Digital collage: The law firm

by Jack Brummet

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The wrong side of the tracks (in Kent, Washington)

by Jack Brummet

Growing up, I lived on the wrong side of the tracks; worse...we were actually situated between the two sets of railroad tracks that bisect downtown Kent.  Every night, I'd hear the 1:13, 2:45, and 3;58 freight trains pass along the tracks a couple blocks away.

It felt so lonely being awake in the early morning,  hearing that mournful distant horn become a deep throaty scream as it thundered by the railroad crossings throughout town.

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UFO over Kent, Washington?

By Jack Brummet, Unexplained Phenomena Ed. 

Artist rendition

A  witness in Kent, Washington reported seeing a “large object with a bright white light at each end” crossing the sky, according to Case 68485 from the Mutual UFO Network. 

The witness watched a silent object moving overhead that could not be identified. Pictured: Kent, Washington. (Credit: Google Maps)

You can read the full article on Open Minds here.
                          

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Mixed Media Painting: The Kent, Wash. Law Firm (finished version)

By Jack Brummet

[click to enlarge]

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Kent, Washington's Hoot Owl Band, circa 1889

By Jack Brummet, Green River Valley History Ed.

The Hoot Owl Band was a Kent, Washington ensemble that played dances in the Green River Valley. This group shot is from 1889, the same year that Washington became a state.

The band of eight local men provided music for mostly square dances and included Levy Smith (cornet), and George Crow(fiddle).  I believe Levy Smith is of the Smith Brother's family (who owned and ran a large dairy), and I grew up on Crow Street, named for George Crow's family. 

[Photograph from the collection of the Greater Kent Historical Society and Museum]

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The Kent, Washington Bus Depot

By Jack Brummet, Kent History Ed.

This is a posed photo from my father in law Pete's archives. I am guessing the guy in the middle is some official from Greyhound.

This is a shot of Red's Greyhound Depot/Cafe in Kent. I spent a lot of time here with my Dad in the late 50s-early 60s (Red was one of my Dad's closest friends). Interestingly, KeeKee's Dad Pete also spent time here. I'm sure they met. Even though Kent was then a small farmtown, Keelin and I met much later--after I had left for college. Behind the counter is Gordon "Red" Maganess, and in front of the counter is the ticket agent Bubbins.

For a longer article on the bus depot, go here:  http://jackbrummet.blogspot.com/2013/09/atit-reheated-kent-greyhound-bus-depot.html

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Diatrymas stomping around in Kent, Washington?

By Jack Brummet, Science Ed.

I like the idea the Diatryma may have been stomping around the banks of the Green River, a couple of blocks from where I grew up. . .

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Remembering a passageway along Meeker Street in Kent. Wash.

This alley--which must be in England--reminds me of the passageway I used to walk through every day in my youth Kent, Wash. It was maybe two feet wide and  two or three doors east of the Ben Franklin store, sandwiched between two brick buildings, one of which I think was Grunstead's Cafe (which had several other names over the years).  

The passageway led from the sidewalk on the south side of Meeker Street to a parking lot behind the buildings, and then onto Gowe Street.  Depending on where you were headed, it cut a block off your walk. Do any of my fellow Kentites remember this? Link to an earlier post about Meeker Street: go here.

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72 years ago today, FDR authorized internment camps for American citizens: the internment of Japanese-Americans from Kent, Washington

It was 72 years ago today that FDR signed Executive Order 9066. Which paved the way for the American internment/concentration camps.  I wrote about this a few years ago, especially as it affected the little farm town (no longer) in which I grew up.  From All This Is That, 2012.  /jack

by Jack Brummet, Green River Valley Editor

On June 4 and 5, 1942, more than 1,000 Issei (first generation Japanese immigrants) and Nisei (second generation Japanese Americans) were rounded up in the Yakima Valley and sent to a camp in Wyoming, far from the west coast, where they would be presumably unable to assist Japanese invaders or terrorists.  Other Japanese-named citizens and immigrants were shortly rounded up in other areas of the state, including Seattle.  Many more Japanese Americans were rounded up in other states and areas--120,000 people all together were imprisoned.  Three-fifths of those people were U.S. citizens.

Dust storm at an internment camp a/k/a relocation center

The Japanese-Americans were sent to hastily, and flimsily, constructed camps called "War Relocation Centers" (which we now generally call internment camps)  in remote parts of the nation's interior. . .far away from where they might have, say, used a flashlight to guide a fleet of Japanese bombers toward the Boeing warplane plant.

I focus here on Kent, Washington (now a suburb of Seattle), because that's where I grew up, and know first hand about some of the aftermath of the camps.  The first wave of immigrants to Kent, Washington happened shortly before 1900. The immigrants were mostly European. There were, even as I was growing up, several Italian families still farming the valley. The 1900 census count shows just 13 Japanese-named  families in and around Kent.

