Seattle Neighborhoods: Rainier Beach — Thumbnail History (historylink.org) Rainier Beach is located in the southeast corner of Seattle on the shore of Lake Washington, just inside the Seattle city limits and not far from Renton at the south end of the lake. Dubbed Atlantic City by Clarence D. Hillman (1870-1935), who developed much of the area in the 1890s, the Rainier Beach neighborhood also includes nearby communities such as Pritchard Island, once home to a Duwamish village, and Dunlap, named for the pioneer family that homesteaded the area and logged the huge timber.