- Columbia City, a historic neighborhood in southeast Seattle, began as a townsite developed by promoter J. K. Edmiston, who built an electric rail line from downtown Seattle through the Rainier Valley along the route now followed by Rainier Avenue. It was incorporated as an independent town in 1893 and was annexed into Seattle in 1907. Manufacturers such as the Hitt Fireworks Company and Heater Glove Company sustained the local economy until World War II, when the neighborhood became home to defense workers and Hitt Fireworks switched to military production. Columbia City saw declines in the post-war years, reaching a nadir in the late 1970s when crime was a major concern and many storefronts were empty. In subsequent decades, a combination of public and private efforts helped revitalize the area. The local business community won Landmark District status for Columbia City in 1978, helping to preserve the neighborhood’s historic ambience. Once-empty storefronts have become restaurants, offices, an art gallery, and other businesses.
- Nintendo Entertainment System (allthetropes.org)
The system that brought video game consoles back from The Great Video Game Crash of 1983 in North America (they were pretty healthy elsewhere) and ushered in the modern era of video gaming. Known in Japan/Asia as the Family Computer (commonly abbreviated as the “Famicom”), in South Korea as Hyundai Comboy (현대 컴보이) and in India as the Samurai with unlicensed clones made in Eastern Europe, India, the Middle East and in China, it was the console that brought in the oldest and longest lasting competitor in the Console Wars, Nintendo. It also served as the initial console for many of gaming’s oldest franchises, introduced the modern third-party licensing model for video games, and set the standards in control pads for consoles. It is still very much an icon of video games (less so the redesigned variant).