The fact that I’ve managed to maintain my sanity in this era of increasing political divisiveness is largely due to the fact that I moved to Seattle 11½ years ago. This is one of the most educated and literate cities in one of the most educated and literate states in the country, and it naturally follows that it is one of the most politically liberal cities in the country. (The city has not voted for a Republican presidential nominee since 1984.)
If I were still living in Northeast Florida during all this insanity, I’m quite sure I’d have lost my ever-loving mind. (In fact, a big part of the reason I left there is that I could feel that possibility looming on the horizon. It was a very near thing.)
But it isn’t as if this place is as pure as the driven snow. I wrote recently about some bigots in my neighborhood. And I know I’ve heard some homophobic stupidity here and there, even amongst people I know personally. I’ve experienced sexism in my male-dominated workplace and there are roadblocks in place that make it really difficult for women to get a job in my department. I don’t see that changing. I also experience microaggressions regarding my autism on a pretty much daily basis, but I often get the feeling that those behaviors are due primarily to general societal ignorance regarding the subject more than outright dislike of autistics.
It’s easy for me to float above most of the intolerance. I’m a liberal, educated white woman in a liberal, educated county, where, as of the 2020 census, 61% of the population is White, 23% is Asian, 7 percent is African American, 1% is Native American, and the remaining 7% are Latino or Hawaiian or Pacific Islander or Multi-Racial. So I’ve gotten a free pass that I haven’t earned. While I’d like to think present day intolerance here is the exception to the rule, and the local voting record supports that theory, one can never know what truly lies within the hearts of others.
But Seattle had a lot of struggles along the way in order to get to this political and societal point. There have been a startling number of atrocities that have gone down in this area. A lot of activism had to take place to get us to the point where our human rights are at their current level of better than average, albeit not excellent, health.
Just the other day, I had the opportunity to see what a struggle it has been to maintain human rights here. Dear Husband and I went to MOHAI, the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle, which is housed in the former Naval Reserve Armory that was built by the Works Progress Administration in 1942. There, I learned a great deal about the history and the struggles that Seattle has been through to make this city what it is today. And it also reminded me about some Seattle history that I already knew.
Here are just a few indicators of intolerance, and protests of intolerance, that have occurred in the Seattle area over the years. I wish it were a clean-cut list that says, “This was the intolerance, and this is what we did to put a stop to it.” That would be excellent. But life is never that clean cut. Some struggles are ongoing, and some take a variety of efforts, and many stops and starts amidst backtracking, to affect change.
This list is more of a demonstration that yes, horrible things occurred here, and yes, a lot of people have made a lot of effort to make various things better. And that second bit is admirable. It’s a heck of a lot better than horrible things happening and then having people whitewash history to the point where future generations aren’t even aware that change is needed, as is the case in many parts of this country.
Let me start off by saying that all of Seattle once was the traditional territories of the Coast Salish peoples, including the Duwamish Tribe. In fact, the very spot where MOHAI now stands is on the historic and contemporary lands and shores of the Duwamish, Suquamish, Muckleshoot, and other Coast Salish Nations. It is important to acknowledge the forced displacement of Native Communities from this land while honoring the endurance of the Duwamish people who still live here. I wish more communities did so. Having said that…
Mid 19th Century: Almost immediately after Europeans settled in this area, Native Americans were legally banned from residing within Seattle city limits.
1884: Chinese people had been contributing to the growth of America since the 1860’s, but in the 80’s, jobs got scarce and white workers didn’t like the competition from immigrants who got paid less. So they called for a ban on Chinese immigration, which resulted in the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, which blocked Chinese from entering the country, and denied residency to those already here. In 1884, a lull in the local logging industry caused a rise in local tensions.
1886: Vigilante groups met downtown to take action against the “Heathen Hoarde.” The Chinese retreated to the docks, and Deputized Home Guards were the only things standing between them and the outraged mob. The Mayor got a bomb threat, warning him not to intervene. Most of the Chinese decided to leave on the next boat. But a Judge intervened and had them escorted home, which caused the mob to get violent.
The Governor declared martial law. President Cleveland sent troops. For 2 weeks, Seattleites needed a military pass to leave their homes. By the end of the month, nearly all the Chinese immigrants in the Seattle area were gone.
1896-1899: When word got out that gold had been found in Alaska, the Klondike Gold Rush began, and Seattleites were smart. They knew that the odds of striking it rich by finding gold were slim, but the odds of striking it rich by selling supplies to the fools who were rushing up there to seek gold were beyond belief. Seattle was truly the gateway to the Yukon, and they cashed in on it. 7 out of 10 prospectors bought their supplies in Seattle. Residents may not have been willing to allow people to have equal rights, but they were more than willing to profit off of everyone in equal measure.
