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Seattle: Past to Present
Seattle, Past to Present, interprets the history of the foremost city in the Northwest and traces the implications of that history for the city's present and future. In the process Seattle emerges not as a rough, half-formed frontier town but as a soft city of streets and houses, middle-class in aspiration and achievement; Roger Sale asks how it came to be that way.
The methods Sale employs range from demographic analysis and residential survey to portraiture and personal observation and reflection. He highlights what was most important in each of the city's major periods from the founding, when the settlers, in waiting forty years for the railroads to come, meanwhile built a city to which the railroads had to come, down to the post-Boeing Seattle of the 1970s, when the city tried for the first time to discover a sense of itself based on the truths and lessons of its own past.
Along the way one finds a good deal that has been obscured or ignored in other books on Seattle and in most books on the history of American cities: a discussion of the economic diversity of late-nineteenth-century Seattle which allowed it to grow; a description of the major achievements of the first boom years, in parks, boulevards, and neighborhoods of quiet elegance; portraits of people like Vernon Parrington, Nellie Cornish, and Mark Tobey who came to Seattle and flourished here; an assessment of Seattle's new vitality as the result of natives and newcomers mixing both in harmony and in antagonism.
The methods Sale employs range from demographic analysis and residential survey to portraiture and personal observation and reflection. He highlights what was most important in each of the city's major periods from the founding, when the settlers, in waiting forty years for the railroads to come, meanwhile built a city to which the railroads had to come, down to the post-Boeing Seattle of the 1970s, when the city tried for the first time to discover a sense of itself based on the truths and lessons of its own past.
Along the way one finds a good deal that has been obscured or ignored in other books on Seattle and in most books on the history of American cities: a discussion of the economic diversity of late-nineteenth-century Seattle which allowed it to grow; a description of the major achievements of the first boom years, in parks, boulevards, and neighborhoods of quiet elegance; portraits of people like Vernon Parrington, Nellie Cornish, and Mark Tobey who came to Seattle and flourished here; an assessment of Seattle's new vitality as the result of natives and newcomers mixing both in harmony and in antagonism.
- GenresHistoryNonfiction
Paperback
First published January 1, 1976
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 12, 2014
I wouldn’t recommend this book unless you are fully invested in learning more about Seattle’s history. Frankly, it’s not well written. However, if you do come to the book with ample curiosity about Seattle’s boom and bust history from its timber beginnings to post-Boeing period in the 1970s when it truly became its own metropolis, then Seattle Past to Present is worth the long slog. (Though, honestly, the Wikipedia page on Seattle's history is almost as thorough and certainly more efficient.)
As I mentioned in my review of Niall Ferguson's Civilization, I appreciate big history told through the lens of big arguments. And Roger Sale, a literary critic and former professor at the University of Washington, isn't shy in expressing his opinions or criticizing the interpretations of other historians of Seattle's rise.
As a native of Seattle (albeit my family and I moved when I was only five) and as a future resident in just ten days, Seattle's history helped me better understand its present condition. Seattle had plenty of opportunities to decline and even disintegrate: over-exploitation of timber, the bust of the Klondike Gold Rush, the Great Depression, and the Boeing bust during the 1970s. But every period of bust has shortly been followed by yet another boom period, which attracts newcomers, diversifies the economy, and ultimately creates a more cosmopolitan city.
Seattle began as a timber economy, transitioned smoothly to the manufacturing economy when Boeing became the world's airplane maker, and then transitioned relatively smoothly yet again to technology, retail and service with the rise of Microsoft, Amazon Starbucks, REI and Nordstroms. The timber and manufacturing economies firmly established Seattle as a middle class city, which is only now being threatened by the young millionaires of the Internet economy. Still, there are few rich or poor neighborhoods in Seattle — and there are many neighborhoods where expensive and cheap homes stand side by side. As Sale rights, it has always been a city where the baker, banker and professor are immediate neighbors.
While Sale is clearly a proud resident of Seattle, he isn't afraid to take the gloves off and deal critical blows, especially in how the city has dealt (or continually refused to deal) with ethnic integration. First it forcibly kicked out the Chinese in the 1890s. Then its white residents cooly looked on while their Japanese residents were rounded up during WWII and taken to internment camps. Seattle's Black population, which grew considerably during Boeing's WWII expansion, was always isolated from the rest of the city, ultimately leading to ethnic tension in the late 60s. Seattle continues to be a segregated city with good intentions and little evidence of successful integration.
