WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.200 If I told you there was an American territory 00:00:02.200 --> 00:00:06.500 whose founding economy was actively propped up 00:00:06.500 --> 00:00:10.519 by brothels. Right. And where a sick judge once 00:00:10.519 --> 00:00:13.500 literally paddled a canoe to a shootout with 00:00:13.500 --> 00:00:15.500 a rogue governor. Yeah, that actually happened. 00:00:15.619 --> 00:00:18.019 And where progressive labor unions organized 00:00:18.019 --> 00:00:21.219 violent ethnic cleansing. You probably wouldn't 00:00:21.219 --> 00:00:24.460 immediately think of the rainy coffee obsessed 00:00:24.460 --> 00:00:26.500 Pacific Northwest. You definitely wouldn't. But 00:00:26.500 --> 00:00:30.539 today our mission is to explore a really comprehensive 00:00:30.539 --> 00:00:33.920 historical overview of Washington state. We're 00:00:33.920 --> 00:00:36.119 drawing this directly from Wikipedia's incredibly 00:00:36.119 --> 00:00:38.719 detailed historical archives. We are going to 00:00:38.719 --> 00:00:41.979 shortcut your path to being totally well informed 00:00:41.979 --> 00:00:44.840 about how this remote. isolated corner of the 00:00:44.840 --> 00:00:47.259 map evolved. We'll track how it went from ancient, 00:00:47.520 --> 00:00:50.179 wealthy, indigenous societies into a modern hotbed 00:00:50.179 --> 00:00:52.520 of political rebellion, giant monopolies, and 00:00:52.520 --> 00:00:54.679 fierce civil rights battles. It really is a staggering 00:00:54.679 --> 00:00:57.320 transformation. And what makes this source document 00:00:57.320 --> 00:00:59.619 so compelling isn't just the massive timeline 00:00:59.619 --> 00:01:02.490 of dates. It's the recurring theme of radical 00:01:02.490 --> 00:01:04.890 social experiments. I mean, from the very beginning, 00:01:05.010 --> 00:01:07.310 you see people constantly clashing over land, 00:01:07.769 --> 00:01:10.629 over resources, and over the fundamental definition 00:01:10.629 --> 00:01:13.069 of who actually belongs there. OK, let's unpack 00:01:13.069 --> 00:01:15.609 this. Because the sheer scale of the history 00:01:15.609 --> 00:01:18.579 here. is massive. We are talking about human 00:01:18.579 --> 00:01:21.980 habitation dating back 13 ,000 years. Easily 00:01:21.980 --> 00:01:24.939 13 ,000, yeah. Long before Euro -Americans ever 00:01:24.939 --> 00:01:28.099 showed up, anthropologists estimate there were 00:01:28.099 --> 00:01:32.739 125 distinct tribes in this region speaking 50 00:01:32.739 --> 00:01:34.879 different languages and dialects. And we have 00:01:34.879 --> 00:01:37.340 incredible archaeological evidence of just how 00:01:37.340 --> 00:01:39.780 complex that world was. Oh yeah. Like the Osette 00:01:39.780 --> 00:01:42.540 site. Exactly. At Osette, which is up in the 00:01:42.540 --> 00:01:45.200 northwest corner of the state, an entire ancient 00:01:45.200 --> 00:01:48.459 village was buried by a mudslide. This was triggered 00:01:48.459 --> 00:01:51.560 by an earthquake roughly 500 years ago. So it's 00:01:51.560 --> 00:01:54.140 essentially an ancient Pacific Northwest Pompeii. 00:01:54.200 --> 00:01:56.900 Yeah. Just instantly locking all that history 00:01:56.900 --> 00:01:59.060 and daily life perfectly in place. That is a 00:01:59.060 --> 00:02:01.200 great way to look at it. Researchers have cataloged 00:02:01.200 --> 00:02:04.480 more than 50 ,000 well -preserved artifacts from 00:02:04.480 --> 00:02:08.520 that single site alone. Wow. 50 ,000. Yeah, it's 00:02:08.520 --> 00:02:11.639 massive. But what's fascinating here is the sheer 00:02:11.639 --> 00:02:14.099 economic diversity among these early cultures. 00:02:14.560 --> 00:02:16.719 The geography of the region naturally divided 00:02:16.719 --> 00:02:19.560 them, which created completely different socioeconomic 00:02:19.560 --> 00:02:22.330 systems. Okay, how so? Well, you had the coastal 00:02:22.330 --> 00:02:24.810 tribes like the Chinook and the Maka. They had 00:02:24.810 --> 00:02:27.969 incredibly abundant resources. I mean, salmon, 00:02:28.590 --> 00:02:31.009 halibut, and they even hunted whales. And because 00:02:31.009 --> 00:02:33.009 they could dry and store that massive surplus 00:02:33.009 --> 00:02:35.810 of food, it essentially acted as currency, right? 