In 1950, Edmonds was a small town of about 2,000 people working in sawmills and other factories. By 1960, however, its population had nearly quadrupled, and nearly tripled again in the 1960s, as Seattle workers sought single-family homes in low-density suburban towns. Edmonds is separated from Seattle by the town of Shoreline, whose population and land area are both bigger than Edmonds, but which is less well known because Edmonds had its own ferry across the Puget Sound as well as the train station that is the subject of this brochure.

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Apparently, the rapid growth of Edmonds, Shoreline, and north Seattle led Great Northern to stop the Empire Builder and its other premiere trains at Edmonds. The railroad’s 1956 timetable shows that the only train to stop at Edmonds was the Cascadian, which made 22 stops and as many as 24 more flag stops between Spokane and Seattle compared with the Empire Builder‘s three. According to Wikipedia, the Empire Builder first stopped at Edmonds on January 7, 1957. The June 1957 indicates that all GN trains — the Empire Builder, Western Star, and three Internationals along with the Cascadian — were stopping at Edmonds. At least initially, GN was able to do this without adding time to its train’s schedules.

To serve the increased number of passengers using the station, Great Northern replaced its 1910 depot with a larger station that is the subject of today’s brochure. Today, the station is still used by Amtrak’s Empire Builder and its Seattle-Vancouver trains.