History of Ellensburg

named the town after his wife, Mary Ellen Shoudy, and officially began the city of Ellensburgh around 1872. Shoudy was not the first settler in the Kittitas Valley, nor was he the first businessperson, but he was responsible for platting the city of Ellensburgh in the 1870s, and he was the person who named the streets in the downtown district.

The city was originally named Ellensburgh, until the final -h was dropped under standardization pressure from the United States Postal Service and Board of Geography Names in 1894.

There were several early newspapers in Ellensburg. The Daily Record, however, began in 1909 and is the name of the local newspaper today.

Concerns over the state of Ellensburg's historic downtown led to the formation of the Ellensburg Downtown Association to work on revitalizing the area