00:02:35.889 --> 00:02:38.490 Exactly. Which led to private wealth. I have 00:02:38.490 --> 00:02:40.449 to say that challenges the assumption a lot of 00:02:40.449 --> 00:02:43.719 people have. We don't always associate pre -colonial 00:02:43.719 --> 00:02:46.479 societies with private wealth and strict economic 00:02:46.479 --> 00:02:49.300 hierarchies. Right. But they absolutely had it. 00:02:49.360 --> 00:02:51.879 And that private wealth actually encouraged very 00:02:51.879 --> 00:02:54.759 strict gender divisions. Really? Yeah. Because 00:02:54.759 --> 00:02:56.860 there was so much aggressive competition and 00:02:56.860 --> 00:02:59.099 captive taking among the wealthy coastal tribes 00:02:59.099 --> 00:03:02.460 to maintain that status, the men primarily focused 00:03:02.460 --> 00:03:05.900 on warring. Meanwhile, the women took on highly 00:03:05.900 --> 00:03:08.419 prominent roles as traders, managing and growing 00:03:08.419 --> 00:03:11.270 that wealth. But then you look to the east. at 00:03:11.270 --> 00:03:13.810 the Plateau tribes, and it is a completely different 00:03:13.810 --> 00:03:16.330 social structure. Entirely different. The Plateau 00:03:16.330 --> 00:03:19.110 tribes lived in a much harsher environment. They 00:03:19.110 --> 00:03:22.810 relied on seasonal hunting, fishing, and gathering. 00:03:23.030 --> 00:03:25.650 So just a lot more work to get by. Exactly. The 00:03:25.650 --> 00:03:29.129 sheer caloric workload to simply survive was 00:03:29.129 --> 00:03:31.789 immense, which meant both men and women had to 00:03:31.789 --> 00:03:34.009 share the food gathering duties equally. Oh, 00:03:34.009 --> 00:03:36.449 wow. Because everyone's labor was literally keeping 00:03:36.449 --> 00:03:39.370 the community alive, it naturally evolved into 00:03:39.370 --> 00:03:42.430 a highly egalitarian in society based on shared 00:03:42.430 --> 00:03:45.229 labor. And we know this stood out to early Euro 00:03:45.229 --> 00:03:47.349 -Americans, because when the Lewis and Clark 00:03:47.349 --> 00:03:50.729 expedition arrived in 1805, Meriwether Lewis 00:03:50.729 --> 00:03:53.530 specifically wrote about it in his journal. He 00:03:53.530 --> 00:03:56.050 was completely shocked by the unusually high 00:03:56.050 --> 00:03:58.789 status of women and the elderly in these tribes. 00:03:59.250 --> 00:04:01.789 He actually hypothesized that their social equality 00:04:01.789 --> 00:04:04.889 was directly linked to this evenly distributed 00:04:04.889 --> 00:04:07.629 economic role. Right, and he was observing a 00:04:07.629 --> 00:04:09.909 socioeconomic mechanism that had been functioning 00:04:09.909 --> 00:04:11.969 for centuries. It just proves that this region 00:04:11.969 --> 00:04:14.610 wasn't some, you know, empty wilderness waiting 00:04:14.610 --> 00:04:17.709 to be discovered. It was already hosting dynamic, 00:04:17.949 --> 00:04:20.149 sophisticated societies long before colonists 00:04:20.149 --> 00:04:22.629 arrived. But of course, that immense natural 00:04:22.629 --> 00:04:25.350 wealth, the endless salmon, the furs, the towering 00:04:25.350 --> 00:04:28.189 timber, it doesn't stay a secret forever. Unfortunately 00:04:28.189 --> 00:04:31.350 not. Which brings us to an incredibly messy geopolitical 00:04:31.350 --> 00:04:35.639 land grab. By the late 1700s and early 1800s, 00:04:35.699 --> 00:04:39.680 you have this chaotic mix of Spanish, Russian, 00:04:39.899 --> 00:04:42.879 British, and American ships all probing the coastline. 00:04:43.079 --> 00:04:46.209 It was essentially a multi -empire pileup. And 00:04:46.209 --> 00:04:48.509 the United States and Britain, trying to avoid 00:04:48.509 --> 00:04:51.629 a full -scale war over the territory, initially 00:04:51.629 --> 00:04:54.389 agreed to jointly occupy the region in 1818. 00:04:54.529 --> 00:04:56.209 Which honestly sounds like a terrible roommate 00:04:56.209 --> 00:04:58.790 situation. How do two competing empires just 00:04:58.790 --> 00:05:00.889 share a massive territory? Well, functionally, 00:05:00.889 --> 00:05:04.029 it was a geopolitical staring contest. Both empires 00:05:04.029 --> 00:05:06.250 agreed to leave the borders open, secretly hoping 00:05:06.250 --> 00:05:07.930 they could just out -populate the other side 00:05:07.930 --> 00:05:09.990 with their own citizens. Claim the land by default. 