Happy Labor Day, FDR

This was the best I could do for a Labor Day themed post — from my personal collection, a 1944 pamphlet published by a group of Seattle's American Federation of Labor (AF of L) union councils endorsing Franklin Roosevelt for re-election.

The University of Washington's Pacific Northwest Labor and Civil Rights Projects' website, "The Great Depression in Washington State," sheds some additional light on the Puget Sound region's experiences with strikes and unions during the early 20th century.

Let me tell you a story about a train car...

Yesterday we took a drive up to eastern Skagit county via the old South Skagit Highway. On the south side of the Skagit River, it's a beautiful alternate route to Highway 20 (the North Cascades Highway) on the north side of the river.

We ended up in the town of Concrete, once know for its cement production and the legend of the reaction its inhabitants had to the radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds" in 1938.

Still no Martians to be found in Concrete, but we did come upon something unexpected: a vintage passenger train car, parked just 50 feet from the Concrete Town Hall and Sheriff's office.

The car sits in perpetual slumber on the eastern edge of the Cascade Trail, a 22.5 mile former BNSF right-of-way between Concrete and Sedro Woolley. Alas, the only photo that turned out of the exterior is this one, but you get the idea.

I was surprised that when I turned the door lever on the platform entrance of the old car that it was open.  Inside, I discovered a surprisingly intact example of a mid-century passenger car.

A short hallway led me to the Ladies Lounge door, which had some graffiti on it, but was mostly intact.

To the left of the Ladies Lounge door was this original intact lithograph. Train travel was so elegant once...

Further inside, the interior wall of the Ladies Lounge door also had these original lithographs.

To the right of the lithographed wall, two sinks for hand washing, and one for "dental use"...

...and towels and cups for your convenience.

The hallway from the Ladies Lounge leads to the main cabin which appears to have become a hangout for local teenagers... they keep it pretty clean, there's even a garbage can. I think the blue and red seats may be original to the car.

This little "roomette" at the far end of the train was probably a "first class" private room, or maybe used by the conductor?

A slightly better view of the "roomette," with its lithograph and once fine wood paneling.

Beyond the "roomette" was another small room, but at this point the only light I had was from the camera flash, so I didn't go in any further.

A second view of the room at the far forward of the train car, admiring the wavy glass on the door.

On the way back out, I saw these foot rests, attached to what must be heat vents.

Last but not least: Mystery solved? This Hiawatha logo on the wall of the main passenger compartment suggests the car came from the Milwaukee Road railroad route that serviced Chicago-Minneapolis-Seattle between roughly 1946 and 1971. Which explains the hints of orange and red under the decades of grime on the exterior. How it got to Concrete, however, is another mystery....

Skagit River Bridge collapse - Then & Now

Photo courtesy Dan Kerlee

"The bridge that collapsed Thursday into the Skagit River happened about 1,200 yards west of where another bridge collapsed 110 years earlier."

Full story here.

Photo courtesy Heraldnet.com

Blogging: An exercise in brain rehabilitation

Have I mentioned I often dream of trains? Ellensburg Northern Pacific Depot,  2007. Photo by A. Miller.

If you have wondered what happened to this blog, I have been struggling the last few months with coherent writing and editing... a lingering side effect of what they refer to as "chemo brain," from my brush with breast cancer in 2010-2011.

Last summer I finally surrendered to it, and decided to take a break. I didn't intend to take this long of a break, however, but other distractions arose and the site looked to become a derelict historical artifact of its own.

But a few weeks ago, I realized something significant was missing from my life, and looking through this site's archive, I realized what it was. Writing. About history.

As with other therapies I've undertaken in the last few months, it seems that the best course of action with regard to writing is simply to keeping trying. I think an apt description is "A writer at rest tends to stay at rest."

What to expect from here on out? When my head is clear, you may see some lucid essays. When I'm feeling foggy, there will be days or weeks when I simply "show and tell" historic images and memorabilia.

So I hope you'll join me again in following my meandering train of thoughts on history in the Puget Sound region. It will be an interesting ride. 

When Seattle Was...

I've been remiss in promoting a new book, "When Seattle Was," authored by my father, Rolin Miller, and his best friend of many years, Michael Barrett. Here's the Damnation Peak Press description of the memoir.

When Seattle Was: How the Queen City Got Its Kicks Before Emeralds, Windows and Cinnamon Dolce Lattes is an anecdotal coming-of-age book about what it was like growing up in Seattle, Washington, before it was radically changed by the 1962 World's Fair.  

It was a different time before the fair: of Saturday matinees at the local movie theatre, active participation in a growing rock music scene, and relative freedom to explore the city's historically nefarious underbelly. 