The number of Japanese immigrants rose steeply over the next few years until 1907, when the US Government put the brakes on the number allowed to immigrate. Eventually, in the 1920's, Japanese immigration was banned altogether. The Anti-Alien Land Law in 1923 barred these immigrants from owning land, or even becoming citizens. Those with a child born in America could put land in the child's name. Some of the Japanese worked for established farmers and some cleared land and began their own farms in Kent, Auburn, and the tiny nearby villages O'Brien, Orillia, and Thomas.

Many Japanese farmers owned dairy farms until the price of milk plummeted after the World War I. Those farmers jumped into vegetable and berry farming, and their truck farms were profitable. They sold produce in Seattle, at the public market and farm stands, and shipped lettuce and cabbage to the east coast.

By 1930 there were around 200 Japanese families farming the White/Green River valley. In 1942, months after Pearl Harbor, all people of Japanese descent in the White/Green River Valley were evacuated and detained at an internment camp at Tule Lake, California. They lost their businesses, farms and personal belongings. They lost everything in the war hysteria.

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President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered them jailed under Executive Order 9066, a law designating certain "military areas" as zones from which "any or all persons may be excluded." In one of our more shameful national acts of jingoistic racism, all people of Japanese ancestry were removed from the entire Pacific coast--all of California, Oregon and Washington. In 1944, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of this law, saying it is "permissible to curtail the civil rights of a racial group when there is a "pressing public necessity."

My mother, Betty Brummet, remembers Japanese American kids being marched from Ballard High School one day. Some of the students lined up and booed.

The phrase "shikata ga nai" (loosely translated as "it cannot be helped") summarized the interned families' resignation to their helplessness. This was even noticed by the children, as mentioned in Farewell to Manzanar. They tended not to make waves, and complied with the government to prove themselves loyal citizens.

Dust storm at an internment camp

In our war hysteria, we didn't want any Japanese Americans near the west coast. They would form cells and assist soldiers and pilots from the motherland in attacking The Pacific Coast. The number of Germans and Italians placed in the camps is only a fraction of their total population compared with the Japanese, virtually all of whom were locked up.

After the war only about thirty families (out of the original 200) returned to the valley area. I knew the Miyoshis, Yamadas, Nakaharas, Koyamatsus, Hiranakas, and Okimotos. Some of them got back into farming (not on their old farms, which had been confiscated and sold). I worked on the Yamada's farm a couple of springs, cutting and boxing rhubarb, and I worked for a couple of weeks on Kart Funai's farm one summer, bunching radishes and scallions.

Photo of a shop owner in my hometown of Kent, Washington, in 1942

In 1988, the U.S. Congress passed legislation awarding formal payments of $20,000 each to the surviving internees—60,000 in all. This same year, formal apologies were also issued by the government of Canada to Japanese Canadian survivors, who were each repaid the sum of $21,000 Canadian dollars. President Ronald Reagan even apologized on behalf of the United States. $21,000 would buy a fraction of the hundreds of acres of stolen land.  It's better than the reparations paid to the families of slaves (zero, to date), but a pittance compared to losing everything you owned, and the farms you nurtured. If they held on until now, they'd all be rich.

Through the 1950's the Green River continued to flood the valley floor in late spring. This is what made the valley floor some of the richest soil in the world. . .but, alas, flooding prevented big business from locating there. In 1963 the Army Corps of Engineers built the Howard Hansen Dam (an earthen dam, still protecting the valley from floods) to regulate the river waters. The danger of uncontrolled flooding ended. The flat, treeless land on the valley floor now was an attractive area for business. And build they did.

Boeing built an aerospace lab, and the floodgates were opened. Farming was over, and dwindled rapidly, although there are a few pockets left. One of my old high school mates, Danny Carpinito has in fact become a wealthy vegetable farmer. Of the Japanese kids I knew in school, virtually none remained in Kent after high school. Of course, neither did I nor most of my friends, although some of our families still live there.

Sources:

The Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_American_internment

The History of Kent, Washington: http://www.kent.k12.wa.us/curriculum/vtours/kent/

Japanese Relocation Centers: http://www.infoplease.com/spot/internment1.html

The Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_American
Previous articles, and photos on the Green River Valley and Japanese-Americans from All This Is That (http://jackbrummet.blogspot.com/)

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ATIT Reheated: The Kent Greyhound Bus Depot in the early 1960's

By Jack Brummet, Green River Valley Editor


This photo of Kent's Meeker Street, about three blocks west of the Bus Depot,
was taken in 1945, about 18 years before the events described here. Meeker
Street didn't look much different at all, except the cars were newer.