00:05:10.110 --> 00:05:13.149 Exactly. But it led to bizarre border conflicts. 00:05:13.329 --> 00:05:16.139 At one point, tensions over the exact boundary 00:05:16.139 --> 00:05:18.259 line on the San Juan Islands resulted in the 00:05:18.259 --> 00:05:21.660 1859 Pig War. The Pig War. Yeah, it literally 00:05:21.660 --> 00:05:24.959 started over an American shooting a British -owned 00:05:24.959 --> 00:05:27.720 pig that was rooting in his garden. That is wild. 00:05:27.860 --> 00:05:30.680 And it escalated so quickly with local military 00:05:30.680 --> 00:05:33.519 forces that it almost sparked a war between two 00:05:33.519 --> 00:05:37.120 global superpowers over a pig. And the geopolitical 00:05:37.120 --> 00:05:40.240 scheming didn't stop with farm animals. During 00:05:40.240 --> 00:05:42.480 the American Civil War, British Governor James 00:05:42.480 --> 00:05:45.339 Douglas up in British Columbia actually proposed 00:05:45.339 --> 00:05:48.259 that the British Royal Navy invade and seize 00:05:48.259 --> 00:05:51.000 Washington territory. He really did. His logic 00:05:51.000 --> 00:05:53.579 was basically, hey, the U .S. is distracted fighting 00:05:53.579 --> 00:05:55.980 itself. The troops are gone. Let's just sail 00:05:55.980 --> 00:05:58.399 down and take it. Britain ultimately declined 00:05:58.399 --> 00:06:00.959 his proposal so as not to risk a larger war with 00:06:00.959 --> 00:06:03.600 the U .S. But it highlights just how tenuous 00:06:03.600 --> 00:06:06.199 the American grip on this land really was. And 00:06:06.199 --> 00:06:08.399 the people who were actually settling this contested 00:06:08.399 --> 00:06:10.660 land were incredibly diverse. It wasn't just, 00:06:10.660 --> 00:06:12.660 you know, monolithic groups of white pioneers 00:06:12.660 --> 00:06:15.199 in covered wagons. Not at all. Early fur traders 00:06:15.199 --> 00:06:17.540 have been partnering with native women for decades, 00:06:18.060 --> 00:06:20.639 creating a large established Métis or mixed race 00:06:20.639 --> 00:06:24.339 population. And then. In 1846, the settlement 00:06:24.339 --> 00:06:26.519 of Tumwater was founded by George Washington 00:06:26.519 --> 00:06:30.040 Bush, a Black pioneer. Who moved his family all 00:06:30.040 --> 00:06:32.220 the way from Missouri to the Pacific Northwest. 00:06:32.360 --> 00:06:34.279 Wait, let me get this timeline straight. He moved 00:06:34.279 --> 00:06:38.379 in 1846. Yes. That is well before the Civil War. 00:06:39.139 --> 00:06:42.500 How is a Black pioneer navigating the frontier? 00:06:42.829 --> 00:06:45.889 when neighboring territories were legally hostile 00:06:45.889 --> 00:06:48.670 to his very existence. That is the crucial detail 00:06:48.670 --> 00:06:51.350 here. He traveled there specifically to escape 00:06:51.350 --> 00:06:53.589 the racist settlement laws of the neighboring 00:06:53.589 --> 00:06:57.029 Oregon Territory. Oh, wow. Yeah, Oregon literally 00:06:57.029 --> 00:06:59.610 passed laws banning black people from residing 00:06:59.610 --> 00:07:02.850 there under threat of public whipping. So Bush 00:07:02.850 --> 00:07:05.490 pushes further north into Washington, where the 00:07:05.490 --> 00:07:07.689 lack of formal government meant a lack of formal 00:07:07.689 --> 00:07:10.610 racial exclusion. Meanwhile... Over in early 00:07:10.610 --> 00:07:12.269 Seattle, which was originally called Dewamps, 00:07:12.829 --> 00:07:16.000 you have city founder Doc Maynard. and Doc Maynard 00:07:16.000 --> 00:07:19.019 actively supported well -run prostitution as 00:07:19.019 --> 00:07:21.240 a foundational pillar of the local economy. He 00:07:21.240 --> 00:07:23.379 did. He realized that the town was populated 00:07:23.379 --> 00:07:26.139 mostly by single young male loggers and miners 00:07:26.139 --> 00:07:28.420 who had cash but nowhere to spend it. Right. 00:07:28.500 --> 00:07:31.180 By supporting organized brothels, he ensured 00:07:31.180 --> 00:07:33.399 that money stayed circulating within the local 00:07:33.399 --> 00:07:36.060 economy rather than leaving the territory. He 00:07:36.060 --> 00:07:38.399 was functionally dropping up the early settlements 00:07:38.399 --> 00:07:40.420 infrastructure. Okay, I have to jump in here. 00:07:40.839 --> 00:07:43.680 because we picture pioneers as these puritanical 00:07:43.680 --> 00:07:47.500 groups taming the frontier. Sure. But here we 00:07:47.500 --> 00:07:50.680 have a Black founder deliberately escaping racist 00:07:50.680 --> 00:07:54.139 laws, a major city being funded by brothels, 00:07:54.439 --> 00:07:56.779 and a British governor plotting a sneak attack. 