George Kinnear was an early Seattle, Washington real estate developer, responsible for some of the early residential development of Queen Anne Hill

Queen Anne, Seattle, Washington

Queen Anne Hill is a neighborhood and geographic feature in Seattle, Washington, northwest of downtown. The neighborhood sits on the highest named hill in the city, with a maximum elevation of . It covers an area of , and has a population of about 28,000...

. He also had a brief military career.

He was born in Pickaway County, Ohio

Pickaway County, Ohio

As of the census of 2000, there were 52,727 people, 17,599 households, and 13,287 families residing in the county. The population density was 105 people per square mile . There were 18,596 housing units at an average density of 37 per square mile...

. His family soon moved to Tippecanoe County, Indiana

Tippecanoe County, Indiana

Tippecanoe County is a county located in the northwest quadrant of the U.S. state of Indiana. It was created in 1826 from Wabash County. It is part of the Lafayette, Indiana, Metropolitan Statistical Area....

, where they lived in a log cabin

Log cabin

A log cabin is a house built from logs. It is a fairly simple type of log house. A distinction should be drawn between the traditional meanings of "log cabin" and "log house." Historically most "Log cabins" were a simple one- or 1½-story structures, somewhat impermanent, and less finished or less...

 at Lafayette

Lafayette, Indiana

Lafayette is a city in and the county seat of Tippecanoe County, Indiana, United States, northwest of Indianapolis. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 67,140. West Lafayette, on the other side of the Wabash River, is home to Purdue University, which has a large impact on...

 on the banks of the Wabash

Wabash

Usually refers to or is related to the Wabash River in the Midwestern United States. Wabash may also refer to:Geographical features:* Wabash, Indiana* Wabash County, Illinois* Wabash County, Indiana* Wabash Valley Seismic ZoneOther:...

. When he three years old, his father purchased land on Flint Creek and, making his own bricks, erected a brick dwelling with a walnut

Walnut

Juglans is a plant genus of the family Juglandaceae, the seeds of which are known as walnuts. They are deciduous trees, 10–40 meters tall , with pinnate leaves 200–900 millimetres long , with 5–25 leaflets; the shoots have chambered pith, a character shared with the wingnuts , but not the hickories...

 interior. When Kinnear was nine, his family moved to Woodford County, Illinois, taking their livestock with them.

With the outbreak of the Civil War Kinnear joined the Forty-seventh Illinois Regiment, with which he remained until mustered out in 1864. During the war he had sent home much of his pay to his mother, intending to help her out with household expenses. She, however, had lived very modestly and invested his money, leaving him with the not inconsiderable fortune of US$

United States dollar

The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....

3600 upon his return from service. He invested in a herd of cattle which he fed through the winter and sold at an advance the following spring, using the proceeds in the purchase of two sections of Illinois land. He not only became identified with farming interests but from 1864 until 1869 held the office of Woodford County clerk.

On retiring from the county clerkship, he concentrated his energies upon the development and cultivation of his land and, while still farming, he would purchase corn in the fall and place it in cribs, selling it when the market reached, as he believed, its high point. In the meantime, he studied conditions in the developing Pacific Northwest

Pacific Northwest

The Pacific Northwest is a region in northwestern North America, bounded by the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains on the east. Definitions of the region vary and there is no commonly agreed upon boundary, even among Pacific Northwesterners. A common concept of the...

. His attention was first called to the Puget Sound

Puget Sound

Puget Sound is a sound in the U.S. state of Washington. It is a complex estuarine system of interconnected marine waterways and basins, with one major and one minor connection to the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Pacific Ocean — Admiralty Inlet being the major connection and...

 country in 1864; he came to believe that Puget Sound would someday be home to a great city.

He made a trip to the northwest in 1874, looking over the different locations. He was most favorably impressed with the site of the fledgling Seattle and before he returned to Illinois he purchased what is now known as the G. Kinnear addition on the south side of Queen Anne Hill. Four years later, in 1878, he brought his family to the northwest. He sold his Illinois land as quickly as he could, at fifty dollars per acre, and converted the proceeds into Seattle real estate, much of which rose rapidly in value.

Clarence B. Bagley wrote of him:

…from the beginning of his residence on the Sound he did everything in his power to make known to the country the possibilities and opportunities of the northwest and to aid in the development of the city in which he had located. He favored and fostered every measure
which he believed would prove of benefit to the town and country.

In 1878–1879 he labored strenuously to secure the building of a wagon road over the Snoqualmie Pass

Snoqualmie Pass

Snoqualmie Pass is a mountain pass that carries Interstate 90 through the Cascade Range in the U.S. State of Washington. The elevation of the pass summit is , and is on the county line between Kittitas County and King County...

 and as the organizer of the board of immigration he had several thousand pamphlets printed and sent advertisements to the newspapers throughout the country. As the result of this widespread publicity, letters requesting pamphlets arrived at the rate of one hundred or more per day. For several years after the printed supply had been exhausted the requests kept coming in.

In 1885–1886, at the time of the Anti-Chinese riots, he was one of the founders of the Home Guard, and served as its Captain, its highest officer

Officer (armed forces)

An officer is a member of an armed force or uniformed service who holds a position of authority. Commissioned officers derive authority directly from a sovereign power and, as such, hold a commission charging them with the duties and responsibilities of a specific office or position...

. The Home Guard joined the Seattle Rifles, the University Cadets and (eventually) Company D of the Territorial Militia in successfully facing down the anti-Chinese rioters and preventing the forcible eviction of Seattle's Chinese residents. In 1911, shortly before his death, he published his own account of the events, which Bagley described as a "correct account of the whole anti-Chinese trouble", contrasting it to earlier "inaccurate accounts".

In 1887 he donated 14 acre

Acre

The acre is a unit of area in a number of different systems, including the imperial and U.S. customary systems. The most commonly used acres today are the international acre and, in the United States, the survey acre. The most common use of the acre is to measure tracts of land.The acre is related...

s of land overlooking the Sound from the west side of Queen Anne Hill to the young city; this now constitutes Kinnear Park

Kinnear Park

Kinnear Park is a park on the southwest slope of Queen Anne Hill in Seattle, Washington, USA located between W. Olympic Place on the northeast, W. Mercer Place and Elliott Avenue W. on the southwest, the 9th Avenue W. right of way on the west, and the 6th Avenue W. right of way on the east...

.