20th Century: Segregation this century was rampant in Seattle, reinforced by discriminatory real estate practices and white supremacy. The scars from those wounds persist.
1909: Seattle hosted the Alaska-Yukon Pacific Exposition to celebrate its economic vitality and cultural connections. Unfortunately, one way they chose to demonstrate this was to have “living exhibitions” of indigenous people from various regions to show that those people were much more primitive.
1911-1919: The Wobblies promoted the idea that the laboring class was the only group that propped up all other layers of society. Workers were fed up with low wages and dangerous working conditions, and more people became open to the idea of worker solidarity. During WWI, there were more jobs and higher pay in the Seattle shipyards, but once the war was over, wages were being cut. So in February, 1919, Seattle labor unions scheduled the first general strike in North America. (At least the museum calls it the first one, but I’ve since discovered that there was one in Philadelphia in 1835)
1922-1929: When the Seattle branch of the KKK was formed in 1922, it was the largest one in the state for a brief period. It had rallies in the area that attracted thousands through 1924, but then it collapsed when its anti-Catholic school bill was badly defeated at the polls. They sputtered along for another 5 years, and then fizzled out. If there is a klavern in the area today, it’s certainly hiding in the dark like the cockroach that it must be. It has no known presence.
1929: When the stock market crashed and the Great Depression hit, it hit Seattle hard. By 1934, there were several Hoovervilles in town. The one shown here on this map is right where the football stadium now stands. People were picking through garbage heaps. Children were sleeping in cardboard boxes.
1933-1937: The American Bund holds an Anti-Communist (actually a Pro-Nazi) Rally downtown in 1933, despite protests. Various meetings and dances continue to be held until 1937. Boeing employees, in particular, were targeted by the Nazis in the area, because they had a strong desire to infiltrate this aircraft manufacturing company. (See articles here, here, and here.)
1942: During WWII, the Japanese Americans living in Seattle were relegated to internment camps. They were given 2 days’ notice, and could only bring two suitcases and one bag each, containing only things they could carry themselves. They had to bring their own bedding, but no mattresses allowed. If they wanted to sell property or store anything or rehome their pets or livestock, they had to have it done within those two days. Then they were shipped off to Camp Harmony, a temporary Internment Camp that was located where the State Fairgrounds now stand in Puyallup, Washington. (Today, you can find a remembrance gallery beneath the grandstands on the fairgrounds.)
After that, they were shipped off to internment camps in Idaho, California, or Wyoming. But one way out, for the young men, was to join the 442nd Infantry. It was an all Japanese-American unit that became the most decorated military unit in US history.
The temporary exhibit at MOHAI that impressed me the most was called “Tadaima ‘I’m Home’” by artist Miya Sukune. It was a display of traditional Japanese dolls that many of the Japanese-American children of Seattle had entrusted to the principal of a local school upon hearing that they were about to be forcibly relocated. Many of these dolls were never reclaimed after the war, although they were kept at the school until they were finally donated to the museum in 1973.
This display is particularly poignant because the traditional role of these dolls is to offer protection and embody the families’ wishes for a healthy and happy life for each child. Those incarcerated children were robbed of a happy childhood, and their parents wishes must have seemed all but unachievable during those years.
The exhibit also included a felt flower display that was created by 150 community members to honor the Japanese-American people incarcerated during WWII. It’s quite beautiful. I’m always moved by beautiful memorials to beautiful people who were forced to experience ugly injustices.
A side note: I had a job as a Summer Aide at the Social Security Administration in Orlando, Florida when I was in high school. For some reason, the topic of Japanese Internment Camps came up with one of the permanent employees. I allowed as how the conditions were horrific and the situation was outrageously unjust, and she said, “But they wanted to go! They were happy there!” I think that’s the first time I encountered that sort of deluded thinking. I’d bet my life that if she’s still alive, she’s MAGA now.
1948: Washington State hopped on the McCarthyism Bandwagon and started a legislative committee on un-American activities. Chairman Albert Canwell thought Commies lurked in the universities and labor unions. He said these people followed policies laid out by the Soviets. Their primary targets were professors, artists, actors, and people who listen to folk music.
The committee did not allow defendants to cross-examine witnesses who testified against them. DH and I participated in a roll play in which DH acted as a member of the committee, and I was one of the accused. He asked the same kinds of questions they asked. Most of them were completely absurd. Have I read or would I be willing to read various book titles?
Seriously? Clutch your pearls! I’ll read anything if I’m curious. That doesn’t mean I’m going to turn into someone who is looking to overthrow the government. Talk about paranoia.
