Snoqualmie Falls Postcard by Edward H. Mitchell #590

Every October 6, the Snoqualmie Indian Tribe celebrates Snoqualmie Rights Day. The sdukʷalbixʷ Snoqualmie Tribe are the rightful stewards of the land in Snoqualmie Valley and have been in the area since time immemorial. The first Rights Day was celebrated in 2019 for the 20th Anniversary of the United States Federal Government’s affirmation of the Tribe’s recognition status. To mark this day, I am featuring another Snoqualmie Falls postcard from my collection as this majestic 268-foot waterfall is considered a sacred spot to the tribe and plays an important part of the tribe’s creation story.

SNOQUALMIE FALLS POSTCARD BY EDWARD H. MITCHELL #590

The front of this postcard shows Snoqualmie Falls located in Snoqualmie, Washington during a heavy flow of water. The card includes a location printed along the bottom along with the waterfall’s height – 268 ft. – and a catalog number 590.

This postcard may be based on a black and white photo taken by J. Boyd Ellis as it appears similar to this real photo postcard with a catalog number of 103.

John Boyd Ellis was born July 25, 1894 in Perry, Iowa. He moved to Olympia, Washington around 1903, where he attended University of Washington and Western Washington University. Upon earning a teaching degree, Ellis became principal of Marysville High School until 1921 when he moved his family to Arlington, Washington. He became an Eastman Kodak dealer in a small shop on Main Street in the small Snohomish County town.

At the suggestion of a salesman in 1923, Ellis started making black-and-white photographs of the Pacific Northwest and turning them into postcards. He shot most of his photographs using a 4-by- 5 format Crown Graphic camera. Through his eyes, he captured beautiful scenery found throughout Washington, Oregon, Montana, British Columbia and Alaska.

His photography skills led to the creation of Ellis Post Card Co. which produced around 5,000 real photograph post cards. When Ellis, Sr. retired in 1959, his son Clifford B., who was born in 1919, assumed ownership of the family business.

The back of this postcard contains a publisher – Edward H. Mitchell (1867–1940) based in San Francisco, California. I’ve found similar cards with different stamp boxes from 1915-1916. Snoqualmie Falls Lodge opened above the falls in 1916 so the card may have been created prior to that year. The company started printed divided back cards around 1907.

Mitchell published approximately 13,000 postcards between 1895 and 1923. Subjects included mostly views from California and states along the Pacific Coast like Washington.

According to the San Jose Postcard Club, Edward “promoted the sale of cards, devised new and better methods of production, and instituted innovations in design and color, bought companies, as well as forming and dissolving various partnerships. More importantly, while other publishers were dependent upon foreign imports and having their lithography or color-work processed in Germany, Mitchell developed his company into an all-American industry. Primarily, he was a businessman. He was not, as has been reported, a photographer, an artist or a dreamer.”

Snoqualmie Falls is truly a breathtaking wonder in Washington state. This place is part of the tribe’s creation story which says Moon the Transformer created the falls and the first Snoqualmie Man and Woman were made at this sacred spot.

In 2023, the Tribe opened a completely remodeled Snoqualmie Falls Gift Shop and Visitor Center containing a gift shop and a small cafe. They also created a fascinating exhibit titled “Our Story Is the Story of the Falls” which documents the history of Snoqualmie Falls from Time Immemorial to modern day.

You can learn more about the importance of the land to the tribe and what you can do to protect, respect and restore it on the Snoqualmie Tribe Ancestral Land Movement website.