Roslyn was founded in 1886 as a coal mining town. Platted by Logan M. Bullet, vice president of the Northern Pacific Coal Co., the first commercial coal mining operations were begun to support railway operations. Throughout the middle 1880s, the Northern Pacific Railway, the parent of Northern Pacific Coal Co., pushed to reach Puget Sound across the Cascade Mountains. The Northern Pacific began building across Stampede Pass just west of Roslyn, approaching from Wallula, WashingtonWallula in the east and Tacoma in the west. A 77 mile (124 km) gap remained in 1886. In January of that year, Nelson Bennett was given a contract to construct a 9,850 foot (3,002 meter) tunnel under Stampede Pass, completing it in 1888. Roslyn, which lies on the route to Stampede Pass, provided the coal for the railway construction work as well as the continuing railroad operations. The Knights of Labor shut down the mines in 1888 with a strike. The mines recruited black miners from the east to replace of the striking miners. They were initially located in nearby Ronald at Mine No. 3, but after the unrest settled down, moved back to Roslyn proper. In 1889, John Buffo and Peter Giovanni opened a tavern at 1 Pennsylvania Street in Roslyn. In 1898, the tavern was rebuilt out of 45,000 bricks and took the name "The Brick." It is the second oldest continuously operating tavern in Washington. In an 1892 mining accident, 45 miners were killed in an explosion of Mine No. 4, the deadliest mining accident in Washington history. The town hit its peak population, around 4,000, during the 1920s, before the coal industry started to wind down in the area. The Cle Elum Echo (a local paper) reported: "The city of Roslyn is situated on land directly over the tunnel of Mine No. 4, and the shock caused by the explosion was not unlike an earthquake, shaking buildings in all parts of the city, while the burning, oil soaked timbers, vomited out of the shaft, were scattered in all directions, falling upon shingled roofs and causing over twenty roof fires, which were controlled by bucket brigades, all the city water and the fire department being concentrated upon the shaft and abutting frame structures, in spite of this all frame structures within two hundred feet of the shaft and tipple No. 4 were entirely destroyed." Mining featured as part of the town's economy into the 1960s when the mines, although far from played out, became uneconomical and were shut down. Approximately 80% of the coal remains unmined. The Roslyn Historical Cemetery, actually 25 separate but adjacent cemeteries, was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978. Clustered on 15 acres of woods and hills above the main street, the land was donated by or purchased from the Northern Pacific Company by fraternal, ethnic and civic organizations for burial of their deceased members. The Independent Order of Odd Fellows (IOOF); Knights of Pythias Lodge; Soloka Lodge; Wanapum Tribe 28, Improved Order of Redmen; Caccia Tori D’Africa (literally Hunters of Africa - an Italian Lodge), Croatian Fraternal Union Lodge No. 56, SNF Lodge No. 79 (Serbian); Saint Barbara Lodge No. 39 (Greek); and Dr. David Starcevich Lodge No. 56 (Croatian) are among the organizations and ethnicities represented in this cemetery. At least 24 nationalities are represented within the nearly 5000 graves. From 1990-1995, the television series "Northern Exposure" was filmed in Roslyn. Many citizens of Roslyn and nearby Cle Elum, WashingtonCle Elum appeared as extras in the show and the name of the town was featured in the show as the name of one of the founders of the fictional town of Cicely. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roslyn%2C_Washington