Author Archives: Curt Fischer

…Selling a Fair

Century 21, Seattle’s Space Age Fair, was conceived at first as a commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of Seattle’s first World’s Fair, The Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition in 1909. Of course, plans like this quickly get bigger (software people call it feature creep, I believe) and as 1959 came and went, it was a future-loving, space and science-celebrating fair. Continue reading »

…Painted on the Horizon

If you really think about it, Mount Rainier is pretty amazing. In good weather, she looks like she is painted on the horizon. It lends a magical pall over the city. It is comforting in a way to know it’s there, even when I can’t see it because of the clouds. Also, the dramatic photos of it are astounding!

Continue reading »

…Under the Bridge

Seattle Icon

Like many Seattleites, I’m a transplant. I moved to Seattle due mainly to vague memories I had of visiting the city with my family when I was 13 years old. I remembered the laid-back vibe, the fun of riding the monorail and the waterfront.

But what struck me 13 years later was the public art everywhere. Seriously. It is like every wall must be covered with the most gorgeous mural, every park must have a sculpture, and  yeah, some of them are huge! Not just a tiny concrete fountain, no our fountains are made to be like a mountain river, rushing down this hillside, then turning into rapids and waterfalls through a canyon. Oh, and did I mention that all this was located over the freeway? I got the distinct feeling that even the graffiti artists were upping their game. Look at any wall on Capitol Hill and see some pretty great sketches, slogans and sticker art. It is magical.

It is in that spirit that I nominate the Fremont Troll for this week’s Seattle Icon. To me, this distinctive and lovable sculpture represents all the public art that is in this city. Much of it may have come from our pioneering 1% for Art, where any construction project receiving city monies must include 1% of the budget for public art. The Troll, located under the Fremont end of the Aurora Bridge, was part of a local response to do something with this little-used space, to bring beauty to a nondescript dead end. The Fremont Arts Council staged a contest for art to replace the erzatz

The winning entry was by a group calling themselves the Jersey Devils, led by sculptor Steve Badane. The artists donated this model to MOHAI, used to convince the Fremont electorate to choose their sculpture from all the other entrants in 1989. The large, imposing sculpture was finished in 1990.  This is the only model made of the Troll.

The Troll is such an icon of Seattle that Helen and Peder made a MOHAI Minute about it almost three years ago. Check it out:

In addition, Michael Falcone and Hank Graham submitted this awesome film to last year’s History Is____ Film Competition.

So now it is your turn: Find your Seattle Icon and make a video for the History Is____ Film Competition.

…In the P-I, continued from Page 1

Seattle Icons

In 1947, Seattle was a changed city from ten years before. World War II skewed the demographics, the industry, and connections Seattle had with the rest of the world. No longer were we just a city way off in the corner who sometimes called itself the “Gateway to Alaska” or the “Gateway to Asia.” We were now actually a gateway. People had come here to get jobs at Boeing or Paccar, or even just because they had been stationed here during the war and fell in love.

In 1947, one of Seattle’s newspapers, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, was finishing up their new headquarters at Sixth and Wall Street in the Denny Regrade. They hosted a contest for a new emblem for the paper. Perhaps it was Seattleites’ new awareness of the world around them that inspired Jakk Corsaw to design a circular mural of the world. Designers decided that a three-dimensional globe fit in better with the building and new modern era.  The globe is topped with an 18-foot tall eagle, and is circumnavigated by a spinning “It’s in the P-” All of this, continents, letters, eagle, are outlined in neon.

And now it is another historic treasure that MOHAI will be caring for. When the P-I stopped its paper edition in 2009, the city and MOHAI started working with Hearst to preserve this Icon. For me, the globe represents the outward looking nature of Seattle. What else is out there? It represents the spread of information, from telegraph to wireless phones to the Internet, all of which Seattle has participated in wholeheartedly (perhaps due to our somewhat isolated nature.)

