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Snoqualmie Falls
Sacred Snoqualmie site and early hydropower landmark east of Seattle
For the Snoqualmie people, the falls are the place where Moon the Transformer created First Woman and First Man, and the mist rising from the plunge pool has long been tied to prayer. The Snoqualmie River drops 268 feet (82 m) here, at the edge of the Cascade foothills in the city of Snoqualmie, Washington. More than 1.5 million visitors a year stand at the overlook, and the falls reached audiences around the world in the opening titles of the 1990 television series Twin Peaks, which also featured the Salish Lodge perched on the rim.
The falls are also an engineering landmark. In 1899 engineer Charles Baker finished a power plant carved into the rock behind them, described as the world's first completely underground power station, and it still feeds electricity to Puget Sound Energy customers. The site's sacred standing has shaped its recent history. The falls were nominated to the National Register of Historic Places as a traditional cultural property in 1992 over the utility's objections and listed in 2009. In 2019 the Snoqualmie Indian Tribe bought the Salish Lodge and 45 surrounding acres, bringing part of the rim back under tribal ownership.