In 1889, Seattle had an enormous fire (which started when a carpenter’s assistant over-boiled the glue so that it overflowed onto the fire) that devastated the entire 30-block metropolis. The townspeople decided it was a wonderful excuse to rebuild the city (already chock full of logistical problems, such as outhouses located in the tidal plains—which overflowed twice daily with the tides). And their hearts were in the right place, but they certainly went about the rebuilding in a backwards way.
All the new buildings were constructed directly on top of the burned buildings, and the streets were then raised 15 feet to the height of the new buildings (yes, in that order); the sidewalks were last on the list of repairs, so ladders were used to climb down from the street to the buildings for quite some time. This new construction left chambers and tunnels beneath the city where the less-than-savory business interactions took place (gambling, prostitution, whiskey distribution to the Speakeasies (run by the Seattle police, of course), etc.). The tour is a fascinating one and the guides do a wonderful job of keeping the tourists amused with the jokes and unsavory innuendos sprinkled throughout the tour.
The tour was established by William Speidel, an historian and preservationist who revealed the history of Seattle in his book Sons of Profits (a book that immediately hit the city’s banned books list and remains there to this day). In 1962, he was responsible for instigating the campaign for the preservation of Pioneer Square in downtown Seattle because the city wanted to level its oldest neighborhood to build condominiums. He successfully saved the district and subsequently created one of the first National Historic Registered Districts in the country while also saving the country’s largest collection of Victorian-Romanesque buildings. That campaign led to the development of Speidel’s Underground Tour in 1965, which takes place in Pioneer Square.
Mary Gen Davies loves being Program Associate at the Heritage Philadelphia Program, but she is seriously considering moving to the Pacific Northwest.
Should you ever visit Seattle (or be lucky enough to live there), please promise me this: you will go see the Wing Luke Asian Museum. Never mind the Space Needle and the original Starbucks coffee shop, THIS is where the city’s incredible history resides.
The Wing Luke is the only museum in the US dedicated to telling the stories of the Asian Pacific American experience, and they tell these stories profoundly, portraying the people’s experiences in the beauty and simplicity these very cultures embody. The permanent exhibit “Honoring Our Journey,” covers all aspects of the Asian Pacific American experience from harrowing journeys to discrimination upon arrival and the strong community bonds that held them together through it all. At its inception in 1967, the museum was strictly dedicated to Asian folk art, but later expanded its mission; the museum now explores both civil rights and social justice issues while continuing to focus on contemporary art.
The Wing Luke is also a recent Smithsonian affiliate, the first in the Pacific Northwest.
In 2008, when the Wing Luke moved into its current home—the East Yong Kick Building—in Seattle’s Chinatown-International District, preservation was high on the list of priorities. Much of the wood in the galleries and comprising the main staircase are original from when it was built in 1910. They also preserved the adjoining hotel and grocery store and now offer guided tours.
Should you go to this museum, do your best to schedule enough time to go on this “Hotel Experience” tour (included with the regular $12.95 price of admission). It’s a Pacific Northwest version of the Lower East Side Tenement Museum in NYC, refurbished and interpreted just as simply and profoundly as its New York sibling.
There was minimal use of technology, and when it was used, it fit seamlessly into the hotel’s bare-bones rooms. For instance, below is a video taken in the “kitchen” of the hotel where the visitors were able to hear and see what those early 20th century Asian immigrants might have been cooking. (Look carefully at the end of the 25-second clip to see a chicken foot in the wok.)
If you’re unable to make it to the West Coast anytime soon, you can also check out this 7.5 minute video about the Wing Luke:
Mary Gen Davies loves being Program Associate at the Heritage Philadelphia Program, but she is seriously considering moving to the Pacific Northwest.
The Visitor Studies Association is hosting two workshops in Philadelphia this fall. Their announcement follows:
Are you an informal educator looking to measure the impact of your work? Do you need data to show how your program is making a difference? The Visitor Studies Association (VSA) invites members and non-members to participate in one or two introductory workshops on evaluation and/or developing a logic model. These workshops are part of VSA’s regional workshop series. Sign up for one or both. They will be held at The Franklin Institute on November 16th. Multiple attendees from a single institution receive discounted registration fees. Practitioners as well as evaluators are welcome! For more information, visit the website.
Evaluation 101, November 16, 2009, 9am -12pm
Presenters: Saul Rockman and Jennifer Borland
This workshops offers practitioners as well as evaluators an introduction to the range of issues and approaches to formative and summative evaluation. The workshop is based on the content of an existing, freely-available and accessible website focused on evaluation in informal settings. Participants explore components of evaluation strategies and review labs on the site that are available for post-workshop reference.
Logic Model Workshop, November 16, 2009, 1-4pm
Presenter: Joe E. Heimlich
This workshop introduces techniques useful in facilitating diverse stakeholder groups through the development of a logic model. Using a thought-provoking, practical, and fun format, the workshop leader facilitates participation in a Mock Logic Development Stakeholder Meeting. Interspersed “sidebar discussions” allow reflection on the group process. Workshop content includes introduction of relevant theory, research findings, and lessons learned from experience. Knowledge about facilitating stakeholder groups is enhanced by exploration of concepts like granulation, flow, linking, clustering, forks in the road, identifying audiences, and “hot spots.”
1969: The Year of Gay Liberation on view at the New York Public Library between June 1, 2009 – June 30, 2009, Jason Baumann, Curator.
And how could it not? Those of us who identify with or care about the struggle for basic civil rights in this culture cannot absorb or discuss this material dispassionately, even if it is now forty years old. The individual and organizational stories chronicled here are dramatic and compelling – drag queens who refused to be passively herded into police vans, scraggly members of the emerging and bold Gay Liberation Front, feminist lesbians proudly naming themselves The Lavender Menace, upending Betty Friedan’s famous disdain.
The objects preserved and presented here, all from the LGBT archives of the NYPL are gritty, scrappy, and fragile. They are mimeographed announcements, grainy photos, staple-pricked fliers, articles torn from magazines and newspapers. But this is potent ephemera, never coolly displayed or distantly interpreted. This is emotional territory, so emotional that many still don’t view it as legitimate history. Why have there been so few projects of LGBT history here in Philly?
Jason Baumann, exhibition curator and Coordinator of LGBT Collections at The New York Public Library claims “The year 1969 marks the first time homosexuals united, demanded, and were willing to fight for full inclusion within American society. As a result of the actions taken during this time gays and lesbians marked a paradigmatic shift not only in the ways that they saw themselves but also in how the world would see them.”
Maybe so. But I would argue that this exhibition is so celebratory that it forgets its context. Stonewall was in many ways a culmination of decades of civil rights work by homosexuals, rather than a catalyst. A rite of passage rather than a birth. On July 4, 1965, a group of gays and lesbians marched in front of Independence Hall at the first national march for homosexual rights (there’s a state historical marker in front of the Hall marking this event – really – go see it). And after World War II, many gay people chose to stay on the West Coast rather than return to their small towns. It was there, in California in the 1950s, that the first large-scale gay rights organizations in the U.S. formed, with hundreds of members (the Mattachine Society and Daughters of Bilitis).
This isn’t to deny the importance of documenting the story of Stonewall, or this exhibition and its presentation of these ordinary, extraordinary objects. The celebration is in many ways understandable. Jason Baumann’s appointment as a curator of LGBT collections is in itself a bold act worth celebrating. Pursing a truly inclusive practice of history remains an ongoing, complicated project. Those of us in the public history field know that the presentation of history is contentious, imperfect, fluid, and crucial. That’s why we go to work every day.
Bill Adair is the Director of Heritage Philadelphia Program.
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