Also, I’m a sucker for a good neon sign. With the P-I Globe, we are a step closer to my personal never-gonna-happen dream of a Neon Sign Sculpture Garden in Seattle. (This is my own personal dream, not a plan of MOHAI’s, nor a remote possibility.) In my dreams, the Globe is a bit like the Unisphere in Queens. But in Neon!

Where ever the Globe gets sited, it is now assured that it will stay intact in Seattle. Help us with the conservation of this Seattle Icon, to Light Up the Globe. You can donate here. Thank you!

And if you were unsure before as to how a gigantic symbol of a defunct (printed) newspaper can be an icon of a city, we had two different films contributed to the History Is____ Film Competition last year. Below is the film by Jameson Kelley, who took a more documentary approach to the P-I going out of the old-fashioned business of printing their paper.

…Icons

Seattle Icons

Working in a history museum, I think often about the soul of a city, that which makes a place different than any other. Then I stop thinking and play the Sims. But when I am thinking, one of the concepts I ponder is icons.

If I may quote Dictionary.com, an icon is “a sign or representation that stands for its object by virtue of a resemblance or analogy to it.” So by that measure, we will be examining eight different Seattle Icons in the coming weeks, discussing what they tell us about the city and the people who live here. And if you forget where we are in the list, you can use this handy graphic to keep track. So stick around, cause we start next week!

…Exceedingly Delicous

Sunday Recipe

From the 1930s to the 1950s, Seattle’s Queen Anne Hill had a windmill. Not for pumping water, like this earlier windmill on First Hill, but for selling delicious Dutch bakery items.

Van de Kamp’s Dutch Bakeries were founded in 1915 by Theodore Van de Kamp and Lawrence L. Frank in Los Angeles. Originally, their stand sold potato chips. The first retail bakery version of their enterprise opened in 1921, in a building designed in the shape of a windmill, complete with rotating arms. The Van de Kamp’s Holland Dutch Bakery chain of bakeries and coffee shops proliferated  through  Los Angeles, with Van de Kamp’s bakeries also setting up shop in markets and grocery stores in the 1930s. Around 1930, several Van de Kamp shops opened around Seattle.

During the 1940s, while America was at war, Van de Kamp offered a good steady job for women on the homefront. The leaflet at left was one of the ways they advertised open positions in their bakeries. One of the benefits (drawback?) was that their staff had to wear blue versions of traditional Dutch women outfits. There is not information on whether wooden clogs were required.

Like many food industries, Van de Kamp’s also provided their customers with recipes, of course including products made by Van de Kamp’s. I’ve included one such recipe below. One interesting note is that in the corner is a date (May 7, 1945) and a note for a radio station, (KJR-960 Kilocycles) 3:45 P.M. Presumably, this recipe was read over the air so that homemakers could make the recipe that night for their families.

Exceedingly Delicious First Course Dish

Ingredients Required to serve 6.

• 1 can hearts of artichokes (unrationed or fresh)
• ½ cup olive oil, imported, not rationed
• 1 large white onion or 2 small, very finely chopped
• ½ lb. fresh stringless beans
• ½ water
• Salt, white pepper or paprika

Directions: Canned hearts of artichokes have so far been unrationed, they are much easier to use and are really better than fresh, unless you boil fresh until they are very, very tender. Place in saucepan ½ cup imported olive oil; (if using domestic olive oil I suggest you dilute it with equal part peanut oil). Add equal quantity of cold water to the olive oil; place saucepan over fire and bring to boiling point; then add the string beans which should be cut across in one inch lengths, add also the very finely cut or chopped white onion, salt, pepper, and paprika. (Buy nice fresh crisp string beans). When beans are cooked tender the water will be cooked out of the oil. If necessary you can add just a little boiling water in case beans are not quite tender when oil is cooked out of the oil. There should not be any water in the oil when the beans are finished cooking. When cooked remove from fire; when cool add the canned artichoke hearts and chill in refrigerator. Serve as a first course, ice cold. It’s really scrumptious!