Written by former Roosevelt High School classmates Rolin Miller and Michael Barrett, the 177-page softbound book tells tales of teenagers discovering oft-risky ways of entertaining themselves when Seattle was still the Queen — not Emerald — City. 

It was a more carefree time, a period of steel and stone rather than glassy skyscrapers and Plexiglass Bubbleators. 

The Century 21 Exposition, which operated from April 21 through October 21, 1962, opened the doors to out-of-towners and big-city ideas like never before. The skyline quickly grew to dwarf the Smith Tower, once the tallest building west of the Mississippi River, and Seattle's primary symbol long before the Space Needle became its new icon. Indeed, the fair may have even hastened the arrival of megacompanies Starbucks, Microsoft, Costco and Amazon.com where Boeing had earlier stood alone.  

When Seattle Was is a must-read for for anyone old enough to remember the "good ol' days" and for those who came later but want to know what it was like.

When Seattle Was contains a number of rarely seen photos of the era from several local historical archives, including the Seattle Library, the Museum of History and Industry, The Shoreline Historical Museum and others.

You can currently find When Seattle Was on Amazon.com; Volume Two (!) of When Seattle Was is expected to be released in Summer 2013.

Seattle's Seafair: a tradition of hydros and beer

It's the final weekend of Seafair, Seattle's annual summer megafestival, which traditionally culminates in the Unlimited Hydroplane Race at Stan Sayres Memorial Park on Lake Washington, and the U.S. Navy Blue Angels show.

These days I think most people outside of Seattle tend to avoid the event, myself included, because the traffic is horrendous, parking is horrendous, and there are just too many people everywhere (i.e. even worse than usual).

But once upon a time, Seafair was really more a regional event, particularly the hydroplane races, which are said to have attracted 500,000 people in their heyday a half century ago. That's half a million people -- in 1960, Seattle's entire population, according to the U.S. Census, was 557,087.

I have few bits of ephemera from "the old days" of Seafair -- including the 1961 program you see above.

My favorite part of the Seafair program, however, are the advertisements, such as this classic one from "Light"  Olympia Beer, at left.

"A brisk and refreshing companion, light Olympia Beer is always 'welcome aboard.'"

And lest we forget, "It's the Water." (the ending tag "... And A Lot More" came later in the 1970s).

These days, you're more likely to find microbrews filling the coolers of hydro race fans. One can hope that there are a few bottles of Olympia being shared out there for old times sake, but sadly, Olympia Beer is no longer even brewed in Tumwater, WA, where the Olympia Brewing Company was founded in 1896.

The Seafair tradition continues for a new generation, as Beth Knox, Seafair's CEO, insists in a Seattle Times interview last month. For the rest of us, there are just memories... and a few cool souvenirs.

On the passing of J.P. Patches, my childhood 'pal'

J.P., Gertrude, Ilga and me at the Arlington's Children's Parade, circa 1979.

My husband broke it to me this afternoon that a beloved icon of my childhood had passed away.

Chris Wedes, better known as Seattle children's TV host J.P. Patches, died today after a lengthy battle with cancer. He was 84.

Now, why on earth would I burst into tears at this news?

I think because, like many "Patches Pals" around the Puget Sound are feeling right now, I feel as though I have lost someone who, while I didn't know him personally, felt like my friend.

I watched "The J.P. Patches Show" religiously from the time I was old enough to sit up and watch TV, until the final show in 1981 — yes, 1981, when I was entering my freshman year of high school.

The show went off the air just at that moment I found myself at that fragile threshold between childhood and adolescence — where I still wanted to play with Barbie dolls, but also yearned to wear makeup (Cover Girl makeup, not clown makeup).

It was literally not just the end of an era, it was the end of my childhood.

While the show was on, though, I had the opportunity to meet him not once, but twice: first, on a tour of the KIRO-TV studios in elementary school, and the second time, during the summer of 1979, when my lifelong friend Ilga and I entered ourselves into the Arlington Children's Parade as a pair of gypsies. We won first prize in the "group" category, and were presented with a cash (!) award by J.P. and Gertrude.

At its peak, "The J.P. Patches Show" on KIRO/7 had more than 100,000 daily viewers daily and was broadcast in the morning and afternoon. It debuted Feb. 10, 1958, and when it went off the air in 1981 it was the longest running locally-produced kids show in the United States. — seattlepi.com

Now as an adult, Wedes' passing signals another end of an era, the loss of one more icon of the Seattle of my childhood in the 1960s and 1970s, a place that had true character... and characters.

So thank you, J.P., for being my "pal." You will be missed, and always remembered.