Thorp, WA

Thorp is an unincorporated Kittitas County CDP at the narrow western end of the Kittitas Valley, where Cascade forests open into ranch and farm country. The 2020 census counted 232 residents. The community sits above the upper Yakima River floodplain, about eight miles northwest of Ellensburg and near the route toward Cle Elum. Fielden Mortimer Thorp, recognized as the first permanent white settler in the valley, gave the town its name, but Indigenous villages including Klála, Tátxanixsha, and Yumi'sh were part of the river landscape long before the present town.

Thorp's working history includes a mill known for its Tip Top brand, the 1938 fire that destroyed several downtown businesses, and the Odd Fellows and Rebekahs lodge rooms above the former hotel and mercantile. Thorp Community Day brings a harvest-season parade through the village, and Thorp School District No. 400 serves local students. The Yakima River, Iron Horse State Park, Snoqualmie Trail, farms, and mountain roads make the CDP a meeting point of agriculture, outdoor routes, and the valley's layered history.