Rainier Valley Historical Society (Out of Many, One display)

Hillman City Heritage Bell & Mural

The Hillman City Heritage Bell is a 120-year-old cast iron church bell rescued from demolition, carefully restored, and transformed into a neighborhood landmark.

Originally crafted around 1907, the bell hung in a church steeple at Rainier Avenue South and South Lucile Street, where it rang out for multiple congregations for nearly a century. After the church was converted into a funeral home, the bell was removed from the tower but remained on the property. Before the building’s demolition in 2020, the bell was saved and donated to Rainier Valley Historical Society (RVHS).

Beginning in 2021, RVHS restored the bell and selected local muralist, Cathy Fields, through a public Call for Artists. Cathy’s mural wraps the bell in vivid, narrative vignettes that trace Hillman City’s history, honoring Coast Salish peoples, early neighborhood businesses, immigrant families, and the area’s streetcar-era growth. In July 2024, the bell was installed at the corner of Rainier Avenue South and South Findlay Street, one block from its original home. It now stands as a beloved neighborhood landmark and celebration of Hillman City history.

How it represents the community’s American experience:

The Hillman City Heritage Bell represents the American experience through community action and the belief that local stories matter.

Hillman City, in Southeast Seattle’s Rainier Valley, has long been shaped by migration and change. Indigenous Coast Salish peoples stewarded this land for thousands of years. Later, settlers and immigrant families established homes, churches, businesses, and civic institutions, each generation adding to the neighborhood’s identity. The bell rang above these changing communities, marking gatherings, milestones, and daily life. When the building was demolished, it could easily have been discarded, another quiet loss in a rapidly changing neighborhood.

Instead, neighbors stepped in.

Its preservation was not required by ordinance or led by a major institution. It was saved because residents, volunteers, and a small nonprofit believed their shared history deserved to remain visible. Through hands-on restoration by locals, the bell was reimagined as a work of public art shaped by community voice.

Today, installed at a busy neighborhood intersection and freely accessible to all, the bell reflects a community that does not wait to be preserved by others, but takes responsibility for telling its own story. In that way, the Hillman City Heritage Bell embodies a distinctly American tradition of resilience, reinvention, and grassroots civic pride.

On display on the corner of Rainier Ave South & South Findlay St in Seattle, WA.