00:07:57.459 --> 00:07:59.720 Was there any actual law and order here? The 00:07:59.720 --> 00:08:02.959 reality is that extreme geographical isolation 00:08:02.959 --> 00:08:06.139 forced a very unique pragmatism. When you are 00:08:06.139 --> 00:08:08.079 thousands of miles from the federal government, 00:08:08.319 --> 00:08:10.860 cut off by the Rocky Mountains, you have to rely 00:08:10.860 --> 00:08:13.339 on the people immediately around you to survive. 00:08:13.620 --> 00:08:15.160 Regardless of their background or profession. 00:08:15.339 --> 00:08:18.060 Exactly. It created strange political alliances 00:08:18.060 --> 00:08:21.079 and a very deep sense of local autonomy. But 00:08:21.079 --> 00:08:23.879 that pragmatic, live and let live attitude was 00:08:23.879 --> 00:08:26.199 about to collide violently with federal authority. 00:08:26.639 --> 00:08:29.819 Enter Governor Isaac Stevens in the 1850s. If 00:08:29.819 --> 00:08:32.620 isolation bred pragmatism, Stevens was the exact 00:08:32.620 --> 00:08:34.899 opposite. Here's where it gets really interesting. 00:08:35.580 --> 00:08:37.840 Because Stevens was hawkish, he was authoritarian, 00:08:38.179 --> 00:08:40.220 and he was federally appointed. He wasn't elected 00:08:40.220 --> 00:08:43.120 by the locals. And his primary mandate was to 00:08:43.120 --> 00:08:46.279 secure the land for American settlement. He accomplished 00:08:46.279 --> 00:08:49.080 this through a series of rapid treaties that 00:08:49.080 --> 00:08:51.580 essentially coerced tribes into giving up their 00:08:51.580 --> 00:08:54.340 ancestral lands and moving to designated reservations. 00:08:55.080 --> 00:08:58.320 But treaties on paper rarely hold up against 00:08:58.320 --> 00:09:02.039 greed. In 1855, gold is discovered on the newly 00:09:02.039 --> 00:09:04.519 established Yakama reservation. Always gold. 00:09:05.059 --> 00:09:07.899 Always. White miners immediately flood the area, 00:09:08.139 --> 00:09:10.639 ignoring the treaties completely. And this sparks 00:09:10.639 --> 00:09:12.720 a brutal series of conflicts known generally 00:09:12.720 --> 00:09:16.759 as the Indian Wars from 1855 to 1858. The violence 00:09:16.759 --> 00:09:19.470 was systemic and devastating. Chief Leshy of 00:09:19.470 --> 00:09:21.730 the Niskaly tribe refused to accept the Treaty 00:09:21.730 --> 00:09:23.690 of Medicine Creek, which demanded his people 00:09:23.690 --> 00:09:26.490 cede their lands. Right. He pulled out of negotiations, 00:09:26.870 --> 00:09:29.190 which sparked the Puget Sound War. And Leshy 00:09:29.190 --> 00:09:31.389 was eventually captured and executed by the territorial 00:09:31.389 --> 00:09:34.730 government for murder. But the trial was incredibly 00:09:34.730 --> 00:09:38.509 controversial. Because his defense argued a crucial 00:09:38.509 --> 00:09:41.580 legal distinction. that the killing of a militia 00:09:41.580 --> 00:09:44.220 man occurred during active combat, making it 00:09:44.220 --> 00:09:47.700 an act of war, not a civil murder. Exactly. The 00:09:47.700 --> 00:09:50.019 first trial actually ended in a hung jury because 00:09:50.019 --> 00:09:52.360 locals understood that distinction. It wasn't 00:09:52.360 --> 00:09:54.899 until a second trial under intense political 00:09:54.899 --> 00:09:57.740 pressure that he was convicted. Wow. In fact, 00:09:57.899 --> 00:09:59.940 the legal foundation of his conviction was so 00:09:59.940 --> 00:10:02.840 flawed that Chief Leshy was formally exonerated 00:10:02.840 --> 00:10:05.919 by a historical court in 2014. But what Governor 00:10:05.919 --> 00:10:08.700 Stevens did during this war to maintain control 00:10:08.700 --> 00:10:11.720 is just mind -blowing. He suspected that some 00:10:11.720 --> 00:10:14.740 of the local citizens, specifically former Hudson's 00:10:14.740 --> 00:10:17.039 Bay Company men who had married Native women, 00:10:17.639 --> 00:10:19.559 he thought they were covertly aiding the Native 00:10:19.559 --> 00:10:22.899 tribes. Yes. So