Before rural and suburban areas around Seattle had a metropolitan bus and train system; before they created the Howard Hansen Dam that would prevent the Green, Black, and White Rivers from flooding the valley in which I grew up, we had The Greyhound and Red's Bus Depot. After my father died in 1964, the Greyhound was how we got around. . .if we got around. Getting around was going to Seattle on the bus at Christmas to window-shop and have a sandwich or sundae at The Copper Kettle, or the Paul Bunyan Room at one of the now defunct Seattle department stores.

Red's Kent Bus Depot, located on Meeker Street, two doors in from Central Avenue, was a magical, male, perfect small town place. Being the bus depot in a 3,000 person [ed's note: in later decades, it would become a nearly 100,000 person city] town meant that you were a hub of activity.

Red (a/k/a Gordon Mageness) ran the cafe and Bubbins sold tickets and managed the Greyhound side of the operation. Bubbins even wore a green eyeshade, a vest, and a garter on his crisp, white long-sleeved shirt with a perfectly double-knotted Windsor tie. I don't have a picture of Bubbins, but he looked like an older, shorter (!) Harry Truman, well-haberdashed, a little cranky, and very business-like.


A chocolate malt served in a glass identical to those 
used at Red's Bus Depot Cafe

Red was unusual in Kent for being a life-long bachelor. He had been married early (to whom????), and I remember often visiting our relatives in the Hillcrest Cemetery and we would stop at the joint grave of his children, who either died at birth, or early in life. I remember the elaborate gravestone, in bronze, with lambs on it. [Were they twins? How did they die? Who was his wife??]. No one ever talked about his wife. I don't know what happened with their marriage. Red was the only man we knew who was a bachelor. All I could figure out about being a bachelor was it meant you could own a speedboat, belong to the Elks' club, and go to the barbershop every day for a trim and a shave. He was surrounded by friends at work, ate dinner at the Elks, and even owned a chunk of a racing filly. . .bachelorhood looked OK.



From the time I was about eight years old, Red would frequently have me run over two blocks to Dunham's Grocery for iceberg lettuce, tomatoes or onions, or to have Ray Dunham grind 12 more pounds of sirloin. These missions were always good for a quarter and a vanilla malt.

Red's cafe menu listed hamburgers, cheeseburgers, tuna-fish and toasted cheese sandwiches, soup, chips (regular and barbecue), cottage cheese and canned pineapple wheels nestled in fronds of iceberg lettuce, floats and sodas, ice cream cones, sundaes, hot fudge sundaes, banana splits, milkshakes (served in a tall glass along with the "extra" in the metal container), Boyd's coffee, tea, grapefruit, orange, and tomato juice, milk, bottled soda pop (only beer came in cans), and Green River on tap [ed's note: Green River was developed in 1919 by the Schoenhofen Brewery of Chicago as a non-alcoholic product for the Prohibition era. It was popular for many decades as a soda fountain syrup, and for many years, trailed only Coca Cola in popularity].

Watching Red make milkshakes was a sensuous experience. He slapped a spotless and gleaming stainless steel container on the counter and used a polished scoop (that sat in a container under a trickle of warm water) to dig three generous scoops of vanilla ice cream from a three gallon tub, pumped in a stream of chocolate, vanilla, or strawberry syrup, followed by a righteous pour of whole Smith Brothers milk (the dairy my friends Jim, Kathleen and Frances's extended family owned) and a scoop of malt, if you sprang for an extra nickel. He walked over and snapped the metal container into the pale green shake machine with a decisive click, flipped the switch and the medium-pitched whirring began. After an indeterminate, but always perfect period of mixing, he poured it into a tall glass, and left the rest on the counter.

If you fancied soup, he opened a single-serving size of Campbell's and dumped it into a proprietary Campbell's soup heater. There were usually a few cheeseburgers and grilled cheese sandwiches cooking on the flat steel grill, along with a pile of onions sizzling in a pool of golden fat. Next to the ancient (even then) manual cash register, were candy bars, cigars, snoose, combs, rain bonnets, nail clippers, aspirin, cigarettes, mints, Callard and Bowser's butterscotch, Cadbury's chocolate, Big Hunks, Dots, Junior Mints, Three Musketeers, Baby Ruths, Butterfingers, Almond Joys, Mountain Bars (made in Tacoma), and gum. Across the floor was a rack of newspapers and magazines: Time, Life, Post, Detective Magazines, the women's magazines (Family Circle, Good Housekeeping, and the like), tabloids, Popular Science and Popular Mechanics. I don't think he carried any skin magazines. Playboy had recently debuted in the 60's, but this was more or less a family cafe. He probably kept the Playboys in the mysterious back room).


The bus depot's decor was minimal: a few tattered travel and bus posters, a black and white television, and a large portrait of F.D.R. My father-in-law Pete acquired the FDR poster when the depot closed down. It now resides in his den. There was a black and white TV on the wall (I never saw a color TV until I was in 11th grade at a friend's house).