Sale also documents the many visionary civil engineers and urban planners that have been calling for effective public transit for the Seattle metropolitan area since the 1950s. They warned of the traffic and chaos that would result if the middle class city continued to expand and every family owned a car. Unfortunately, Seattle's residents routinely voted against public transit in favor of more freeways and bridges. They wanted their cars and suburbs, and as a result Seattle followed the urban planning model of Los Angeles more than New York or San Francisco. Finally, after decades of attempts, Seattle has established a light rail system that will have decent coverage by 2020.
I always find that history is the best way to learn about the present. During the westward expansion of the United States in the 1850s, Sale observes, single men headed to San Francisco to make their fortune in the Gold Rush while families settled to Portland and Seattle to construct their homesteads and become self-sufficient. I think there is an argument to make that the greedy ambition of Silicon Valley today and the rugged self-sufficiency of the Pacific Northwest were established in their first decades.
As I mentioned in my review of Niall Ferguson's Civilization, I appreciate big history told through the lens of big arguments. And Roger Sale, a literary critic and former professor at the University of Washington, isn't shy in expressing his opinions or criticizing the interpretations of other historians of Seattle's rise.
As a native of Seattle (albeit my family and I moved when I was only five) and as a future resident in just ten days, Seattle's history helped me better understand its present condition. Seattle had plenty of opportunities to decline and even disintegrate: over-exploitation of timber, the bust of the Klondike Gold Rush, the Great Depression, and the Boeing bust during the 1970s. But every period of bust has shortly been followed by yet another boom period, which attracts newcomers, diversifies the economy, and ultimately creates a more cosmopolitan city.
Seattle began as a timber economy, transitioned smoothly to the manufacturing economy when Boeing became the world's airplane maker, and then transitioned relatively smoothly yet again to technology, retail and service with the rise of Microsoft, Amazon Starbucks, REI and Nordstroms. The timber and manufacturing economies firmly established Seattle as a middle class city, which is only now being threatened by the young millionaires of the Internet economy. Still, there are few rich or poor neighborhoods in Seattle — and there are many neighborhoods where expensive and cheap homes stand side by side. As Sale rights, it has always been a city where the baker, banker and professor are immediate neighbors.
While Sale is clearly a proud resident of Seattle, he isn't afraid to take the gloves off and deal critical blows, especially in how the city has dealt (or continually refused to deal) with ethnic integration. First it forcibly kicked out the Chinese in the 1890s. Then its white residents cooly looked on while their Japanese residents were rounded up during WWII and taken to internment camps. Seattle's Black population, which grew considerably during Boeing's WWII expansion, was always isolated from the rest of the city, ultimately leading to ethnic tension in the late 60s. Seattle continues to be a segregated city with good intentions and little evidence of successful integration.
Sale also documents the many visionary civil engineers and urban planners that have been calling for effective public transit for the Seattle metropolitan area since the 1950s. They warned of the traffic and chaos that would result if the middle class city continued to expand and every family owned a car. Unfortunately, Seattle's residents routinely voted against public transit in favor of more freeways and bridges. They wanted their cars and suburbs, and as a result Seattle followed the urban planning model of Los Angeles more than New York or San Francisco. Finally, after decades of attempts, Seattle has established a light rail system that will have decent coverage by 2020.
I always find that history is the best way to learn about the present. During the westward expansion of the United States in the 1850s, Sale observes, single men headed to San Francisco to make their fortune in the Gold Rush while families settled to Portland and Seattle to construct their homesteads and become self-sufficient. I think there is an argument to make that the greedy ambition of Silicon Valley today and the rugged self-sufficiency of the Pacific Northwest were established in their first decades.
July 27, 2011
Not holding my attention. This is not a traditional history, which, fair is fair, Sale warned me about in his introduction: "It is not, like a formal history, crammed as full of facts and details as can be made room for. My aim has been to describe and discuss what for me are the most important and most characteristic truths about each of the city's various major periods." What this ends up meaning is that Sale is going to spend a lot of time with philosophical musings about how Seattle attracted a heterogeneous group of settlers who somehow made the city more attractive and strong than, say, Tacoma.
