Short answers, pulled from the story.
Renton, Washington is best known as the final assembly point for the Boeing 737 family of commercial airplanes. As of 2001, roughly 40 percent of all commercial aircraft flying worldwide had been assembled at the Boeing Renton Factory.
Erasmus M. Smithers is credited with founding and establishing Renton in 1875 after discovering coal in the area. He named the town in honor of Captain William Renton, a local lumber and shipping merchant who invested heavily in the coal trade.
Renton was incorporated as a city on the 6th of September 1901, when coal mining and timber processing were the dominant industries in the area.
Boeing's construction of the Renton Factory to produce the B-29 Superfortress during World War II drove rapid growth. Renton's population rose from 4,488 in 1940 to 16,039 in 1950, a more than threefold increase in a single decade.
Boeing Commercial Airplanes, Paccar, Wizards of the Coast, Providence Health and Services, and Kaiser Permanente all have significant operations or headquarters in Renton. The Seattle Seahawks also maintain their headquarters and training facility there at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center.
The Black River largely disappeared after the 1916 completion of the Lake Washington Ship Canal. The canal lowered Lake Washington's surface by several feet, eliminating the lake's drainage through the Black River; the Cedar River was then redirected to drain into Lake Washington instead, and only a few remnants of the Black River remain today.