The place was a fascinating mix of blue collar and white collar. Lawyers, merchants, dentists, and judges sat side by side with furnace repairmen, framers, sheetrockers, roofers, and like my Dad and Norm Peterson, Bill Cavanaugh, Al Corkins, Al Simms, and Al Conwell. I remember seeing my future father-in-law--Pete Curran-- there, along with his brother and some of their law partners. They were the guys wearing suits. My dad and his brethren wore overalls, or blue work shirts and jeans. . .usually spattered with paint, mud, or engine grease.

The mayor of the town, Alex Thorton, who owned a car repair shop a few blocks down Central Avenue, showed up on occasion--. I remember seeing Lou Kerhiaty, who owned the town's Ben Franklin (a/k/a Dime Store), and the Yahns, who owned Edline-Yahn funeral parlor. Kenny Iverson. a friend of my dad's, was the shortest man I knew. He was the only one of our friends who wore a suit. He was a salesman. Of course, the lawyers and funeral directors also wore suits, and some of the businessmen and druggists, and bankers. But most our our family's friends were strictly blue collar. Red presided over a fascinating amalgam of blue and white collar folks.

Although United Parcel Service was founded in Seattle in 1907, I never remember seeing a UPS truck. In those days, Greyhound was what UPS later became. Every bus coming from Seattle and elsewhere carried packages destined for Kent. Auto parts, chemicals, mail order clothes, gifts, and tools all arrived in the Greyhound cargo holds. If you needed a package sent or delivered, you either used the Post Office (as it was then called) or you used Greyhound. They didn't deliver, however. You went to the Bus Depot to pick up your packages: carburetors, bolts of muslin, cartons of books, seeds, and farm implements.

I remember being in the Bus Depot on November 22, 1963. . .and the fellas asking me who would be President now. There were no tears at the bus depot that day, but there was a stunned sort of hush as people watched events unfold on the black and white TV hung on the wall. I knew the name Lyndon Johnson somehow. The bus house gang were Democrats, but Scoop Jackson/JFK defense/blue-dog Democrats. I was awarded a soda for knowing LBJ's name.

The dark oak back-bar was even by the early 1960's looking ancient, with dark heavily-veined, and probably smoke-encrusted wood. The glass-fronted cabinets lining the back bar were filled with soda bottles that looked like they hailed from the 19th century. There was Nehi Soda, NuGrape, Honey Dew (made in the Seattle area), a brand of Sarsaparilla, Orange Crush, RC, Dr. Pepper, Shasta soda (another northwest brand), Bubble-Up, Kickapoo Joy Juice, YooHoo chocolate, Seven-up, Pepsi, Coca-Cola, Schweppes Ginger Ale and Bitter Lemon, and a glass globe of green lime syrup, which Red mixed with seltzer to make the beloved Green River soft drink.

Three beautiful leather dice cups with yellowed ivory dice sat on the bar for low-key gambling. If you wanted to roll the dice for lunch, Red was always game. You got a free lunch, or paid double if you lost. I think the odds were pretty even if you were a regular; it was something to do.

If you were friends with Red (and who wasn't?), in the back room there was a "jug."  He just might invite you in the back for a "snort." The jug was a half gallon of Seagram's 7 Crown or Jim Beam. I can't remember how it was dispensed--did they mix it into the standard drink I remember all adults I knew drank (the 7 & 7)? Among my people, hillbillies one generation removed from the hills, a drink meant a Seven & Seven, a/k/a, a Seagram's with Seven-up. Or beer, which was not really considered an alcoholic beverage. Some of my friends' fathers left for work with a six pack in their pickup and returned home with a fresh "sixer." And they had probably also stopped into the Pastime, The Blinker, The Club, The Moonlite Inn, or The Virginia, for a snort on their way home.

The closing of the bus depot - In the late 1960's, The Bus Depot closed. Seattle and King County had passed "Metro," a sort of latter day WPA project that finally cleaned up Lake Washington (and did it very well), helped build the dam, and fund a comprehensive King County bus system (and tried to get a subway system passed...the failure of which is one of Seattle/King County's great mistakes). With the coming of Metro buses to Kent, there was no longer a need for a Greyhound bus stop there. If you were taking a bus to a distant place (I took the bus to NYC three times), you took Metro to Seattle and connected at the Greyhound Bus Terminal on Stewart Street. Metro offered Red a job at the Metro offices in downtown Seattle, and he took the job. In later years, I often stopped into their office (I think it was at 3rd and Marion) to say hi to Red, who sold monthly bus passes from a window in the lobby.

