Indigenous Peoples 

Before maritime explorers “discovered” Washington, the area was home to a flourishing Indigenous population. Anthropologists estimate that the region supported 125 distinct Northwest tribes who spoke over 50 different languages and dialects. The coastal tribes of what is now called western Washington, and the Plateau Tribes of eastern Washington each worked with the land in different ways to support their survival.

The coastal tribes used the abundant (and sacred) cedar for food, clothing, ceremony, and building materials. They built beautiful longhouses and carved vitally-important dugout canoes, while the Plateau tribes practiced seasonal hunting, fishing, and gathering upon their more arid landscapes in the east.

Today, a tongue-twisting variety of counties, cities, parks, locales, bodies of water, and more are named after various Tribes and their native languages, and this honoring of Indigenous words and people is a unique distinction in what is, oddly enough, the only state named after a U.S. President.

If you want to move to Puyallup, the Sequalitchew area, Snoqualmie, Okanogan, Klickitat, or Wahkiakum County, for example, it’s best to ask a friendly local how to pronounce the word before you go tossing it around in coffee shops.  

White Settlers

There are many different accounts of the European explorers who first arrived by sea, but the stories of those who made the overland journey by foot, horseback, wagon, and later steam engine are also noteworthy.

The most famous traverse and survey of the area was made in the fall of 1805 and the spring of 1806 when Captain Meriwether Lewis and Lieutenant William Clark led the Corps of Discovery, a party of nearly 50 people, across the entire state in search of the fabled “Northwest Passage,” a waterway that would connect the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific. 

Such a route doesn’t exist, but what they found ended up to be much more important contributions to science, botany, weather, geography, Tribal culture, and so much more.

The news of their work spread and the government was eager to populate the fertile and resource-rich lands of the Pacific Northwest, so hopeful adventurers hitched up their wagons and set out for Washington and Oregon in droves. 

The Donation Land Claim Act of 1850-1853 offered land to settlers who used only their bravery and tenacity as payment, and it was their rugged individualism that helped Washington inch closer to Statehood. Initially part of Oregon Territory from 1848 to 1853, Washington then became its own territory and eventually gained statehood as the 42nd State in 1889. Today, 7.7 million people now call Washington home.

The steady stream of folks looking to make Washington home seemingly hasn’t ended. And why would it, when the economy is growing by 6.5% per year, the fastest rate in the Nation, and that may be partly attributed to Washington having the highest rate of minimum wage in the country, after the District of Columbia.

The 18th largest state by area, Washington homeowners reside in the 13th most populous state and one of the wealthiest and most liberal in the country. The majority of its residents seek to find a home in Washington in the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue Metropolitan Area and though those residents are categorized as mostly blue voters, the population on the east side of the country is markedly red. 

If there’s one thing residents can agree on though, it’s industry, and the industriousness of those early pioneers has not been forgotten. If anything, it has been magnified in the 21st century, with Washington being a leading lumber producer and supplying its residents and the rest of the nation (and the world) with an abundance of apples, hops, pears, blueberries, sweet cherries, and spearmint oil. Like the ample bear population that resides in the state’s numerous mountain ranges, many a Washington resident has been known to completely gorge themselves on a plethora of berries that grow statewide during the entire summer.

And it’s not just agriculture that makes buying a home in Washington attractive, it’s the tech sector, too. Move over Silicon Valley, because Washington homes are more affordable and the landscape is more beautiful. With behemoth corporations like Amazon, Boeing, Costco, Microsoft, and Starbucks all centered in the state, Washington is quickly becoming the industry Center of the Universe.

There is one very important takeaway for those seeking to create a homestead in Washington, and it is first acknowledging the majesty and power of the Cascade Range. These mighty mountains run north/south from Canada to northern California and dictate the climate, weather, and geology of the entire state of Washington. 

The Cascade Range encompasses powerful volcanic peaks that are part of the Ring of Fire, the volcanoes that encircle the Pacific Ocean. The tallest peak in the entire range is found in Washington, at Mount Rainier, which reaches a staggering 14,411 feet, (or 4,392 meters), into the sky.

In a state completely bisected by such a commanding landform, the climates on the west and east sides of the state are dramatically different. Western Washingtonians, who you won’t catch with an umbrella, but instead with the best raincoats money can buy, have a sometimes soggy, but unmistakably lush landscape they call home. Eastsiders are afforded more days per year of sunshine and dry days due to the mountains blocking many of the weather systems that crash down upon folks in the west.

Regardless of what part of the state you hail from, or what area you are looking to make your home in Washington, you could honestly think of it as almost two different states: the east and west are that different. Let’s examine them.