Columbia Sportswear Home Page

Columbia Sportswear Home Page

Columbia Sportswear Home Page

When you search for information on Washington, you'll come up with links for both the state of Washington and the national capital, Washington, D.C. (a.k.a. District of Columbia). You'll want to take care not to confuse the two.

A note on spelling: Washington State resident and Business Writing blogger, Lynn Gaertner-Johnson, says: "I live in the state of Washington. I live in Washington State. And when it comes to capitalization, it's the state of confusion." However, as she illustrates in her statement, "state" is capitalized when it comes after Washington, but not when it comes before.

Washington State History

Let's begin with the Washington Territory to discover the origins of the state of Washington. The original Washington Territory was formed in 1853. It was nearly called the Columbia Territory and it was bigger than Washington today.