Other stories about Kent, Washington that have appeared here:

Square Dance At Valley Elementary
Foot Washing Baptists & The Catholic Devils
Cruising the Renton loop with a keg of nails
My Pathetic Political Career
Growing Up In Kent, Washington: Tarheels, Hayseeds, Hillbillies, and Crackers
Uncle Guy, more hillbilly cred, and living a good life
Fishing With The Old Man
Uncle Romey
It Can Happen Here: Japanese Relocation Camps, 1942-1946
More on the El Rancho Drive-in in Kent, Washington
Snack bar ads, intermission countdowns, and the El Rancho drive-in
Four more images of Kent, Washington in the 40's and 50's
Kent, Washington's Meeker Street 1946
Too good to leave in the comments: Scooter and the Hell's Angel Heavy chug-a-lugScooter and $2 all you can drink beer day at the Sundowner circa 1973
My Grandma's tavern in Carnation, Wash.
My Dog Slugger
Hucking Eggs in Kent, Washington
Home-made Hillbilly Toys
Square Dance At Valley ElementaryFoot Washing Baptists & The Catholic Devils
Hillbilly Cred
"Chicken Thieves Busy in Kent And Vicinity"

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The Alvord T. Bridge Closes

By Jack Brummet, Green River Valley Ed.

A protest against the T Bridge earlier this year

The Alvford T. Bridge was a couple of blocks from where I grew up and we spent a lot of time playing on and under it, riding bikes on it, and hanging from it and dropping into the river.  I never knew its name before.  We always called in The T Bridge.  It led to three junkyards and some farms.  

The bridge (a through truss bridge), built in 1914 over the Green River on S. 3rd Avenue in Kent, is scheduled for demolition and removal.   The bridge has been considered structurally deficient for years and the county closed the bridge and will demolish, but not replace it.  There are two other bridges across the river very close by.  

A snapshot I took last week

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From All This Is That Eight Years Ago. 2004: Hucking eggs in Kent, Wash.

By Jack Brummet, South King County Editor

[From All This Is That eight years ago.  This is one of Jack's several dozen posts on growing up in Kent,. Washington.  This particular post was made in the first month of ATIT's life in 2004 /ed,].

For a couple of years, one of our favorite pastimes was hucking eggs at cars. Not that we were particularly destructive, but we were boys, and destruction was part of our makeup...whether it was instilled by nature, or nurture. Eggs were the perfect vehicle--a dozen cost fifty-three cents, they wouldn't kill anyone, didn't dent sheet metal, and did no real damage to the finish of those 50's and 60's behemoths with leaded, toxic, permanent paint.

Eggs were peripheral to the fun; they were the catalyst. Eggs triggered behaviors in drivers that tapped into our fight or flight response. The egged driver had one of three responses:

• They drove on obliviously, or tapped their brakes and kept moving.
• They stopped and maybe got out, checked the egged fender, and drove off.
• They went completely ballistic; crazy as a sh*thouse rat; or went for their shotgun, or pistol.

We aimed for Response Number 3. It was all about the adrenaline. Ours and theirs.

Those most likely to respond were also the most likely to inflict serious damage if they actually caught you. They were big and they were dumb. The men who gave chase were brain-damaged palookas who fly off the handle, berating clerks and starting fights in taverns; the dolts who bullied anyone that bisected their arc. These knuckleheads were chronically pissed-off guys with quarter-inch fuses and were always ready for-- and, indeed, welcomed--a fight. After all, we weren't exactly innocent bystanders. This would be a righteous stomping of The Guilty.

We could have saved a lot of eggs if we had figured out a way to profile these guys. Any of the victims could be turned, or converted into a Number 3 if they departed the relative safety of their car. As they walked around the car, inspecting the egg on the windshield or fender, a second fusillade of eggs flew from the bushes. If you hucked five or six eggs at a stationary target at least a few would make the target...perhaps splattering on their coat, or hitting the car and doing peripheral damage when they splattered. If they actually stopped or slowed down, we always launched a second volley. A driver who was willing to turn the other cheek was suddenly pushed to the brink.

It was all about the chase, and the resultant adrenaline rush. When you hit the the right guy's car, he came after you. The best ones slammed on their brakes and immediately began driving around in circles, revving their V8s, screeching around corners, trying to find the perpetrators. It added an aural element to the rush.

We always had proximate hiding spots and a loose escape plan. There was always a vacant garage, a boxcar, an abandoned car, or a hedge to hide behind. Once in a while, 'though, we'd be walking along the street, and someone--usually Lonnie Edwards--would attack a house or car as we were walking around. With no plan, and no cover, there was chaos as we scrambled for shelter anywhere. It was almost more scary to hit a house, because you were out in the open, and you never knew when someone would open the door, jacking shells into a ten gauge shotgun. Back in the 60's, not a lot of people were packing heat in their cars. These days egg hucking could very well be fatal.