It is funny to me that there is so much Tacoma bashing in this book. I've never been to either city, but I'm going to visit Seattle soon, and I will happily join in looking down my nose, and over my latte, at Tacoma. Unless Seattle is unpleasant, in which case maybe I'll become a Tacoma partisan.
Sale spends so much time with his philosophical musings that he gives short shrift to the stuff I actually wanted to hear about, like the expulsion of all the Chinese in the 1880s. I raise my eyebrow at this. It seems like Sale's attitude was basically, this isn't going to be pretty, so lets just power through it and then I'll imply that Seattle-ites weren't so bad, because some people wanted to expel the Chinese in an orderly fashion, rather than at gunpoint. Just because everyone on the West Coast in 1880 was a nasty bigot, not just the people in Seattle, doesn't mean that Seattle gets off the hook.
What's really crazy to me in reading histories of western cities is how young they are, and how quickly they grew. It really is mind-boggling. When the first white people got to Seattle and started to build a town, in the 1850s, the little Massachusetts town I live in now had been around for about 130 years. Then before fifty years was up, Seattle had a hundred thousand people, and this little Mass town was pretty much the same as it had been for 150 years. Now today Seattle has 600,000 people and my little town is still humming along at 900 people, not all that different from 1750 or so.
It is funny to me that there is so much Tacoma bashing in this book. I've never been to either city, but I'm going to visit Seattle soon, and I will happily join in looking down my nose, and over my latte, at Tacoma. Unless Seattle is unpleasant, in which case maybe I'll become a Tacoma partisan.
Sale spends so much time with his philosophical musings that he gives short shrift to the stuff I actually wanted to hear about, like the expulsion of all the Chinese in the 1880s. I raise my eyebrow at this. It seems like Sale's attitude was basically, this isn't going to be pretty, so lets just power through it and then I'll imply that Seattle-ites weren't so bad, because some people wanted to expel the Chinese in an orderly fashion, rather than at gunpoint. Just because everyone on the West Coast in 1880 was a nasty bigot, not just the people in Seattle, doesn't mean that Seattle gets off the hook.
What's really crazy to me in reading histories of western cities is how young they are, and how quickly they grew. It really is mind-boggling. When the first white people got to Seattle and started to build a town, in the 1850s, the little Massachusetts town I live in now had been around for about 130 years. Then before fifty years was up, Seattle had a hundred thousand people, and this little Mass town was pretty much the same as it had been for 150 years. Now today Seattle has 600,000 people and my little town is still humming along at 900 people, not all that different from 1750 or so.
June 2, 2020
I did not read this history when it was first published in 1976. Of course I had read about it many times so when I saw it was being re-issued with an updated introduction by Knute Berger, I decided it was time. I so enjoyed Berger's introduction especially the description of the Madrona breakfast group that included the author Roger Sale years after he wrote this book and other Seattle favorites including my favorite writer Joel Connelly.
Sadly, the introduction was by far the best part of the book. The book itself is not a true history, more of a collection of essays of different periods of Seattle with a particular focus for each period. For example the chapter of Seattle between the wars focused on Teamster Dave Beck as symbolic of Seattle during that time, greatly influenced by unions, but unions that passed on challenges of economic inequality and social justice in favor of giving specific union membership access to a Babbit style of middle class. The tension with the Longshoreman under Harry Bridges is mentioned but not satisfactorily analyzed. The same for the book's earlier treatment of the anti-Chinese riots and the later treatment of internment of Japanese Americans.
There were nice tidbits in reading today. Sale argued that Seattle would be more interesting today if Denny Hill had not been razed, that argument is even more compelling reading today after years of the Mercer mess. Sale bemoans the construction of the Alaskan viaduct and its cutting the waterfront away from the rest of the Seattle; reading it today as the Viaduct is taken down increases the excitement of this part of future Seattle.
Maybe I was expecting too much after hearing of the hype over the years and I'm not sure there is a suitable substitute for a Seattle history, but this left me a bit cold. And perhaps wishing that a Knute Berger or Joel Connelly would write the history that this city deserves
Sadly, the introduction was by far the best part of the book. The book itself is not a true history, more of a collection of essays of different periods of Seattle with a particular focus for each period. For example the chapter of Seattle between the wars focused on Teamster Dave Beck as symbolic of Seattle during that time, greatly influenced by unions, but unions that passed on challenges of economic inequality and social justice in favor of giving specific union membership access to a Babbit style of middle class. The tension with the Longshoreman under Harry Bridges is mentioned but not satisfactorily analyzed. The same for the book's earlier treatment of the anti-Chinese riots and the later treatment of internment of Japanese Americans.