I also took a computer survey that the museum was conducting, and was pleased to see that I fit in with the majority of respondents. But I was really disturbed about the minority respondents. 36% are willing to say to hell with the constitution if they feel it will increase national security? 20% think the government should be able to track our library cards and monitor our phone and emails? Has history taught them nothing? Jeez…
1950: Seattle’s Civic Unity Committee, along with organized, peaceful protests, finally got all the Jim Crow stores in the city, including restaurants, hotels, bars, beauty parlors, barber shops and doctor’s offices, to take down their “Whites Only” signs and allow patronage for all.
1958: A mixed-race couple who ran a boarding house in the University District and rented rooms to black students who couldn’t find housing nearby, found a cross burning on their front lawn just outside their children’s bedroom window.
1960’s and 1970’s: This was when activists really started to rise up in Seattle and demand reforms. They spoke up for Civil rights. Native American rights. Women’s rights, LGBTQ rights. The environment. Equal Housing.
Of course there was pushback. For example, White fishermen did not want to share the fishing grounds with the Native Americans who had fished them long before the Europeans ever came. But sorry boys, the Judge did not agree with you.
I was proud to see that Washington was the first state to legalize abortion by popular vote, 3 years before Roe v. Wade. And we still allow it, thank God. No back alley coat hanger situations here. No adolescents forced to bear the children of their rapists.
1999: The World Trade Organization decided to hold its Ministerial Conference in Seattle. Activists viewed the WTO as being on a crusade to bypass local, federal, and even international trade laws in order to increase corporate profit and global domination. This led to a week-long protest in which 50,000 people descended on the city, and ultimately shut the meeting down. The “Battle in Seattle” was the catalyst for many other things, such as the Occupy movement, the Bernie Sanders Movement, and it is the reason that at many large meetings, all protesters are now restricted to locations several blocks away, out of the public eye.
2020: Seattle CHOP, the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest, aka CHAZ, the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone, was occupied by protesters for about a month, as a result of the murder of George Floyd by a police officer in Minneapolis, Seattle’s dark history of police brutality, and federal overreach in general. Due to the Seattle Police’s inability to de-escalate the situation, and to, instead, make things much, much worse than necessary, eventually, their East Precinct building was boarded up and abandoned, and the people occupied a one block radius around the station.
They created a block-long Black Lives Matter mural, seen below. (It has since become permanent, but has to be continually maintained due to vandalism.) They also had free film screenings in the street, live music, a coop with free food and other supplies, and an area for public speaking. There was no official leadership. For the most part it was reasonably peaceful, although some businesses were vandalized.
DH and I had the opportunity to visit CHAZ, and saw what it was like with our own eyes. But toward the end of its existence, there were some shootings on its outer edges, the last of which resulted in the death of a 16-year-old boy. The neighborhood had to be shut down.
Other things that have impressed me about Seattle are that we elected an openly gay mayor in 2014. We also had the only member of the Socialist Alternative Party to be elected to public office in Kshama Sawant. She served on city council from 2014 to 2024, and is now running for election in Washington State’s 9th Congressional District in 2026, in hopes of becoming a member of the US House of Representatives. And the current mayor of Seattle is Katie Wilson who is a democratic socialist. She and her husband and child rent a one bedroom apartment, do not own a car, and take public transportation to get around Seattle.
So, yes, despite its shady past, and the work that still needs to be done in this city, I am proud to be here. Let’s face it, no matter where you live, civil discourse will always need to remain dynamic, to keep greed, racism, sexism, exploitation and all the other dark forces at bay. It can be exhausting. But I’m proud to finally be living in a place that seems up for the continued challenge, especially in times like these.
It struck me, as I walked through MOHAI, that this history, and these protests, represent a microcosm of America itself. For some reason Seattle has distilled these things down to their most basic elements, and seems to have kicked the more trivial things to the curb. Still, its history is a sort of telescoped version of what is going on all over the country this very minute. Crunch 175 years of Seattle history into about 12 years countrywide, and you get a clear picture of the chaos going on, the hatred and the struggles, and the potential for positive outcomes.
Things will get messy. Making a better, more equitable world for all of us won’t be easy. But with effort, perhaps justice can prevail. At least I hope so.
So many people have been told that protests are always violent, and full of rioters and rage and destruction. That’s absolutely, positively not true. Protesters are not un-American domestic terrorists as Trump would like you to believe. They are just your friends, neighbors, and loved ones who desperately want a better world. I see Seattle’s protest culture as a point of pride.
I’ll leave you with this image, which ChatGPT created for me. Next time Trump tells you a city is on fire or in chaos, or out of control, go and see for yourself, or ask the people who live there. You have nothing to fear from us. Every protest I’ve ever been to has been peaceful and a balm to my soul. You might even enjoy our company if you get to know us.
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