Some victims would comb the neighborhood relentlessly for half an hour, racing up and down the streets. Sometimes we would would end up exposed. As the car rushed up and slammed on its brakes, we played innocent. They hadn't actually seen us, after all. "We did see four, five guys were running right over there..."

The Police would frequently be called of course, and we'd give them a blast of eggs too. Answering a complaint, or after having an egg tossed at their prowl car, they would drive around the neighborood too, sometimes cruising with their lights off, hoping we would show our faces. If they'd pursued us on foot, they might have found us, but on foot just wasn't real big in 1965. After the police showed, we would, naturally, switch locations.

One night, we stumbled on a fresh delivery of eggs, sitting on the loading dock of Westland Hatchery. Each case contained a gross (a dozen dozen), or 144 eggs. We spirited away several boxes, and suddenly had 600 eggs to toss. Our first attack came as we hid to the side of the hatchery in overgrown bushes. The first hundred eggs were fired as cars passed the hatchery, as if the hatchery itself were waging war on the beer-fogged drivers. Central Avenue was littered with hundreds of eggshells before the night was over.

We lobbed all 600 eggs that night and the beast was sated. We took the sport as far as it could go. We never hucked eggs again, and retired at the top of our game, just barely unbeaten and un-arrested.

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70 years ago today the U.S. prepared to "intern" all Japanese Americans; 120,000 were eventually imprisoned

by Jack Brummet, Green River Valley Editor

On June 4 and 5, 1942, more than 1,000 Issei (first generation Japanese immigrants) and Nisei (second generation Japanese Americans) were rounded up in the Yakima Valley and sent to a camp in Wyoming, far from the west coast, where they would be presumably unable to assist Japanese invaders or terrorists.  Other Japanese-named citizens and immigrants were shortly rounded up in other areas of the state, including Seattle.  Many more Japanese Americans were rounded up in other states and areas--120,000 people all together were imprisoned.  Three-fifths of those people were U.S. citizens.

Dust storm at an internment camp a/k/a relocation center

The Japanese-Americans were sent to hastily, and flimsily, constructed camps called "War Relocation Centers" (which we now generally call internment camps)  in remote parts of the nation's interior. . .far away from where they might have, say, used a flashlight to guide a fleet of Japanese bombers toward the Boeing warplane plant.

I focus here on Kent, Washington (now a suburb of Seattle), because that's where I grew up, and know first hand about some of the aftermath of the camps.  The first wave of immigrants to Kent, Washington happened shortly before 1900. The immigrants were mostly European. There were, even as I was growing up, several Italian families still farming the valley. The 1900 census count shows just 13 Japanese-named  families in and around Kent.

The number of Japanese immigrants rose steeply over the next few years until 1907, when the US Government put the brakes on the number allowed to immigrate. Eventually, in the 1920's, Japanese immigration was banned altogether. The Anti-Alien Land Law in 1923 barred these immigrants from owning land, or even becoming citizens. Those with a child born in America could put land in the child's name. Some of the Japanese worked for established farmers and some cleared land and began their own farms in Kent, Auburn, and the tiny nearby villages O'Brien, Orillia, and Thomas.

Many Japanese farmers owned dairy farms until the price of milk plummeted after the World War I. Those farmers jumped into vegetable and berry farming, and their truck farms were profitable. They sold produce in Seattle, at the public market and farm stands, and shipped lettuce and cabbage to the east coast.

By 1930 there were around 200 Japanese families farming the White/Green River valley. In 1942, months after Pearl Harbor, all people of Japanese descent in the White/Green River Valley were evacuated and detained at an internment camp at Tule Lake, California. They lost their businesses, farms and personal belongings. They lost everything in the war hysteria.

.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered them jailed under Executive Order 9066, a law designating certain "military areas" as zones from which "any or all persons may be excluded." In one of our more shameful national acts of jingoistic racism, all people of Japanese ancestry were removed from the entire Pacific coast--all of California, Oregon and Washington. In 1944, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of this law, saying it is "permissible to curtail the civil rights of a racial group when there is a "pressing public necessity."

My mother, Betty Brummet, remembers Japanese American kids being marched from Ballard High School one day. Some of the students lined up and booed.

The phrase "shikata ga nai" (loosely translated as "it cannot be helped") summarized the interned families' resignation to their helplessness. This was even noticed by the children, as mentioned in Farewell to Manzanar. They tended not to make waves, and complied with the government to prove themselves loyal citizens.

Dust storm at an internment camp

In our war hysteria, we didn't want any Japanese Americans near the west coast. They would form cells and assist soldiers and pilots from the motherland in attacking The Pacific Coast. The number of Germans and Italians placed in the camps is only a fraction of their total population compared with the Japanese, virtually all of whom were locked up.

