HISTORY
Power to the People Spokane’s Steam Plant Square celebrates its 100th anniversary BY CARRIE SCOZZARO
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The century-old building once powered downtown Spokane but has been reimagined as a restaurant space. YOUNG KWAK PHOTOS
36 INLANDER MARCH 3, 2016
nside the Steam Plant, which celebrates its 100th anniversary this weekend, is a restaurant where four of seven boilers used to stand, a brewing company in what was called the zeolite room — zeolite is a naturally occurring mineral, mined in Metaline Falls and used as a water softener — and high-tech office space in an area that once held 1,200 tons of coal. The Steam Plant is actually two buildings. Originally called the Central Steam Heat Plant, the plant is a low, sturdy structure encased in red brick with distinctly arched glass windows, and those twin, 225-foot smokestacks climbing skyward like the city’s turn-ofthe-century industrial ambitions. A viewing area was added to one of the smokestacks, which can be specially lit, such as when they glowed pink in support of breast cancer awareness. “Through our Light Up the Stacks program, we have partnered with numerous local organizations, helping them to raise awareness about their causes — causes that affect people in our community,” says the Steam Plant’s general manager, Tim Denniston. Outside, it looks much like it did on March 5, 1916, when Harry Flood, president of