Alice B. Toklas and Gertrude Stein walking their poodle, Basket, a few years after Stein’s novel The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas made them both famous. Carl Mydans / Getty
Alice B. Toklas lived in Seattle once.
She moved here in 1890, with her family, from San Francisco. Alice’s father, Ferdinand, half of Toklas, Singerman and Company, had opened the “San Francisco Store,” purveyors of fine men’s clothing, in Seattle in 1877 then commuted between Seattle and San Francisco for years. The company thrived: six office and retail buildings built near Pioneer Square (now all demolished, alas), a sales force of a hundred, and a reputation for being the most well-managed local business of its day. After the Great Seattle Fire of 1889, Ferdinand moved his family (wife, son, daughter) north to Seattle to keep a closer eye on the business. Alice was 13 when they arrived…