Gig Harbor

History

The Gig Harbor is the traditional homeland of S'Homamish or Homamish (), an ancestral band of the modern-day Puyallup people. The area is known in their Lushootseed language as , meaning "place where game exists". There was a Puyallup settlement at the mouth of the harbor that included six houses, and a large longhouse. This village existed until the late 19th century, with the longhouse finally being torn down by settlers in 1915. The band was later relocated to the Puyallup Indian Reservation. During a heavy storm in 1840, Captain Charles Wilkes brought the captain's gig (small boat) into the harbor for protection. Later, with the publication of Wilkes' 1841 map of the Oregon Territory, the sheltered bay was named in English as Gig Harbor by George Sinclair for his boat. In 1867, fisherman Samuel Jerisich came to the Gig Harbor area, along with many other immigrants from Sweden, Norway, and Croatia. The town was platted in 1888 by Alfred M. Burnham, the owner of a local general store and native of Albert Lea, Minnesota, where he advertised opportunities in Gig Harbor. Commercial fishing, boat building, and logging dominated the economy of the Gig Harbor area, which developed two business districts in the 1920s on opposite sides of the harbor. The first Tacoma Narrows Bridge was completed in July 1940 to replace the ferry crossing, but collapsed a few months later. Gig Harbor was re-incorporated as a city in 1981. In 1905, the Skansie brothers were the first in the area to build a gasoline-powered fishing boat. They did so at first by refitting boats with a gasoline-powered engine. Usually the motors were quite small, between 6 and 8 horsepower; the Skansie brothers originally used a 7-horsepower engine. Although these were powerboats, neither masts nor a…

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which are land and is water. It is located on the Gig Harbor Peninsula, a sub-peninsula of the Kitsap Peninsula. Gig Harbor has a marine west coast climate: Warm and dry summers, transitional springs and autumns, and cool and wet winters, with occasional snow. The annual high and low temperatures of Gig Harbor are , respectively, making for an average of .

Race & ethnicity

Most-observed species

• American Crow

  Corvus brachyrhynchos C.L.Brehm, 1822 · Aves
  32,931
• Song Sparrow

  Melospiza melodia (A.Wilson, 1810) · Aves
  32,641
• Dark-eyed Junco

  Junco hyemalis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  30,149
• American Robin

  Turdus migratorius Linnaeus, 1766 · Aves
  28,434
• Spotted Towhee

  Pipilo maculatus Swainson, 1827 · Aves
  25,858
• Black-capped Chickadee

  Poecile atricapillus (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  24,571
• Northern Flicker

  Colaptes auratus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  22,878
• Anna's Hummingbird

  Calypte anna (R.Lesson, 1829) · Aves
  21,923

Largest nearby schools

• Stadium High School
  High · Tacoma · 1,571 students · 23.4:1 ratio
• Gig Harbor High
  High · Gig Harbor · 1,435 students · 24.7:1 ratio
• Peninsula High School
  High · Gig Harbor · 1,372 students · 21.4:1 ratio
• Curtis Senior High
  High · UNIVERSITY PLACE · 1,349 students · 23.3:1 ratio
• Dr. Dolores Silas High School
  High · Tacoma · 1,114 students · 23.2:1 ratio
• Curtis Junior High
  Other · UNIVERSITY PLACE · 911 students · 22.2:1 ratio
• Narrows View Intermediate
  Middle · UNIVERSITY PLA · 712 students · 18.7:1 ratio
• Mason Middle School
  Middle · Tacoma · 659 students · 21.3:1 ratio

Most recent

• M 2.84 — 2026-05-27
  4 km W of Wauna, Washington
• M 2.52 — 2026-03-17
  7 km SE of Mineral, Washington
• M 2.86 — 2026-03-11
  2 km W of Home, Washington
• M 3.02 — 2026-02-24
  4 km ESE of Cathcart, Washington
• M 2.6 — 2026-01-25
  1 km ENE of Enetai, Washington
• M 3.0100000000000002 — 2026-01-22
  2 km NNW of Ames Lake, Washington