Cruising through Thurston County - Rainier Multi-Cache

Rainier was named for it’s view of Mount Rainier.

Rainier’s founding father, Albert Gehrke, a German immigrant, moved to Tacoma from Wisconsin in 1880 where he owned and operated a small German grocery.

He came to Rainier in 1890 to homestead a 170 acre claim, which includes much of the present-day Rainier. A year or two later Civil War veteran Captain C. A. Koeppen started a post office and general store.

The town was settled in about 1889 or 1890 by The Binghampton Colony sent over by The Binghampton Land company, from Rochester, New York. A regular city of dancehalls, stores, and many other things including a three-story hotel were all constructed in the town. Population had reached its peak at about 1,500 when the mill burned in the late 1920s (28 or 29) many of the townspeople began to leave. Rainier had a large Japanese community that moved on after the fire and a large German community which purchased the grade historic school/Lutheran church. Another fire in the 1930s destroyed many of the towns wooden buildings including the hotel.

In 1906 Robert Pettit from Wallville and Bob White of Tacoma started a logging camp. Five years later Lindstrom and Hanford of Tacoma bought the mill, about 1927 it was destroyed by fire

The newly named Bob-White Mill stood on the site of the present day Rainier Sportsmen club. As mill town prospered, three theaters, two grocery stores, restaurants, a doctor, and a dentist prospered.