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AAA Pacific Northwest Map, 1988

1988 · Pacific Northwest, USA

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Background

A full-color painting of a woman in traditional fringed dress tending an open fire fills the right panel of this 1988 Seattle tourist map — advertising Tillicum Village, the alder-smoked salmon-bake destination on Blake Island — while the left panel carries a schematic pictorial guide to the city's landmarks.

Tourmap Company, founded in 1962 by husband-and-wife team Richard and Marjorie Ingalls, published its first Seattle edition in 1964; the gold "25th Annual Edition" seal on this copy checks out (confirmed by a 1997 edition catalogued as the 34th). These maps were never precision cartography — schematic pictorial guides, with landmarks illustrated by small drawings arranged for tourist legibility rather than geographic accuracy. The ©1987 copyright date despite the 1988 cover is standard production-year offset for an annual; mailing orders were handled through a Spokane P.O. Box for 75¢ a copy.

The right-panel cover is an advertisement. Tillicum Village on Blake Island — a marine state park reachable only by boat, about seven miles southwest of downtown Seattle — was founded in 1962 by local entrepreneur Bill Hewitt, who had catered a potlatch-style salmon bake for Boeing four years earlier. The full experience: a cruise from Pier 55, alder-smoked salmon served in a re-created Northwest Coast longhouse, and performances of tribal dance. The island is believed to be the birthplace of Chief Seattle, the Suquamish and Duwamish leader for whom the city is named. The figure on the cover tends the cooking fire; the phone number printed above her was the booking line. Argosy Cruises acquired the operation in 2009; it closed permanently in 2021.

Several landmarks on the map have since transformed or disappeared:

  • The Elephant Car Wash — its rotating pink neon elephant on Denny Way a Seattle fixture since 1956 — closed in 2020; the sign was donated to the Museum of History and Industry (MOHAI).
  • Rainier Brewing Company in SODO, shown with a small pictogram, was shuttered by Pabst in 1999 and converted to an arts campus, though the rooftop "R" sign still stands.
  • Uwajimaya, a Japanese-American grocery and housewares chain, appears twice — International District and Bellevue — reflecting its dual-city presence in the late 1980s.
  • The Museum of Flight at Boeing Field had opened its glass-and-steel Great Gallery just one year before this map went to press.

Researched with claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 on May 24, 2026. AI-assisted — verify before citing.

Highlights

  • "TILLICUM VILLAGE / BLAKE ISLAND MARINE STATE PARK / (206) 329-5700" runs across the very top of the cover panel, identifying the map's primary advertiser.
  • A gold circular "25th ANNUAL EDITION" seal appears in the upper right corner — if 1988 is the 25th, the series began in 1964.
  • The cover figure wears a fringed dress and tends an open fire with a long pole — the Tillicum Village salmon-bake experience rendered as tourist-brochure illustration.
  • "Elephant Car Wash" is labeled in the upper map panel with a small pictogram; the rotating pink neon elephant on Denny Way had been a Seattle landmark since 1956.
  • The copyright line reads "©1987 Tourmap Company" — the production year — despite the 1988 cover date, and notes the 75¢ mail-order price from a Spokane P.O. Box.
  • Uwajimaya is labeled twice on the map — once near the International District and again in Bellevue — each callout marking a different store location.

Further reading