Myron Thomas graduated from college, packed his bags and moved halfway across the country from Nebraska to take a job with Microsoft. The work was great and the area had much to offer. He even liked the weather.

Thomas, who arrived in 1993, is like thousands of other transplants who came here over the past decade to work in the region's emerging computer-related industries.

They helped drive Washington's 21.1 percent population growth over the past 10 years. U.S. Census data released Thursday show the state's 2000 population at 5,894,121, up from 4,866,692 in 1990.

The nation's population grew 13.2 percent, or about 33 million people, to 281,421,906, from 248,709,873 people in 1990.

Thursday's state population figures are the first to be released from Census 2000. The first numbers broken down to county and city level will be released in March.

Washington is now the 15th-largest state, up from 18th a decade ago.

Historic economic and social factors have spurred the state's growth over the past 150 years. The computer and dot.com industries are driving the latest growth, but not to the same extent as the railroad when it arrived in the late 1880s or the Alaskan gold rush that followed.

More growth came in the 1940s, as the area's military population, centered at Fort Lewis, grew in response to the nation's involvement in World War II.

The war effort also boosted The Boeing Co., which would become the state's largest private employer.

Some state economists and historians say the technology industry created by The Boeing Co. in Washington also paved the way for the incoming software industry, whose most noted pioneer, Microsoft, moved to the state in 1979.

Today, Washington is almost 500,000 times more populous than it was in its first census in 1850, when only 1,201 white people lived in what was a remote region waiting to be connected with the rest of the nation. (In those days, the census virtually ignored the American Indian population.)

The railroad and Alaska gold

That link started with various surveys and pleas to the federal government to extend that nation's railway system to the Pacific Ocean in the mid-1800s. In the 1860s, supporters of the Northern Pacific Railroad got a charter and a land grant for their project but struggled to get funding.

The Northern Pacific Railroad finally got off the ground in the 1870s - with Tacoma as its western terminus in the Puget Sound - and was finished in 1883.

Before the railroad, an overland trip to Washington took six months and was fraught with danger and disease, said University of Washington historian John Findlay.

The railroad provided a quick, cheap and safe way to get here, Findlay said. Railroad companies bought enormous tracts of land to build the railroad and would promote the area to attract immigrants to buy land and ship products via the rail lines, he said.

The railroad attracted industries and allowed shipment of more equipment for timber companies, he said, which got them farther into the forests to harvest more trees.

"In all kinds of ways, the railroads stimulate population growth," Findlay said.

When the Alaskan gold rush began in 1897, the trains out to Washington were packed with gold seekers ready to jump off in Seattle for a northbound ship.

During this time, from 1890 to 1910, Washington's population grew by almost 220 percent.

The war years

The state's next big growth period would be in the 1940s. Alan Archambault, curator of the Fort Lewis Military Museum, said about 500,000 soldiers circulated through Fort Lewis for training during World War II.

Because the post drew soldiers from all over the country, Archambault said, it also bolstered the nonwhite population in this area.

After the war, many soldiers who passed through Fort Lewis would return to the area. As Fort Lewis would remain one of the Army's largest posts, soldiers continued to choose to stay in the region after they left the service.

Col. Thomas Watson, Jr., was briefly stationed at Fort Lewis in the early 1960s. The son of a Marine, he had been moving with the military since birth. He joined the Army through the Reserve Officers Training Corps in college and served in World War II and the Korean and Vietnam wars.

Although his family often lived in Washington, D.C., between overseas assignments, they returned to Washington state in 1970. Watson retired a year later, and he and his wife, Katharine, now live in Fircrest.

"We looked around and this always seemed to be the place to come back to," said Watson, 81. "... If it hadn't been for Fort Lewis, we would never have come here in the first place."

Moving to Washington meant escaping the hot weather, high costs and hotheads of the East Coast, he said.

"People don't seem to be at everybody's neck all the time," he said.

He also appreciates being close to services at Fort Lewis. Although the post population has shrunk -- to about 10,000 soldiers - its ties outside the gates have grown as more soldiers live and interact off post.

"My feeling is it has more of an impact now," Watson said, "because it's been totally assimilated into the community."

Boeing

Part of those military ties belong to The Boeing Co. The aircraft manufacturer, founded in 1916, got its first major order as the United States entered World War I.

During World War II, when Boeing cranked out the bombers that helped the Allies win the war, the company recruited workers from other parts of the Northwest and Midwest by sending out agents and advertising in local papers, said Boeing historian Thomas Lubbesmeyer.

The high wartime wages were generally enough to get new employees to move to Seattle, he said, and Boeing employment in the local area peaked in early 1945 at about 50,000. However, it fell to 7,000 after the war.

The company bounced back and grew to more than 100,000 employees in 1966 when military contracts, orders for commercial jets and the launch of the space program kept business booming.

But by the early 1970s, the company had to cut back its production as military orders fell off at the end of the Vietnam War and the general economy worsened. Lubbesmeyer said the number of Boeing employees in Washington fell to 37,000, and the unemployment rate in Seattle was three times the national average.

Economic conditions in Washington would continue to climb and slide based on what was coming out of Boeing's plants. Today, Boeing is the largest aerospace company in the world and the largest private employer in Washington.

Microsoft

High-speed planes would give way to high-speed modems as the software, computer and dot.com industries grew in the 1980s and 1990s. State demographers estimate that since 1990, the number of people employed in computer-related industries has grown from 12,538 to 55,009, or by 278 percent.

The largest numbers are in prepackaged software, a creator of 25,473 jobs. That's primarily from Microsoft, which employs about 21,000 people in the Puget Sound area.

Shane Hope, managing director of the state's growth management program, said there's a tie between the type of people drawn to the high-tech industries and the type of life Washington offers.

"Certainly having Microsoft here helped stimulate other high-tech businesses," Hope said, "but the fact is we have a highly rated university as well as a number of other high-level educational resources and a highly trained work force in addition to having a high quality of life.

"Sometimes it's called the 'Mount Rainier Effect,' with the beauty of the environment, water and mountains," she said. "And a lot of that is appealing to young people."

And younger people, in fact, are the type that high-tech companies are often interested in, she said.

That fits the profile of Thomas, the 31-year-old software programmer from Nebraska.

He spent two summers in Washington working as an intern for Microsoft before taking the job in January 1993, less than a month after he graduated from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

"(Microsoft) is a fantastic place to work," he said. "They were literally doing things that changed the world."

Washington's winters were better than the sub-zero temperatures and blowing snow he left in the Midwest, he said. The area offers a lot for entertainment, he said, including all of the major sports teams.

"I loved the fact I was close to the mountains, close to the water," he said. "Anything I wanted to do was really close."

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Staff writers Sandi Doughton and David Wickert contributed to this report.

* Staff writer Paula Lavigne Sullivan covers Pierce County. Reach her at 253-597-8542 or paula.sullivan@mail.tribnet.com.

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CHART: We're 15th in population

Census 2000 population figures released Thursday. For more figures, check the U.S. Census Bureau's Web site at www.census.gov.

Rank / State / April 1, 2000 / April 1, 1990 / Change / Percent

1 / California / 33,871,648 / 29,760,021 / 4,111,627 / 13.8

2 / Texas / 20,851,820 / 16,986,510 / 3,865,310 / 22.8

3 / New York / 18,976,457 / 17,990,455 / 986,002 / 5.5

4 / Florida / 15,982,378 / 12,937,926 / 3,044,452 / 23.5

5 / Illinois / 12,419,293 / 11,430,602 / 988,691 / 8.6

6 / Pennsylvania / 12,281,054 / 11,881,643 / 399,411 / 3.4

7 / Ohio / 11,353,140 / 10,847,115 / 506,025 / 4.7

8 / Michigan / 9,938,444 / 9,295,297 / 643,147 / 6.9

9 / New Jersey / 8,414,350 / 7,730,188 / 684,162 / 8.9

10 / Georgia / 8,186,453 / 6,478,216 / 1,708,237 / 26.4

11 / North Carolina / 8,049,313 / 6,628,637 / 1,420,676 / 21.4

12 / Virginia / 7,078,515 / 6,187,358 / 891,157 / 14.4

13 / Massachusetts / 6,349,097 / 6,016,425 / 332,672 / 5.5

14 / Indiana / 6,080,485 / 5,544,159 / 536,326 / 9.7

15 / Washington / 5,894,121 / 4,866,692 / 1,027,429 / 21.1

16 / Tennessee / 5,689,283 / 4,877,185 / 812,098 / 16.7

17 / Missouri / 5,595,211 / 5,117,073 / 478,138 / 9.3

18 / Wisconsin / 5,363,675 / 4,891,769 / 471,906 / 9.6

19 / Maryland / 5,296,486 / 4,781,468 / 515,018 / 10.8

20 / Arizona / 5,130,632 / 3,665,228 / 1,465,404 / 40.0

21 / Minnesota / 4,919,479 / 4,375,099 / 544,380 / 12.4

22 / Louisiana / 4,468,976 / 4,219,973 / 249,003 / 5.9

23 / Alabama / 4,447,100 / 4,040,587 / 406,513 / 10.1

24 / Colorado / 4,301,261 / 3,294,394 / 1,006,867 / 30.6

25 / Kentucky / 4,041,769 / 3,685,296 / 356,473 / 9.7

26 / South Carolina / 4,012,012 / 3,486,703 / 525,309 / 15.1

27 / Oklahoma / 3,450,654 / 3,145,585 / 305,069 / 9.7

28 / Oregon / 3,421,399 / 2,842,321 / 579,078 / 20.4

29 / Connecticut / 3,405,565 / 3,287,116 / 118,449 / 3.6

30 / Iowa / 2,926,324 / 2,776,755 / 149,569 / 5.4

31 / Mississippi / 2,844,658 / 2,573,216 / 271,442 / 10.5

32 / Kansas / 2,688,418 / 2,477,574 / 210,844 / 8.5

33 / Arkansas / 2,673,400 / 2,350,725 / 322,675 / 13.7

34 / Utah / 2,233,169 / 1,722,850 / 510,319 / 29.6

35 / Nevada / 1,998,257 / 1,201,833 / 796,424 / 66.3

36 / New Mexico / 1,819,046 / 1,515,069 / 303,977 / 20.1

37 / West Virginia / 1,808,344 / 1,793,477 / 14,867 / 0.8

38 / Nebraska / 1,711,263 / 1,578,385 / 132,878 / 8.4

39 / Idaho / 1,293,953 / 1,006,749 / 287,204 / 28.5

40 / Maine / 1,274,923 / 1,227,928 / 46,995 / 3.8

41 / New Hampshire / 1,235,786 / 1,109,252 / 126,534 / 11.4

42 / Hawaii / 1,211,537 / 1,108,229 / 103,308 / 9.3

43 / Rhode Island / 1,048,319 / 1,003,464 / 44,855 / 4.5

44 / Montana / 902,195 / 799,065 / 103,130 / 12.9

45 / Delaware / 783,600 / 666,168 / 117,432 / 17.6

46 / South Dakota / 754,844 / 696,004 / 58,840 / 8.5

47 / North Dakota / 642,200 / 638,800 / 3,400 / 0.5

48 / Alaska / 626,932 / 550,043 / 76,889 / 14.0

49 / Vermont / 608,827 / 562,758 / 46,069 / 8.2

NA / D.C. / 572,059 / 606,900 / -34,841 / -5.7

50 / Wyoming / 493,782 / 453,588 / 40,194 / 8.9

Total Resident Population

281,421,906 / 248,709,873 / 32,712,033 / 13.2

- Source: U.S. Department of Commerce, U.S. Census Bureau

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GRAPH: (Population Timeline)

From the gold rush in the late 1800s to the information technology boom of the late 1900s, thousands of people have been moving to Washington state each decade.

1850: 1,201

1860: 11,594

1870: 23,955

1880: 23,955

1890: 357,232

1900: 518,103

1910: 1,141,990

1920: 1,356,621

1930: 1,563,396

1940: 1,736,191

1950: 2,378,963

1960: 2,853,214

1970: 3,413,244

1980: 4,132,353

1990: 4,866,692

2000: 5,894,121

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SIDEBAR: A century and a half of growth

* 1999: Thousands of protesters disrupt the World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle and police in riot gear cordon off much of downtown.

* 1995: Seattle-based e-tailer Amazon.com starts selling books online.

* 1989: State celebrates its centennial year.

* 1986: Microsoft stock goes public.

* 1979: Microsoft moves from New Mexico to Washington.

* 1975: Microsoft founded.

* 1966: Interstate 5 completed from California through Washington.

* 1962: Seattle is host to World's Fair.

* 1954: Boeing 707's first flight.

* 1941: Grand Coulee Dam completed. U.S. enters WWII.

* 1937: Bonneville Dam on the Columbia River is completed.

* 1929: U.S. stock market crashes, triggering the Depression.

* 1917: Fort Lewis Army post established as Camp Lewis.

* 1917: U.S. enters World War I.

* 1916: William Boeing incorporates an airplane making business called Pacific Aero Products Company, later to become The Boeing Co.

* 1902: Reclamation Service begins irrigation project in Yakima and Okanogan valleys to facilitate farming.

* 1900: Frederick Weyerhaeuser sets up a logging business in Western Washington.

* 1897-99: Klondike Gold Rush; Seattle grows quickly as a jump-off point for people heading to the gold fields.

* 1893: Great Northern Railroad completed to Seattle.

* 1889: Washington becomes the 42nd state.

* 1886: Coal mining town of Roslyn founded; mine operated by the Northern Pacific Coal Company.

* 1884: Tacoma incorporated.

* 1883: Northern Pacific Railroad completed to Tacoma, linking Washington to the East.

* 1869: Seattle incorporated.

* 1860: Gold discovered in the Okanogan.

* 1859: Olympia incorporated.

* 1853: Washington Territory created.

- SOURCES: The Washington State Historical Society; The Boeing Co.; U.S. Census Bureau