"A Volume of Memoirs and Genealogy of Representative Citizens of the City of
Seattle and County of King, Washington." New York and Chicago: Lewis Publishing
Co., 1903.  p. 460.
 
SAMUEL LEROY CRAWFORD

     Born near Oregon City, Oregon, June 22, 1855, of a family connected on both
sides in the first settlement of Oregon, Samuel LeRoy Crawford is one of the few
descendants of the pioneers of the northwest that are distinguishable among the
"che-chacos" that make up the larger part of the population of the northwest
today.  His parents crossed the plains to Oregon in 1847; the father, Ronald
Crawford Crawford, to join his brother, Medorem, who had settled in the
Willamette valley in 1842; and the mother, then a young girl, Elizabeth Moore,
with her parents to join her grandfather, Major Robert Moore, who had come
across the plains in 1842 and taken up a donation claim at the falls of the
Willamette river opposite Oregon City.  Major Moore was one of the organizers of
the first civil government west of the Rockies, the provisional government of
Oregon, established in 1843.  Medorem Crawford also took an active part in
forming that government and was during the remainder of his life a prominent
figure in the political and civic history of the state.
     After receiving a common school education in the schools of Oregon City and
Salem, in 1869 Samuel Crawford moved to Olympia, Washington, with his father's
family.  While there he learned the printer's trade and worked for several years
on the Washington Standard and the Daily Echo.  Visiting Seattle and becoming
convinced that it was the most promising place on Puget Sound, Mr. Crawford came
her in June, 1876, and took charge of the mechanical department of a newly
established paper, the Daily Intelligencer.  In a few years his instinct for
news and his ability for newspaper work cropped out and he was placed at the
head of the local department.  In 1880 he and Thomas W. Prosch purchased the
Intelligencer and by enterprise and hard work made it the leading journal of the
territory.  In 1882, when the Intelligencer was consolidated with the Post as
the Post-Intelligencer, Mr. Crawford sold his interest, but remained for six
years in charge of the news department.  In November, 1888, he and another
employee of the Post-Intelligencer, Charles T. Conover, quit its service and
entered the real estate business.  Their co-partnership, later incorporated
under the title of Crawford & Conover, gave this state its soubriquet "The
Evergreen State," and has spent large sums of money in advertising the wealth
and advantages of Seattle and the state of Washington.  Mr. Crawford is
president of this corporation and is also a member of the firm of Crawford,
Conover & Fisken, general insurance agents.
     For many years a trustee of the chamber of commerce, Mr. Crawford has
always been one of its chief workers, particularly in receiving and entertaining
visitors, for which he is especially fitted by his knowledge of what Seattle has
done and is doing.  Because of this knowledge and his familiarity with values of
real estate in and about Seattle Mr. Crawford is frequently called upon to
appraise property for the federal and state governments and the large
corporations having interests here.
     Mr. Crawford has a fine collection of interesting and valuable photographs
of pioneer men and places, and his memory is a treasure house of anecdotes of
early days on Puget Sound.  He was a member of the first baseball nine of the
sound; in fact, he introduced baseball to Seattle, and was for years one of the
best amateur players on the sound.  He was also a member of the volunteer fire
department, which served Seattle well for many years, and was a charter member
of Seattle Hook & Ladder Company No. 1.
     Princess Angeline, Chief Seattle's daughter, counted Mr. Crawford, who
speaks Chinook, one of her "tillicums," and used to go to him for advice and
assistance, and he often acted as interpreter when a prominent visitor to this
city wished to interview the old princess.  After her death Mr. Crawford raised
a fund among the children of Seattle and erected a monument over her grave in
Lake View cemetery.  He appealed to children rather than adults in the hope that
contributing to this fund would make them feel linked in some measure to the
early history of their city, which he believes should be made familiar to the
rising generation, that, knowing from what small beginnings and by what
struggles Seattle has attained her present position, they may appreciate what
Seattle means to the old residents.
     A genuine westerner, hearty, generous, hospitable, "Sam Crawford," as he is
familiarly known to thousands of the old residents of the Puget Sound country
and to many of the new, is the type of the men that have made the "Seattle
spirit" famous by their pride and confidence in the city and by their united and
untiring efforts to advance her interests.  Of this spirit, which was undaunted
by a fifteen million dollar fire and which carried the city through the great
financial panic without the loss of a bank and with a steady increase in wealth
and population, no other Seattleite has more than Mr. Crawford, no other has a
deeper love for Seattle or a firmer belief that the future for which he has
helped to lay the foundation will gloriously fulfill the promise of the present.

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Submitted to the WA. Bios Project in October 2006 by Diana Smith.

Notice: These biographies were transcribed for the Washington Biographies
Project. Unless otherwise stated, no further information is available on the
individual featured in the biographies.