a

city and the county-seat of Spokane county, Washington, U.S.A., on both banks of the Spokane river, near the eastern boundary of the state, and about 242 M . E. of Seattle . Pop.-(189o), 19,922; (1900), 36,848, of whom 7833 were foreign- born, including 1683 English Canadians, 1326 Germans, and 1168 Swedes; (r910 census 104,402 . Spokane is served by the Great Northern, the Oregon Railway & Navigation Co . (Union Pacific system), the Northern Pacific, the Idaho & Washington Northern, the Spokane, Portland & Seattle, and the Spokane & International railways, and by the Spokane & Inland Empire (electric) line connecting with the Coeur d'Alene mining region, Idaho, and with Colfax, Washington and Moscow, Idaho . Among the principal buildings of the city are the Federal building, the county court-house, the city-hall, the post office, the Paulsen building, the Columbia and Auditorium theatres, the Spokane club, the masonic temple, the Spokesman-Review building, and a large Roman Catholic church . Spokane is the see of a Protestant Episcopal bishop . The city has a Carnegie library, and ten public parks aggregating 320 acres; the more important are Liberty Park (25 acres), Manito Park (85 acres), and Corbin Park (13 acres) . Fort George Wright (established in 1895) is 3 M. west of Spokane on a tract of 1022 acres given to the United States Government by the city, for that purpose, in 1894-1895 . Spokane is the seat of Gonzaga College (Roman Catholic) for boys, founded in 1887 and incorporated in 1904; of Spokane College (1907; Lutheran); of Brunot Hall (Protestant Episcopal), for girls; the Academy of the Holy Names (Roman Catholic), for girls; and of other schools and academies . Among the city's charitable institutions are a home for the friendless (189o), the St Joseph orphanage (18go), St Luke's (190o) and the Marie Beard Deaconess (1896) hospitals, each having a training school for nurses, a Florence Crittenden home, and a House of the Good Shepherd . The Spokane river is a rapidly flowing stream with two falls (the upper of 6o and the lower of 70 ft.), within the city limits, providing an estimated energy of about 35,000 horse-power at low water .

Of this energy, in 1908, about 17,000 horse-power was being utilized, chiefly for generating

electricity (the motive power most used in the city's industries), as well as for lighting and transit purposes, while about 9000 horse-power in electrical power was transmitted to the Coeur d'Alene mines . At Post Falls, Idaho, 22 M. east of Spokane, about 12,000 horse-power is developed, and at Nine Mile Bridge near Spokane, about 20,000horse-power . Spokane's manufactu ring interests have developed with remarkable rapidity . In two there were 84 factories capitalized at $2,211,304, and their product was valued at $3,756,119 . In 1905 there were 188 factories capitalized at $5,407,313 (144'5% increase), and the value of their products was $8,830,852 (135.1% increase) . The city's principal manufactures in; 1905 were: lumber and planing mill products ($2,040,059); flour and grist-mill products ($1,089,396); malt liquors ($679,274); foundry and machine-shop products ($479,954); and lumber and timber products ($478,019) . Spokane is an important jobbing centre, is a natural supply point for the gold, silver and lead mining regions of northern and central Idaho, eastern Washington, and Oregon, and is a distributing point for the rich agricultural districts in this region . The first permanent settlement on the site of Spokane was made in 1874 by James N . Glover, who bought from two trappers a tract of land here . The settlement was named Spokane Falls, in memory of the Spokan Indians, a tribe of Salishan stock, which formerly occupied the Spokane Valley; the word Spokan is said to mean " children of the sun." Spokane was incorporated as a town in 1881 and in the same year received its first city charter (amended in 1891) . The city became the county-seat in 1882 . The present name was adopted in 189o .

The city was reached by the Northern Pacific

rail-way in 1883, by the Union Pacific in 1889, and by the Great Northern in 1892 . On the 4-6th of August 1889, thirty squares of the city (nearly all of its business section) were destroyed by fire, with a loss estimated at $5,000,000 . Rebuilding was at once begun, and in about two years the city had been almost entirely reconstructed and greatly improved . In 1910 Spokane adopted a commission form of government .