In its 100 years, North Bend has gone from a rough and tumble outpost in a remote valley to a Seattle suburb. Throughout the years, the city has been shaped by its geography — a broad valley floor surrounded by soaring, rugged mountains covered with hardy trees.

North Bend’s natural resources have attracted people to its location since before it existed. Thousands of years before Europeans arrived, American Indians inhabited the Upper Valley, which was a reliable source of agricultural produce and wild game. The Snoqualmie Tribe also traded with tribes from Eastern Washington across Snoqualmie Pass.

In the late 1800s, self-reliant individuals were drawn to the Upper Valley, which still had land available for homesteading at the time, according to Gardiner Vinnedge, whose great-grandparents arrived in the North Bend area in 1883.

Cut off by Snoqualmie Falls, Upper Valley residents were limited to subsistence farming before the Seattle, Lake Shore and Eastern Railway reached the town in 1889. The railroad allowed farmers — and later logging companies — to get their products to market.

Before the railroad arrived, William Taylor, one of North Bend’s first residents platted the town, naming it Snoqualmie Prairie Acres. The city was renamed to avoid confusion with its neighbor, Snoqualmie.

Logging began to boom in the Valley in the early 1900s. While Snoqualmie was primarily a logging town, North Bend was also a trading town, given its location next to the pass, said Vinnedge, who works at the Snoqualmie Valley Historical Museum and teaches history at Seattle’s Bush School.

North Bend had a very entrepreneurial spirit when it was incorporated in 1909, he said.

The decision to incorporate was likely driven by the city’s merchants, according to Cristy Lake, a North Bend resident and historian.

Still, most of the city’s residents worked off the land or for the railroads, and the largest demographic was single, white males.

Electricity came in the 1910s, and “by the ’20s, there were neon signs plastering all of North Bend,” Lake said.

The town’s tourist industry began with the railroad and grew with the popularity of the automobile.

In 1941, the state built the Sunset Highway through North Bend (on what is now North Bend Way) and over the Pass, bypassing Snoqualmie and the Lower Valley.

The highway “is what makes North Bend different from Snoqualmie,” Vinnedge said. North Bend’s merchants continued to be the city’s movers.

Regardless of their differences, the two towns and Fall City were consolidated into one school district in 1944 as an effort to conserve resources during World War II.

After the war, the Valley’s logging industry dwindled, but the cars kept coming through North Bend, which in 1965 was ordered by the state to install its first traffic light at the intersection of North Bend Way and Bendigo Boulevard South. Eastbound traffic was backed up nearly to Preston, according to Vinnedge.

In 1978, Interstate 90 bypassed North Bend, making it a Seattle suburb, he said.

Without the highway, the city had to lure tourists to its streets and gave the downtown an Alpine theme, which can still be seen on the building occupied by George’s Bakery on North Bend Way.

A surefire way to attract business came in the early 1990s when the Factory Outlet Stores opened by I-90’s Exit 31.

But North Bend had overextended its water rights, and in 1999 the city voluntarily imposed a development moratorium, which caused the city to miss out on the region’s housing boom in the 2000s.

Ten years later — and a century after its incorporation — North Bend lifted the ban, having secured enough water for 50 years of growth. At the same time, the city began developing a branding campaign, which it could begin implementing next year.

The city’s campaign will look to attract tourists to the endless outdoor recreation opportunities present in North Bend’s natural setting.

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North Bend Timeline

• Snoqualmie Tribe seasonally inhabits area around North Bend, which is a source of agriculture and game, and trade with Yakima.
• 1855-56: Washington Territory militia builds blockade houses in Upper Valley to defend against anticipated attack from American Indians in Eastern Washington, which never materializes.
• 1865: Matts Peterson becomes the first permanent settler on the site of present-day North Bend.
• 1880: William Taylor arrives and opens trading post in Peterson’s former house.
• 1889: Rail lines connect Upper Valley to Seattle. Taylor plats North Bend, which he calls “Snoqualmie Prairie Acres.” Washington becomes a state.
• 1904: North Bend Timber Company established. Lumber would be one of the town’s main industries for half a century.
• 1905: First automobile crosses Snoqualmie Pass.
• 1909: North Bend incorporated as a town; Peter Maloney is the town’s first mayor.
• 1910: Chicago Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway reaches North Bend.
• 1912: Nita Baldwin is the first person to graduate from North Bend High School.
• 1910s: Electricity reaches North Bend.
• 1918: The 1918 Influenza Pandemic hits North Bend, killing several people.
• 1931: Mount Si Trail opens.
• 1939: Si View Park built.
• 1941: Sunset Highway opens. North Bend Theater opens.
• 1944: Last class graduates from North Bend High School.

The following year, the town is consolidated into one school district with Snoqualmie and Fall City.

• 1965: The state requires North Bend to install a traffic light at North Bend Way and Bendigo Boulevard South, which backs traffic up nearly to Preston and Denny Creek.
• 1978: Interstate 90 bypasses North Bend.
• 1990: Twin Peaks begins filming in North Bend and Snoqualmie. The state enacts the Growth Management Act, which greatly expands the city’s role in planning its future.
• Early 1990s: Nintendo facility and Factory Outlet Stores built.
• 1999: Development moratorium established due to lack of water rights. North Bend misses out on the region’s housing boom.
• 2009: North Bend celebrates its centennial. Development ban lifted.