to arrest them without due process, 00:10:23.220 --> 00:10:25.500 Stevens unilaterally declares martial law. He 00:10:25.500 --> 00:10:27.860 completely suspends the functions of all civil 00:10:27.860 --> 00:10:29.899 officers in Pierce County, which prompts Chief 00:10:29.899 --> 00:10:32.539 Territorial Justice Francis Chenoweth to try 00:10:32.539 --> 00:10:35.120 and stop Stevens by issuing a writ of habeas 00:10:35.120 --> 00:10:37.440 corpus for the prisoners. And for those unfamiliar 00:10:37.440 --> 00:10:40.539 with the term, a writ of habeas corpus is basically 00:10:40.539 --> 00:10:43.100 a fundamental legal demand that the government 00:10:43.100 --> 00:10:46.299 prove it has a valid lawful reason to hold someone 00:10:46.299 --> 00:10:48.690 in jail. You can't just lock people up on suspicion. 00:10:49.090 --> 00:10:51.629 Right. But Stevens ignores the law completely 00:10:51.629 --> 00:10:54.110 and actually sends soldiers to arrest the judge. 00:10:54.309 --> 00:10:57.669 This part is wild. Chenoweth, who is recovering 00:10:57.669 --> 00:11:00.450 from a severe illness at the time, literally 00:11:00.450 --> 00:11:04.090 paddles a canoe from Whidbey Island all the way 00:11:04.090 --> 00:11:07.590 to Pierce County to physically hold court. Paddling 00:11:07.590 --> 00:11:10.909 a canoe while sick. Yes. He shows up. backed 00:11:10.909 --> 00:11:14.370 by a 50 -man local militia to fight off the governor's 00:11:14.370 --> 00:11:16.690 federal troops. They have an armed standoff at 00:11:16.690 --> 00:11:18.610 the courthouse. This raises an important question, 00:11:18.789 --> 00:11:20.610 though. When you look at that standoff, you are 00:11:20.610 --> 00:11:23.029 literally watching the DNA of Washington state 00:11:23.029 --> 00:11:26.269 being forged in real time. How so? That intense 00:11:26.269 --> 00:11:28.429 hatred of federal overreach, it starts right 00:11:28.429 --> 00:11:30.490 there. The citizens viewed the federal government 00:11:30.490 --> 00:11:32.889 as overbearing and completely out of touch with 00:11:32.889 --> 00:11:36.149 local realities. That anti -authoritarian sentiment 00:11:36.149 --> 00:11:38.990 was forged at Dunpoint during this era of martial 00:11:38.990 --> 00:11:42.460 law. And that intense distrust didn't just fade 00:11:42.460 --> 00:11:46.340 away. It seamlessly morphed into a massive statewide 00:11:46.340 --> 00:11:49.139 populist explosion a few decades later. Right. 00:11:49.299 --> 00:11:53.740 By the 1880s and 1890s, the enemy wasn't an authoritarian 00:11:53.740 --> 00:11:57.039 governor anymore. It was massive corporate monopolies 00:11:57.039 --> 00:11:59.059 like the railroads, specifically the Northern 00:11:59.059 --> 00:12:01.679 Pacific Railroad, which controlled vast amounts 00:12:01.679 --> 00:12:04.200 of land and entirely dictated the economic life 00:12:04.200 --> 00:12:06.500 of the local farmers and workers by controlling 00:12:06.500 --> 00:12:08.740 shipping rates. So in response to this corporate 00:12:08.740 --> 00:12:11.679 strength, hold. This radical third party called 00:12:11.679 --> 00:12:14.360 the People's Party explodes in popularity. The 00:12:14.360 --> 00:12:17.299 populace. Yeah. They swept into power with this 00:12:17.299 --> 00:12:20.200 massive almost utopian list of progressive reforms. 00:12:20.480 --> 00:12:22.360 They wanted to bust the monopolies. They fought 00:12:22.360 --> 00:12:24.860 for equal pay regardless of race or sex. They 00:12:24.860 --> 00:12:26.720 pushed for women's suffrage. Very progressive 00:12:26.720 --> 00:12:29.379 for the time. In 1895, populist governor John 00:12:29.379 --> 00:12:32.139 Rogers tasked the Barefoot Schoolboy Act, which 00:12:32.139 --> 00:12:34.259 guaranteed basic education funding for every 00:12:34.259 --> 00:12:37.559 child. rich or poor, by ensuring the state taxed 00:12:37.559 --> 00:12:39.759 corporate wealth to pay for local schools. On 00:12:39.759 --> 00:12:42.019 paper, it looks incredible. But of course, when 00:12:42.019 --> 00:12:44.159 you dig into the historical reality from the 00:12:44.159 --> 00:12:46.659 sources, it is much, much darker. There is a 00:12:46.659 --> 00:12:49.259 violently exclusionary side to this populist 00:12:49.259 --> 00:12:50.879 labor movement. And this is where the history 00:12:50.879 --> 