Seattle always looks to be a bit out of the way yet it is home to Boeing, Microsoft (and of course Starbucks ). Is it just chance that these and others are there or is there some underlying reason of geography or situation that encouraged them ?

It didn't hurt that Boeing founder William Boeing, and Microsoft founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen lived in Seattle. And Seattle's place as a major transportation hub, especially for importing and exporting goods from Pacific Rim countries like Japan certainly doesn't hurt either.

Fabulous answer Jelp01 !!

Can't give any information about Boeing (which is now headquartered in Chicago)or Microsoft... but

Starbucks was born and raised in Seattle so it grew from a single coffee stand to a National success. There is no mystery why it is headquartered in Seattle. It started there and the founder lives there.

Let's not forget that Seattle enjoys the invaluable benefit of being only a few hours drive from Vancouver.

'A bit out of the way'. Ha!

Fred, do you have a world map that puts the west coast of the Americas at the left-hand margin? Seattle would look like an outpost on such a plan. On the other hand, world maps printed in America often have the Americas in the centre, with Asia, clumsily bisected, at the edges. India can appear twice. This arrangement does illustrate Jelp's point, though.

Why, thank you, Tree! I knew there had to be some benefit to living a five-hour drive from Seattle, and now I found it......being able to answer questions about it on AnswerPool!

And as Ami said, Starbucks began from one stand in the Pike Street Market, and that coupled with it's founder living there explains it. What I don't quite know is how it came to begin there in the first place. The nearest I can find out is that it had to do with the shipping industry, and the fact that so many people associated with it are coffee drinkers. If anyone has better information on this, I'd like to hear it. My curiosity's up now!

[This message was edited by Jelp01 on 09-22-03 at 06:07 AM.]