…Baking

In 1904, the Sagamiya Confectionary Co. was founded in 1904 by Unosuke Shibata.  It was in business for more than 70 years, closing in the late 1970s. This bakery was dedicated to using traditional Japanese methods of producing baked (and steamed) goods. I have included some of the artifacts we have from the Sagamiya Confectionary Co. Continue reading »

Weekly Move Update

And the packing keeps going, guided toward the new museum like salmon are guided toward their spawning ground. (After a long weekend, I get poetic.) Enjoy!

Monday, February 13
Favorite: Portable General Electric Television, ca. 1956 (1963.3187)
MOHAI		PSMHS
114	Items	1	Items
29	Cat #	1	Cat #
9	Boxe	1	Boxes
1	Crates	0	Crates

Tuesday, February 14
Favorite: Carved Ivory Model of the Narwhal (1959.1655.454)
MOHAI		PSMHS
20	Items	0	Items
15	Cat #	0	Cat #
7	Boxes	0	Boxes
1	Crates	0	Crates

Wednesday, February 15
Favorite: Oil painting of a hiker resting in a natural setting by Richard Bennett, 1940-1948(/strong> (2006.38.1)
MOHAI		PSMHS
11	Items	0	Items
11	Cat #	0	Cat #
4	Boxe	0	Boxes
3	Crates	0	Crates

Thursday, February 16
Favorite: Seattle World’s Fair sign, Century 21 logo, 1962 (1963.3119.54R)
MOHAI		PSMHS
38	Items	0	Items
15	Cat #	0	Cat #
11	Boxe	0	Boxes
2	Crates	0	Crates

Friday, February 17
Favorite: Standing Hair Dryer and Curling Iron, 1930-1940 (2011.120.1)
MOHAI		PSMHS
3	Items	0	Items
2	Cat #	0	Cat #
10	Boxe	0	Boxes
2	Crates	0	Crates

And today was a pretty big day already! The Japanese Maple was transplanted from Japan to the A-Y-P Exposition in 1909 by Julius Bonnell  and later transplanted onto MOHAI’s grounds by his son in 1964. Today it was moved onto a truck which will take it to Lake Union Park to be transplanted again into its hopefully last resting place next to the Armory.  A video is attached below:

…a Jade Circle

Sunday Recipes

Seattle has always been a place for people from all over the earth to settle. Starting with the Salish people, after its founding in 1852, immigrant groups have colored every part of Seattle life, including its food.

The Seattle Chinese Women’s Club was formed from the University Chinese Women’s Club in 1958. It was founded in order to teach the children of the American-born children of Chinese Americans about their heritage. In 1963, the Jade Circle of the Chinese Women’s Club published the cookbook, Precious Chinese Recipes. This recipe is taken from that cookbook:

Sherry Pork (Sui Jau Juh Yook)

• 4 cup pork, sliced thin
• 2 tbsp. oil
• 4 cloves garlic, crushed
• ¼ cup green onion, cut in 2″ lengths
• ¼ cup ginger, fresh, crushed
• ½ cup sherry
• 1 tsp. sugar
• 1 tsp. salt
• ¼ tsp. monosodium glutamate (MSG)

Heat skillet, add oil. Sauté garlic and ginger. Add port and sauté 5 minutes. Add remaining ingredients. Cook 2 minutes. Serve.

…Patriotic Eating

Earlier this week, I showed you a recipe for spaghetti that could be made even with World War II food rationing. How did the government get people to freely give up staples they would have never thought about giving up before the war? The same way you get anyone to do anything: Posters!
Attached are a collection of posters from World War I and World War II asking for the American people on the homefront to participate in a shared sacrifice. One could argue that this shared sacrifice, knowing that the rich family next door had to deal with the same sugar shortage as your lower-middle class clan, probably had as much to do with America’s united stance during these conflicts as a shared enemy did. (Of course, there was opposition to the wars, but that’s a topic for another blog. A juicy, interesting topic if there ever was one.) Anyway, enjoy the fun posters and perhaps think of shared sacrifices we all have today.