Sons of the Profits 1st Ed 15th Printing Seattle History DJ

William C. "Bill" Speidel's lively and deliberately irreverent account of Seattle's first fifty years strips away the reverential mythology surrounding the city's founders to examine the money, land speculation, railroads, political maneuvering, rivalries, vice, and personalities that helped create Seattle. Organized into eleven chapters with bibliography and index, the volume is particularly rich in Seattle historical material and includes maps and period illustrations. The front endpapers reproduce Dan Calvin's 1965 Composite Map of Seattle's Birthplace; the rear endpapers reproduce a map of the area affected by the Great Seattle Fire of June 6, 1889, based on a map by former Seattle Fire Chief Harry Bringhurst and restored by G. E. Bundy in 1964. Other illustrations include an 1841 Elliott Bay chart by Charles Wilkes, early railroad material, Robert McCausland's drawing of Seattle's original skyline, and period images from West Shore Monthly. This copy is explicitly designated "FIRST EDITION" on the copyright page and is the Fifteenth Printing, June 1990. The same page supplies an unusually complete printing history, beginning with the Second Printing of April 1968 and continuing through fifteen printings. Bound in black cloth with gilt spine lettering. Book: Very Good+ with a square, secure binding, clean text, mild age toning, and localized light rubbing/scuffing near the lower spine/front-board area. Dust Jacket: Very Good, complete and attractive from the front, with rubbing, toning, edge wear, small chips and short tears, and a more substantial chip/tear at the upper-left corner of the rear panel. Jacket retains the original Bob Cram cover illustration and rear-flap credit. No ownership inscriptions or other markings. William C. Speidel (1912-1988) was a Seattle-born journalist, publicist, author, popular historian, and preservation advocate whose work became closely associated with the rediscovery of the city's early history. Speidel was instrumental in drawing public attention to the neglected Pioneer Square neighborhood and in 1965 established what became Bill Speidel's Underground Tour, using the surviving subterranean storefronts and sidewalks of old Seattle to make local history accessible - and entertaining - to a broad audience. His preservation campaign contributed to the movement that ultimately protected Pioneer Square as a historic district. Bob Cram (1925-2017) was a Seattle commercial artist, cartoonist, television personality, and celebrated ski illustrator. A Seattle native and World War II veteran who received the Purple Heart, Cram studied commercial art at Seattle's Burnley School of Art on the GI Bill and subsequently became a professional advertising illustrator and co-owner of Seattle's Graphic Studios. Cram became especially familiar to Pacific Northwest audiences beginning in 1963 as KING-TV's "cartooning weatherman," creating humorous characters and drawings live during his weather reports; he remained at KING until 1971. He was also a prolific skiing cartoonist whose work appeared in magazines and books for decades. His contribution to ski culture was eventually recognized with induction into the Northwest Ski Hall of Fame in 2004 and a 2012 International Skiing History Association Lifetime Achievement Award for Illustrated Ski Humor. Cram had a longstanding creative association with William C. Speidel. He was already illustrating Speidel's work by 1955, when his drawings appeared in You Can't Eat Mount Rainier. Contemporary commentary described the then-29-year-old Cram as an established Seattle cartoonist working in advertising and greeting-card design.…