- Tacoma — Thumbnail History (historylink.org)
Tacoma epitomizes the cultural, economic, social, and technological development of the Puget Sound region and the entire state of Washington. Situated above Commencement Bay on scenic bluffs that were home to the Puyallup Tribe and other native peoples for millennia, the county seat of Pierce County possesses a natural harbor that was admired by the sound’s earliest Euro-American explorers. Tacoma won the prize of the era in 1873 when the Northern Pacific Railroad selected it as its western terminus. Tacomans have since established their community as a regional center for Pacific Rim shipping, forest products, high technology, and the arts. Ranked in the 2000 census as Washington’s third-largest city, Tacoma in the early years of the twenty-frist century embarked on an urban renaissance, with the construction of light rail transit, new museums and cultural centers, and a state-of-the-art telecommunications network.
- Tacoma, Washington (Wikipedia)
Tacoma (/təˈkoʊmə/ tə-KOH-mə) is the county seat of Pierce County, Washington, United States. A port city, it is situated along Washington’s Puget Sound, 32 miles (51 km) southwest of Seattle, 36 miles (58 km) southwest of Bellevue, 31 miles (50 km) northeast of the state capital, Olympia, 58 miles (93 km) northwest of Mount Rainier National Park, and 80 miles (130 km) east of Olympic National Park. The city’s population was 219,346 at the time of the 2020 census. Tacoma is the second-largest city in the Puget Sound area and the third-most populous in the state. Tacoma also serves as the center of business activity for the South Sound region, which has a population of about 1 million.