After the war only about thirty families (out of the original 200) returned to the valley area. I knew the Miyoshis, Yamadas, Nakaharas, Koyamatsus, Hiranakas, and Okimotos. Some of them got back into farming (not on their old farms, which had been confiscated and sold). I worked on the Yamada's farm a couple of springs, cutting and boxing rhubarb, and I worked for a couple of weeks on Kart Funai's farm one summer, bunching radishes and scallions.

Photo of a shop owner in my hometown of Kent, Washington, in 1942

In 1988, the U.S. Congress passed legislation awarding formal payments of $20,000 each to the surviving internees—60,000 in all. This same year, formal apologies were also issued by the government of Canada to Japanese Canadian survivors, who were each repaid the sum of $21,000 Canadian dollars. President Ronald Reagan even apologized on behalf of the United States. $21,000 would buy a fraction of the hundreds of acres of stolen land.  It's better than the reparations paid to the families of slaves (zero, to date), but a pittance compared to losing everything you owned, and the farms you nurtured. If they held on until now, they'd all be rich.

Through the 1950's the Green River continued to flood the valley floor in late spring. This is what made the valley floor some of the richest soil in the world. . .but, alas, flooding prevented big business from locating there. In 1963 the Army Corps of Engineers built the Howard Hansen Dam (an earthen dam, still protecting the valley from floods) to regulate the river waters. The danger of uncontrolled flooding ended. The flat, treeless land on the valley floor now was an attractive area for business. And build they did.

Boeing built an aerospace lab, and the floodgates were opened. Farming was over, and dwindled rapidly, although there are a few pockets left. One of my old high school mates, Danny Carpinito has in fact become a wealthy vegetable farmer. Of the Japanese kids I knew in school, virtually none remained in Kent after high school. Of course, neither did I nor most of my friends, although some of our families still live there.

Sources:

The Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_American_internment

The History of Kent, Washington: http://www.kent.k12.wa.us/curriculum/vtours/kent/

Japanese Relocation Centers: http://www.infoplease.com/spot/internment1.html

The Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_American
Previous articles, and photos on the Green River Valley and Japanese-Americans from All This Is That (http://jackbrummet.blogspot.com/)

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ATIT Reheated (from five years ago): The internment of The Japanese families of Kent, Washington

By Jack Brummet, Green River Valley Editor

This is a photo of a shop owner in my hometown of Kent, Washington, in 1942.

The first wave of immigrants to the Kent, Washington area happened shortly before 1900. The immigrants were mostly European. There were, even as I was growing up, several Italian families still farming the valley. The 1900 census count shows 13 Japanese families in and around Kent.

The number of Japanese immigrants rose steeply over the next few years until 1907, when the US Government put the brakes on the number of Japanese allowed to immigrate. Eventually, in the 1920's, they banned Japanese immigrants.  Period.  The Anti-Alien Land Law in 1923 barred these immigrants from owning land, or ever becoming citizens. Those with a child born in America could put land in the child's name. Some of the Japanese worked for established farmers and some cleared land and began their own farms in Kent, Auburn, and the nearby villages O'Brien, Orillia, and Thomas (which were annexed to Kent before I was born). 

Many Japanese farmers had dairy farms until the price of milk cratered after WW I. A lot of those farmers jumped into vegetable and berry farming, and their truck farms were profitable. They sold produce in Seattle, at farm stands, and to the east coast.

In 1930 there were about 200 Japanese families farming in the White/Green River valley. In 1942 during WW II all Japanese people in the White/Green River Valley were ordered evacuated from this area and were detained at the War Relocation Camp at Tule Lake, California. They lost their businesses, farms and personal belongings. They lost everything in the war hysteria.

.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered them jailed with Executive Order 9066, designating certain "military areas" as zones from which "any or all persons may be excluded." This shameful national act ordered the removal of all people of Japanese ancestry from the entire Pacific coast. In 1944, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of this law, saying it is permissible to curtail the civil rights of a racial group when there is a "pressing public necessity." I don't know if that decision still stands or not. Maybe this is the precedent we use for locking up various Muslims and people of middle-eastern extraction.

The forced removal encompassed about 120,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans--3/5 of them U.S. citizens. They were sent to shoddily constructed camps called "War Relocation Centers" in remote portions of the nation's interior. . .far away from where they might have, say, used a flashlight to guide a fleet of Japanese bombers toward the Boeing warplane plant.

My mother, Betty Brummet, remembers Japanese American kids being rounded up at Ballard High School one day. Some of the students lined up and booed.

The phrase "shikata ga nai" (loosely translated as "it cannot be helped") summarized the interned families' resignation to their helplessness. This was even noticed by the children, as mentioned in Farewell to Manzanar. The Japanese citizens tended not to make waves.  They even, incredibly, still believed in America.