There were nice tidbits in reading today. Sale argued that Seattle would be more interesting today if Denny Hill had not been razed, that argument is even more compelling reading today after years of the Mercer mess. Sale bemoans the construction of the Alaskan viaduct and its cutting the waterfront away from the rest of the Seattle; reading it today as the Viaduct is taken down increases the excitement of this part of future Seattle.
Maybe I was expecting too much after hearing of the hype over the years and I'm not sure there is a suitable substitute for a Seattle history, but this left me a bit cold. And perhaps wishing that a Knute Berger or Joel Connelly would write the history that this city deserves
March 1, 2018
After living here for 3.5 years it was time for a history lesson. I picked this book up on a whim at the library and found a lot to love. The early Seattle history was fascinating, as was the background of institutions like Cornish, SAM, and UW, and the effect that Boeing had on the city's development. I liked that the author confronted Seattle's ugly past regarding minorities head-on and drew parallels between the treatment of the Chinese, Japanese and blacks over the years. However, the book is EXTREMELY dated, which can't really be helped being that it was published in 1976. So the story leaves off quite a long time ago and I'll need to find a different book to fill that void! But other complaints include the lengthy digressions into the politics of labor and city planning. Perhaps others would find this interesting but I had to skim a lot.
April 3, 2023
Excellent book! Covers seattle history in interpretative strokes from its founding until about 1970-5. Particularly interesting to read an informed, curious local observer’s sense of the city’s strengths, hopes, and weaknesses after the Boeing bust but prior to any tech boom. Two essential insights: “land and labor are the essential preconditions of real growth” - not capital. Seattle is an essentially retiring, bourgeois city - from its first founding and especially from its interwar rise of organized but conservative labor, postwar colony years as the support of Boeing manufacturing. It has suffered and will suffer from its lack of real political development or engagement outside of spurts of enthusiasm, and its skin-deep liberalism shouldn’t be overstated: its public tolerance is mostly a petit bourgeois “live and let live” mentality, applied to an unusually wide base of homeowners.
August 5, 2022
One of the most interesting things about this book is the first chapter, where Sale describes Seattle "today" (i.e., 1976-ish). My, how things have changed in the last 45 years. It would be interesting if he were still around to write a companion introduction, comparing today's Seattle to that Seattle, especially focusing on the aspects (climate, economics, housing density, etc.) he highlighted in his original book. Throughout the book are other comments about the Seattle of the late 1970s, as well as predictions about the future.
Sale is at times snarky, at times dismissive, at times bitchy and curmudgeonly, and at times has moments that had me gasping in surprise in public. He tells the story of Seattle's history, yet seems to tell about events and themes that others haven't (or not many have, or not all in one history).
If you want a typical history, with the most well-known or essential facts and stories of Seattle's history, this probably won't be the book you want. However, if you want to go deeper, get stories, themes, and shifts not often included or called out in other Seattle books, give this one a try.
Sale is at times snarky, at times dismissive, at times bitchy and curmudgeonly, and at times has moments that had me gasping in surprise in public. He tells the story of Seattle's history, yet seems to tell about events and themes that others haven't (or not many have, or not all in one history).
If you want a typical history, with the most well-known or essential facts and stories of Seattle's history, this probably won't be the book you want. However, if you want to go deeper, get stories, themes, and shifts not often included or called out in other Seattle books, give this one a try.
June 2, 2009
i learned a little about seattle from a book where, maybe i am ignorant (or just real tired), but felt like i cam across one or two fragment sentences. oh well, tired or not, seattle is but a few years old (in the scheme of things), and it kind of gave some depth to a town where i never felt there was any...excepting of course, asian concentration camps. i learned a bit and appreciated it. especially liked the part where the first european women arriving on seattle soil (of the denny party), knelt down and CRIED. i understand these women, i get their tears. but i also see what the men saw,...it is pretty incredible here and we owe a lot to those visionaries. but given landing on alki in 1851 (or whatever) on a dec/jan day, i woulda cried too.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews