Burien is located in the state of Washington and a suburban city in King County and is in the south of Seattle on Puget Sound. The area where the present-day Burien stands were settled in 1864 when a French-Canadian, George Ouellet, purchased several of his first land patents for the homestead site directly for the federal land office. He arrived in the Washington territory, and after three years of purchasing his homestead in Burien, he married the 14-year-old Elizabeth Cushner and started a family. It was said that the name Burien was given by the early settler named Mike Kelly after he emerged from the trees and said, “This is truly a sunny dale.” At present, a few of the long-time residents of the city still refer to Burien as Sunnydale.