The Mercer Girls or Mercer Maids were women who chose to move from the east coast of the United States to the Seattle area in the 1860s at the invitation of Asa Mercer. Mercer, an American who lived in Seattle, wanted to "import" women to the Pacific Northwest to balance the gender ratio.

Second expedition

Mercer decided to try again on a larger scale in 1865, and again collected donations from willing men. He asked for $300 to bring a suitable wife and received hundreds of applications. However, in the aftermath of Abraham Lincoln's assassination, his next trip east went wrong, until speculator Ben Holladay promised to provide transport for the women. However, the New York Herald found out about the project and wrote that all the women were destined to waterfront dives or to be wives of old men. Authorities in Massachusetts were not sympathetic, either.

thumb|The Mercer Girls on deck aboard the Continental, sketched by [[Alfred Waud|A.R. Waud for Harper's Weekly, 1866.

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  • Original Mercer Girls, Mercer Girls chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution
  • Seattle at 150: Ordway, the unwed 'Mercer Girl,' was still well-loved James R. Warren, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, October 16, 2001