00:12:54.080 takes a really grim turn, because this same populist 00:12:54.080 --> 00:12:58.000 movement was virulently anti -Asian. Yes. The 00:12:58.000 --> 00:13:00.340 wealthy capitalists and railroad barons were 00:13:00.340 --> 00:13:03.120 importing cheap Chinese labor to work the mines 00:13:03.120 --> 00:13:05.519 and lay the tracks. OK. And the white working 00:13:05.519 --> 00:13:08.080 class, who made up the base of this populist 00:13:08.080 --> 00:13:10.679 movement, reacted to this economic pressure with 00:13:10.679 --> 00:13:14.340 horrific racial violence. In 1885, vigilante 00:13:14.340 --> 00:13:17.600 groups in Tacoma forcefully expelled all 700 00:13:17.600 --> 00:13:19.740 Chinese Americans from the city. They dragged 00:13:19.740 --> 00:13:22.000 them from their homes and burned their businesses 00:13:22.000 --> 00:13:26.429 to the ground. A year later. In 1886, a violent 00:13:26.429 --> 00:13:28.669 mob tried to do the exact same thing in Seattle. 00:13:28.870 --> 00:13:31.309 The Seattle riot descended into absolute anarchy. 00:13:31.470 --> 00:13:33.830 The mob was going door to door, kidnapping Chinese 00:13:33.830 --> 00:13:36.250 residents to force them onto boats out of the 00:13:36.250 --> 00:13:38.629 city. But in Seattle, there was armed pushback. 00:13:38.909 --> 00:13:41.370 Sheriff John McGraw actually led a local militia 00:13:41.370 --> 00:13:43.850 called the Seattle Rifles to protect the captured 00:13:43.850 --> 00:13:46.070 Chinese citizens. Yeah, that was a huge moment. 00:13:46.320 --> 00:13:48.759 They physically barged through the mob to take 00:13:48.759 --> 00:13:51.500 the victims into protective custody, and it resulted 00:13:51.500 --> 00:13:53.659 in a shootout in the streets. The territorial 00:13:53.659 --> 00:13:56.299 governor had to declare martial law again. just 00:13:56.299 --> 00:13:59.100 to quell the violence. But the tragic reality 00:13:59.100 --> 00:14:02.399 is that despite these efforts, many Chinese residents 00:14:02.399 --> 00:14:05.919 were still illegally deported. And the political 00:14:05.919 --> 00:14:09.100 fallout reveals a lot. The politicians like Sheriff 00:14:09.100 --> 00:14:11.620 McGraw and the mayor, who tried to protect the 00:14:11.620 --> 00:14:14.299 Chinese citizens, were swiftly voted out of office 00:14:14.299 --> 00:14:16.320 in the next election. Wait, I really need to 00:14:16.320 --> 00:14:18.559 pause here. So the exact same political party 00:14:18.559 --> 00:14:21.460 that was fighting for women's suffrage, universal 00:14:21.460 --> 00:14:24.940 education and equal pay was simultaneously organizing 00:14:24.940 --> 00:14:27.549 violence ethnic cleansing. How does that even 00:14:27.549 --> 00:14:30.649 compute? It is a stark paradox, but we have to 00:14:30.649 --> 00:14:33.090 look at how economic fear was weaponized according 00:14:33.090 --> 00:14:35.470 to the historical accounts. The labor movements 00:14:35.470 --> 00:14:38.230 in Washington during the 1880s were entirely 00:14:38.230 --> 00:14:41.250 focused on protecting white working class interests 00:14:41.250 --> 00:14:44.029 against the crushing weight of corporate monopolies. 00:14:44.049 --> 00:14:46.769 They did not view Asian immigrants as fellow 00:14:46.769 --> 00:14:49.870 workers in the struggle for labor rights because 00:14:49.870 --> 00:14:52.210 the Chinese laborers were deliberately brought 00:14:52.210 --> 00:14:55.370 in by the wealthy elite to break strikes and 00:14:55.370 --> 00:14:58.370 undercut local wages. So they blame the laborers. 00:14:58.710 --> 00:15:01.129 Exactly. The white working class viewed them 00:15:01.129 --> 00:15:04.649 purely as tools of the capitalists. The progressive 00:15:04.649 --> 00:15:07.370 ideals of equality simply did not extend across 00:15:07.370 --> 00:15:10.230 racial lines. It's a chilling reminder of how 00:15:10.230 --> 00:15:13.990 easily economic anxiety can be misdirected. So 00:15:13.990 --> 00:15:16.210 how does a territory with that kind of intense 00:15:16.210 --> 00:15:19.149 racial violence somehow go on to become a pioneer 00:15:19.149 --> 00:15:21.450 for civil rights in the 20th century? It was 00:15:21.450 --> 00:15:24.070 a gradual, hard -fought transformation driven 00:15:24.070 --> 00:15:26.929 by massive economic shifts. As we move into the 00:15:26.929 --> 00:15:29.490 20th century, World War II acts as a massive 00:15:29.490 --> 00:15:31.570 catalyst. Because of the industrial boom. Yeah. 00:15:31.789 --> 00:15:34.330 You have Boeing aircraft, sprawling shipyards, 00:15:34.429 --> 00:15:37.049 and the Hanford Works, which brought in thousands 00:15:37.049 --> 00:15:39.409 of workers to produce the plutonium for the Fat 00:15:39.409 --> 00:15:42.029 Man atomic bomb. And this industrial boom completely 00:15:42.029 --> 00:15:45.149 rewired the demographics. With so many men drafted, 00:15:45.309 --> 00:15:47.629 the industrial machine desperately needed labor. 