Dust storm at an internment camp a/k/a relocation center

In our war hysteria, we didn't want any Japanese Americans near the west coast. They would form cells and assist soldiers and pilots from the motherland in attacking The Pacific Coast. The number of Germans and Italians placed in the camps is only a fraction of their total population compared with the Japanese, virtually all of whom were locked up.

After the war only about thirty families returned to the valley area. I remember the Miyoshis, Yamadas, Nakaharas, Koyamatsus, Hiranakas, and Okimotos. Some of them got back into farming (not on their old farms, which had been confiscated and sold). I worked on the Yamada's farm a couple of springs, cutting and boxing rhubarb, and I worked for a couple of weeks on Kart Funai's farm one summer, bunching radishes and scallions.

In 1988, the U.S. Congress passed legislation awarding formal payments of $20,000 each to the surviving internees—60,000 in all. This same year, formal apologies were also issued by the government of Canada to Japanese Canadian survivors, who were each repaid the sum of $21,000 Canadian dollars. President Ronald Reagan even apologized on behalf of the United States. $21,000 would buy a fraction of the hundreds of acres of stolen land. Sure, it's better than the reparations paid to the families of slaves (zero, to date), but a pittance compared to losing everything you owned, and the farms you nurtured. If they held on until now, they'd all be rich.

Through the 1950's the Green River continued to flood the valley floor in late spring. This is what made the valley floor some of the richest soil in the world. . .but, alas, flooding prevented big business from locating there. In 1963 the Army Corps of Engineers built the Howard Hansen Dam (an earthen dam, still protecting the valley from floods) to regulate the river waters. The danger of uncontrolled flooding ended. The flat, treeless land on the valley floor now was an attractive area for business. And build they did.

Boeing built an aerospace lab, and the floodgates were opened. Farming was over, and dwindled rapidly, although there are a few pockets left. One of my old high school mates has in fact, become a wealthy vegetable farmer. Of the Japanese kids I knew in school, virtually none remained in Kent after high school. Of course, neither did I nor most of my friends, although some of our families still live there.

Sources:
Two previous articles on All This Is That

The Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_American_internment

The History of Kent, Washington: http://www.kent.k12.wa.us/curriculum/vtours/kent/

Japanese Relocation Centers: http://www.infopleaseinfoplease.com/spot/internment1.html

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Kent, Washington in the news

By Jack Brummet, Green River Valley Editor

My home town makes the news once again.  The caption reads:  "Dave Anthony toasts his achievement after driving his truck onto the roof of a friend's soon-to-be demolished Kent home on the West Valley Highway."

Thanks to our favorite contributor, Jeff Clinton, for passing this along.

click to enlarge

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Poem: Kent, Washington

Kent, Washington
By Jack Brummet

1
The truck farms
Are still there,

Buried a layer down now
beneath tilt-up warehouses.

2
Fin, fur, flesh, and feather
Maintain a faint presence—

A robin waltzes in 3/4 time
Around a stranded nightcrawler;

The pale moon hangs low,
Almost humming overhead
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Remembering the Vale Theatre (and the floods) in Kent, Washington

This is the theatre where I learned to love movies.  It was built in about 1946, roughly when this photograph was taken.  The only photo I could find was not snapped to show the theatre, but the annual flooding in the waterlogged valley where I grew up.

We went there most weekends. I remember that a ticket was thirty-five cents. It was not a first run theatre, but I remember seeing I Saw What You Did And I Know Who You Are, House of Wax, lots of bad comedy, The Thing, Gorgo, tons of Godzilla, Frankenstein, Three Stooges, The Birds, Night of the Living Dead, and many more.

 
When I was young, the Kent Valley flooded almost every winter...until the Howard Hanson dam was build far upstream on the Green River.  The dam was completed in about 1942.  Its completion led to the transformation of Kent from a fertile farming area to industrial use, and it eventually became one of the largest concentrations of warehouses in the world.  Historylink.org writes "the dam has changed South King County from flooded farmlands to a sea of warehouses, industrial plants, condominiums, and shopping centers."

The White River and the Green River flowed down from the mountains in the east into the valley and formed a confluence near downtown Auburn.  From there, the river traveled north and was met by the Black River (an outflow from Lake Washington that no longer exists) near Tukwila, where the combined rivers become the Duwamish River which flow into Elliott Bay in southwest Seattle.

As it turns out, the earthen dam was not built for the ages and has shown signs of deterioration.  Over the last few years, the Army Corps of Engineers has been frantically reinforcing the dam to prevent a breach and a King-Hell sudden flood of the valley.  My mom still lives there, and the last two winters were spent in a flood watch, and with the residents all buying flood insurance against the deluge they were assured would never happen again.

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