Ellensburg, originally named Ellensburgh for the wife of town founder John Alden Shoudy, was founded in 1871 and grew rapidly in the 1880s following the arrival of the Northern Pacific Railway.

The city was once a leading candidate to become the state capital of Washington, but its campaign was scuppered by a major fire in 1889.

John Alden Shoudy arrived in the Kittitas Valley in 1871 and purchased a small trading post from Andrew Jackson "A.J."

Robber's Roost was the first business in the valley, aside from the early trading that occurred among Native Americans, cattle drivers, trappers, and miners.

A small stone monument to Robber's Roost with a placard can be found at its original location, present-day 3rd Avenue, just west of Main Street near the alley.

[6] Shoudy named the new town after his wife, Mary Ellen, thus officially starting the city of Ellensburgh around 1872.

Shoudy had not been the first settler nor the first business person in the Kittitas Valley, but he was responsible for platting the city of Ellensburgh in the 1870s and also named the streets in the downtown district.

In 1894, the final -h was dropped under standardization pressure from the United States Postal Service and Board of Geography Names.

[7] Ellensburg was an early center of commerce in Washington and was among the first cities in the state to have electrical service.

On July 4 that year, however, a major fire destroyed much of the downtown area and stalled the campaign, which resumed with a series of referendums, in which Washington voters chose Olympia.

[2] Owing to the strong Cascade rain shadow, Ellensburg experiences a typical Intermountain cool semi-arid climate (Köppen BSk).

Kittitas County is served by the Daily Record, a newspaper published in Ellensburg five days a week.

The city maintains its own public library, which opened on January 20, 1910, using funds donated by Andrew Carnegie.