00:15:47.870 --> 00:15:50.070 One -fourth of the shipyard laborers were women. 00:15:50.240 --> 00:15:52.799 And because the factories literally could not 00:15:52.799 --> 00:15:55.200 function if mothers were at home, this led to 00:15:55.200 --> 00:15:57.200 one of the first government -funded workplace 00:15:57.200 --> 00:16:00.379 child care centers in the country. That wartime 00:16:00.379 --> 00:16:03.179 boom brought highly diverse populations into 00:16:03.179 --> 00:16:05.639 the cities, which laid the critical groundwork 00:16:05.639 --> 00:16:08.279 for the civil rights movements of the 1960s and 00:16:08.279 --> 00:16:10.799 70s. Like what happened with Wing Luke. Exactly. 00:16:11.220 --> 00:16:14.759 In 1962, Wing Luke became the first Asian -American 00:16:14.759 --> 00:16:17.340 to hold office in the Pacific Northwest, and 00:16:17.340 --> 00:16:20.080 he successfully fought to pass an open housing 00:16:20.080 --> 00:16:22.779 ordinance. And that was a legal mechanism that 00:16:22.779 --> 00:16:26.600 made it illegal to refuse to sell or rent a house 00:16:26.600 --> 00:16:28.960 to someone based on their race. Right. Directly 00:16:28.960 --> 00:16:30.919 combating the practice of redlining. And then 00:16:30.919 --> 00:16:33.519 you have the fish wars, which is such a powerful 00:16:33.519 --> 00:16:36.179 chapter. Native American activists were fighting 00:16:36.179 --> 00:16:38.340 against commercial fishing companies and state 00:16:38.340 --> 00:16:41.299 regulations that were eroding their treaty rights. 00:16:41.440 --> 00:16:43.799 Right. Leaders like Billy Frank Jr. of the Niskoli 00:16:43.799 --> 00:16:46.600 tribe and Bernie White Bear organized what they 00:16:46.600 --> 00:16:49.879 called fish in protests. Like sit ins. Mirroring 00:16:49.879 --> 00:16:52.080 the sit ins of the civil rights movement. Yeah. 00:16:52.399 --> 00:16:54.620 They would intentionally fish in contested waters 00:16:54.620 --> 00:16:57.240 getting arrested. publicly to force the courts 00:16:57.240 --> 00:16:59.539 to actually enforce the rights guaranteed to 00:16:59.539 --> 00:17:02.899 them back in the 1850s. The very treaties Isaac 00:17:02.899 --> 00:17:05.299 Stevens forced upon them. And their strategy 00:17:05.299 --> 00:17:08.500 worked. Their activism resulted in the landmark 00:17:08.500 --> 00:17:12.779 1974 bolt decision by the US Supreme Court, which 00:17:12.779 --> 00:17:15.619 legally reaffirmed their right to fish in their 00:17:15.619 --> 00:17:18.200 traditional waters. It was huge. And to show 00:17:18.200 --> 00:17:20.730 you Just how much the narrative has shifted over 00:17:20.730 --> 00:17:24.589 time in 2021, Washington passed a law to replace 00:17:24.589 --> 00:17:27.329 the state's statue of a white missionary in the 00:17:27.329 --> 00:17:30.269 U .S. Capitol with a statue of Billy Frank Jr. 00:17:30.589 --> 00:17:33.809 It's a profound reclaiming of history. And this 00:17:33.809 --> 00:17:36.289 era also saw the rise of the Gang of Four in 00:17:36.289 --> 00:17:38.450 Seattle. Who really? This was Bernie White Bear, 00:17:38.670 --> 00:17:40.950 Bob Santos, Roberta Maestas and Larry Gossett. 