OpenStreetMap (new tab)

Google Map (new tab)

Google Streetview (new tab)

Overview

This modernized Italian palazzo, erected in 1907, stood 5 stories high originally, and had an extra floor added during the 1910s. It was built on the northeast corner of North 2nd Street and East Yakima Avenue.

After 1931, the Miller Building operated across the street from the 11-story Larson Building, another skyscraper landmark in Downtown North Yakima, WA.

Building History

Yakima businessman Alexander Miller (1856-1941), a Swedish immigrant and miller by vocation, and his younger brother John Jacob Miller (1870-1961), financed the construction of the first tall skyscraper in Downtown North Yakima, WA. Born in the southern Swedish Skåne County (Skåne län), Alexander Miiler migrated at age 25 first to the heavily Swedish-settled state of MN, and then moved to Portland, OR, to work in the Portland, OR, flour mill of tycoon W.L. Ladd (1826-1893). He resettled in North Yakima in 1887, rapidly establishing himself in the fields of flour milling, banking and mining. He owned the Yakima Milling Company, possessed substantial real estate holdings, and had significant stakes in the 1st National Bank of Yakima, Guaranty Trust Company and the Sunshine Mining Company. By the 1930s, he was one of Yakima County's wealthiest citizens.

In the mid-1930s, the Miller Building served as one of the preeminent office locations for Yakima's financial, legal and medical professionals. In 1935, 29 lawyers maintained their offices in the Miller Block. The Yakima County Law Library was located in room #621, and the Yakima County Bar Association had space in room #626. Insurance companies concentrated their offices here; the Yakima Real Estate Company (room #224), Mutual Credit Company (room #413), Prudential Insurance Company (room #224), Metropolitan Life Insurance Company (room #410), New York Life Insurance Company (room #419), Continental Assurance Company (room #424), Mutual Benefit Life Insurance Company (room #615) and Northwestern Mutual Fire Association of Seattle (room #501) all leased space here as did at least three independent insurance agents. Many healthcare professionals also rented offices in the Miller Building, including, 11 dentists, four physicians and an optometrist. As a director of the Sunshine Mining Company, Alecander Miller could offer space to that firm for its local office. John J. Miller also had his personal office in the Miller Building in room #301. (See R.L. Polk and Company's Yakima City Directory, 1935, pp. 500-501.)

Building Notes

In 1935, the wool industry of the Pacific Northwest had a presence in the building, including the Washington Wool Growers Association, Oregon-Washington Wool Marketing Association and the Wool Growers Service Corporation, whose offices were in Room #316. At that date, too, the Miller Building Cigar Stand occupied space in the lobby of the Miller Building. (See R.L. Polk and Company's Yakima City Directory, 1935, pp. 500-501.)

Alteration

Another story was added to the Miller Building between its initial completion in 1907 and before 1918, when the WA State Legislature shortened the name of the city from "North Yakima" to "Yakima."

Demolished

The Miller Building was razed in 1986. In 2025, a branch of the Wheatland Bank operated on this corner lot at East Yakima Avenue and North 2nd Street.

PCAD id: 16603