Fire was a constant danger in turn of the century Grays Harbor County, making fire insurance a big business. To help assess liability, agents relied on detailed maps created by the Sanborn Map Company. Today, these maps offer a fascinating window into the past.
Sanborn Map Company
Fire insurance maps show construction materials, water systems and other information that help fire insurance underwriters assess liability. The first ones were created in London in the late 1700s.
American companies began producing fire insurance maps in the mid-1800s. Demand skyrocketed after the Civil War as increased industrialization and immigration fueled the growth of cities and towns.
Through careful management and buying out their competitors, the Sanborn Map Company came to control the American fire insurance map market. Founded in 1867 by Daniel Alfred Sanborn (1827-1883), the company also produced maps for Canada and Mexico.
At its peak in the 1920s, Sanborn Maps employed over 700 people, including 300 field agents. Maps had to be frequently updated. On August 29, 1901, the Aberdeen Herald newspaper remarked that field agent “[Charles] W. Seidel, of the Sanborn-Perris Map Co.,” is in the city, preparing a new fire insurance map of Aberdeen.”
Accessing Grays Harbor Sanborn Maps
With its sawmills and wooden buildings, turn of the 20th century Grays Harbor County was no stranger to fire. Just two years after Seidel’s visit, 10 blocks of Aberdeen were destroyed in the “Black Friday” blaze. One hundred-forty buildings were leveled and three people were killed. The business district was rebuilt in brick and cement.
Sanborn produced fire insurance maps of Grays Habor communities between 1889 and 1948, including a number of updates. Maps have been preserved of Aberdeen, Copalis, Cosmopolis, Elma, Hoquiam, McCleary, Moclips, Montesano, Oakville, Ocosta, Pacific Beach and Satsop.
Sanborn maps were originally lithographic prints, sold as both bound volumes and individual sheets, depending on the size of the town. The August 1906 map of Aberdeen is 36 pages, for example, while a map of the now-vanished seaside town of Ocosta, dated October 1894, is only a single sheet.
Many of Sanborn’s 700,000+ maps are now online.
A number of digitized Grays Harbor maps can be accessed for free through the Library of Congress (LOC). Timberland Regional Library also offers free access, with a library card, to ProQuest’s Digital Sanborn Maps collection, including Grays Harbor maps not digitized through LOC. These maps are in black and white and access will expire on December 31, 2026.
The Washington State Library in Tumwater has a microfilm collection of Grays Harbor Sanborn maps, including ones not digitized on LOC. Images are in black and white.
Using Sanborn Maps
Sanborn maps contain a treasure trove of information for modern users. Genealogists can look up where their ancestors lived and worked. Researchers can track their community’s development. Checking maps can help date old photographs and allow historic preservationists to assess landmark buildings. The maps are also a great way to find potentially polluted sites like old dry-cleaning businesses and gas stations.
While Sanborn held high standards, the maps are not 100% accurate. Construction was ongoing, so what existed on the ground would never completely match the date on the map. Maps sometimes overlooked impoverished or minority neighborhoods.
Large maps, like those for Aberdeen and Hoquiam, opened with an overall view of the “congested” or business district. The opening page also included a street index and description of the community’s water facilities and fire department.
Sanborn maps were color coded to show construction materials. Examining the July 1914 map of Aberdeen, most buildings are tinted yellow to indicate frame/wood construction. Aberdeen High School (except for the bicycle shop) is shaded pink, to show fire-resistant brick construction. Built in 1909, the building burned in 2002. An underground oil tank, a fire risk, is noted behind the building.
To assess fire risk, building uses were often listed. In the detail from the area boarded by 7th, 8th, J and I Streets in Hoquiam in the January 1902 map, businesses such as a fish and meat market are listed, as well as a tinshop. On the lower left-hand corner is a building marked “D” for dwelling, a private home. The map also lists that J Street is 60 feet wide and “paved” with wooden planks, which would have a high fire risk.
Maps included “x” marks for doors and solid lines to indicate walls. Types of heating sources and the location of fire-fighting equipment were also noted. In the January 1910 Elma map, fire hose locations inside Hotel Wakefield on Main Street were carefully marked, as well as the location of the kitchen. Down the street, the Baptist Church’s use of a heat stove and electric lights are listed as well as the height of their bell tower, 45 feet.
Sanborn Maps, Window to the Past
The Great Depression, World War II and changing methods of fire insurance liability assessment dried up demand for Sanborn’s maps. Today Sanborn Geospatial produces GIS data for businesses and governments.
A century or more later, Sanborn maps help us visualize a lost world. John Repps might have been writing about bird’s eye view drawings in his book, “Panoramas of Promise,” but the same holds true of Sanborn maps. As Repps writes in his book, with the maps we can, “in our imagination approach their outskirts, visit their neighborhoods, walk their streets, admire their buildings, and appreciate the richness and variety of the urban scene in this region a century or more ago.”
