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was added to the National Register of Historic Places in fal 2011. It was the home of Frances Axtell, a leading political figure in the early 1900s. In 1912, she was one of the first two women elected to the Washington Legislature; in 1916, she missed becoming one of the first women elected to Congress by only 3,000 votes; and in 1917, was the first woman appointed by a president to a federal commission. Born in Illinois, Frances Cleveland - a cousin of President Grover Cleveland - earned a doctorate in an era when most women didn't attend college. She and her husband, physician William Axtell, moved to the Bellingham area in 1894 and built the Maple Street house eight years later. She died in 1953.
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North America
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