00:17:41.039 --> 00:17:44.279 They formed a radical, uniquely multiracial coalition 00:17:44.279 --> 00:17:46.880 of Native American, Asian American, Latino, and 00:17:46.880 --> 00:17:48.720 Black activists. Which is incredible because 00:17:48.720 --> 00:17:51.200 historically, marginalized groups were often 00:17:51.200 --> 00:17:53.240 pitted against each other to compete for the 00:17:53.240 --> 00:17:55.779 same small pool of government grants. But they 00:17:55.779 --> 00:17:57.519 realized that fighting each other for crumbs 00:17:57.519 --> 00:17:59.980 was exactly what the establishment wanted. So 00:17:59.980 --> 00:18:02.680 instead, they united. They literally occupied 00:18:02.680 --> 00:18:04.940 abandoned schools together to build community 00:18:04.940 --> 00:18:07.559 centers and shared resources to demand a seat 00:18:07.559 --> 00:18:09.799 at the table. And that progressive momentum kept 00:18:09.799 --> 00:18:13.369 building. In 2006, Washington passed gay and 00:18:13.369 --> 00:18:15.829 lesbian anti -discrimination laws, surviving 00:18:15.829 --> 00:18:18.230 a fierce conservative pushback at the ballot 00:18:18.230 --> 00:18:23.490 box. And today, the state is home to modern mega 00:18:23.490 --> 00:18:26.390 -monopolies. We're talking Microsoft, Amazon, 00:18:26.950 --> 00:18:30.069 Starbucks. So what does this all mean? How does 00:18:30.069 --> 00:18:32.910 a state go from being dominated by Boeing monopolies 00:18:32.910 --> 00:18:35.509 to having 40 ,000 anarchists and labor unions 00:18:35.509 --> 00:18:37.769 shutting down the streets to protest the World 00:18:37.769 --> 00:18:40.849 Trade Organization in 1999? If we connect this 00:18:40.849 --> 00:18:43.589 to the bigger picture, the entire history of 00:18:43.589 --> 00:18:46.250 Washington state has been defined by this exact 00:18:46.250 --> 00:18:48.490 tension, the push and pull. It is a perpetual 00:18:48.490 --> 00:18:51.269 battleground between massive consolidated corporate 00:18:51.269 --> 00:18:53.329 power, starting with the Hudson's Bay Company, 00:18:53.509 --> 00:18:55.630 evolving into the Northern Pacific Railroad and 00:18:55.630 --> 00:18:58.809 now modern global tech giants and radical grassroots 00:18:58.809 --> 00:19:01.349 organizers who fundamentally refuse to be dictated 00:19:01.349 --> 00:19:05.049 to. It really is an incredible cycle. So to recap 00:19:05.049 --> 00:19:08.519 our journey for you today, we started with. the 00:19:08.519 --> 00:19:11.900 deeply egalitarian Plateau tribes whose survival 00:19:11.900 --> 00:19:15.259 depended on shared labor. Right. We navigated 00:19:15.259 --> 00:19:17.759 the hawkish overreach of Governor Stevens and 00:19:17.759 --> 00:19:19.880 the pushback of a sick judge paddling a canoe 00:19:19.880 --> 00:19:22.480 to defend the rule of law. We waded through the 00:19:22.480 --> 00:19:24.900 dark paradox of the People's Party, where progressive 00:19:24.900 --> 00:19:28.180 labor ideals collided with horrific, misdirected 00:19:28.180 --> 00:19:31.640 anti -Asian violence. And we ended with the inspiring 00:19:31.640 --> 00:19:34.180 multiracial coalitions and the bolt decision, 00:19:34.440 --> 00:19:36.259 proving that the fight for who belongs in this 00:19:36.259 --> 00:19:39.599 landscape is always evolving. Understanding these 00:19:39.599 --> 00:19:42.240 extreme historical swings is absolutely the key 00:19:42.240 --> 00:19:44.140 to understanding the modern Pacific Northwest. 00:19:44.410 --> 00:19:46.190 And I want to leave you with one final thought 00:19:46.190 --> 00:19:50.009 to mull over. Sure. Since the 1840s, from George 00:19:50.009 --> 00:19:52.069 Washington Bush traversing the country to escape 00:19:52.069 --> 00:19:55.630 racist laws, to the 1890s populist fighting railroads 00:19:55.630 --> 00:19:57.710 all the way to modern tech visionaries dreaming 00:19:57.710 --> 00:19:59.990 up the future people have deliberately traveled 00:19:59.990 --> 00:20:02.250 to this isolated corner of the map to build their 00:20:02.250 --> 00:20:05.799 own radical version of utopia. Does the extreme 00:20:05.799 --> 00:20:08.539 geographic isolation of the Pacific Northwest, 00:20:09.240 --> 00:20:11.460 trapped between the imposing Cascade Mountains 00:20:11.460 --> 00:20:14.299 and the vast Pacific Ocean, naturally act as 00:20:14.299 --> 00:20:16.640 an incubator for people who want to completely 00:20:16.640 --> 00:20:19.480 rewrite the rules of civilization? That is a 00:20:19.480 --> 00:20:21.640 fascinating question to leave on. Thank you so 00:20:21.640 --> 00:20:23.700 much for joining us on this deep dive. We hope 00:20:23.700 --> 00:20:25.759 you walk away seeing the evergreen state in a 00:20:25.759 --> 00:20:27.799 whole new light. Keep questioning, keep learning, 00:20:28.200 --> 00:20:29.279 and we will catch you next time.