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SUGGESTED RESEARCH TOPICS |
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Here is a list of possible topics. Each is described in more detail in the descriptions section below 1900-40 topics:
1940s-50s topics:
1960s- 1970s topics:
Mapping projects:
Descriptions of RESEARCH TOPICS 1900-1940 topics:James Y. Sakamoto and the Japanese American Courier James Sakamoto was an extremely important second generation leader in Seattle’s Japanese American Community. Starting at a young age, he fought anti-Japanese politicians, co-founded the Japanese American Citizen’s League, and founded and edited a newspaper—the Japanese American Courier—to combat bigotry and promote Japanese citizenship claims. His paper ceased publication when he was interned during World War II, a loss he never fully recovered from. Sources:
Colored Marine Employment Benevolent Association and Maritime unionism 1921-34: Excluded from white unions, black and Asian workers sometimes formed their own labor organizations. The CMEBA represented black cooks and stewards on passenger ships that operated on the West Coast. Sources:
Labor, Radicals, and World War I antiwar activity in Seattle -- World War I came in the midst of a wave of rising labor radicalism in the United States, and it was labor and radical activists who formed the bulwark of opposition to World War I. The strong distrust among labor militants and radicals of a war to open foreign markets to American capital, combined with a national economic depression, made the war unpopular, particularly among organized labor. This was especially true in the radical labor stronghold of the Pacific Northwest, where the Industrial Workers of the World and the Socialist Party were particularly effective. IWW members and socialists worked to pass antiwar resolutions in their union halls, joined by broader labor forces like the AFL and the Seattle Central Labor Council. Local chapters of the American Union Against Militarism brought together radicals, labor activists, church groups, and liberal organizations to conduct street polls on the war, and 3,500 people protested a pro-war Preparedness Day Parade on May 28, 1916. After the US entered the war, the 1917 Espionage Act was passed, making “disloyal” statements illegal, and leading to the prosecution and trial of prominent Northwest antiwar activists, socialists, and IWW members. Sources:
Newspapers on Strike: the 1936 Newspaper Guild Strike: One of the first strikes by newspaper reporters anywhere in the country, the Seattle PI strike helped secure the future of the Newspaper Guild and galvanized the local labor movement. Primary sources include local newspapers. Secondary source: William E. Ames and Roger A. Simpson, Unionism of Hearst: The Seattle Post-Intelligencer Strike of 1936. Spying on Labor 1918-1922: Broussais Beck and Roy Kinnear: Employers financed elaborate spy operations to keep track of unions and radicals. Special Collections library has detailed spy reports and employer records that will provide sources for this project. Secondary source: Dana Frank, Purchasing Power: Consumer Organizing, Gender, and the Seattle Labor Movement, 1919-1929; Robert Freidheim, The Seattle General Strike. Launching the CIO on the West Coast 1937-1940 —when the American Federation of Labor expelled the CIO unions in 1937, a west-coast CIO was launched, led by the newly independent Longshore workers union, the ILWU. Timber workers and others soon joined and over the next few years CIO unions fought with AFL unions for jurisdiction in many industries. 1940s-1950s topics:Ship Scalers’, Dry Dock, and Boat Workers’ Union, Local 541 -- Ship scaling—cleaning the interior and exterior of ships—was one of the most unpleasant, dangerous, and poorly paid jobs in the shipbuilding industry. Organized in the 1930s, the Ship Scalers’ union sought to organize and safeguard workers’ jobs in the massive shipyards of Seattle. After World War II, the ethnic makeup of the union turned from Scandinavian to predominantly African American, and the union infused its vision of labor power with demands for racial equality and progressive politics. Because of the union’s political leftism, the anti-union laws and repression of leftist activists in the 1950s led to a series of purges and red scares during the early cold war. Sources: These records are housed in the Labor Archives of Washington State in UW’s Special Collections, and students working on this topic would be able to work directly with Conor Casey, the labor archivist (cmcasey@uw.edu). Filipino Cannery Workers’ Deportation Hearings-- By the end of World War II, the Cannery Workers’ Union in Seattle (Local 7 of the United Cannery, Agricultural, Packinghouse, and Allied Workers of America) had become the bargaining unit for cannery workers up and down the West Coast. Cannery Workers were primarily Asian and Asian American on the West Coast, and Seattle’s local was mostly Filipino, acting not only as a union but also as a center of radical Filipino/a politics in the Northwest. With the rising tide of anti-communist and anti-labor laws in the early Cold War, the Cannery Workers’ radicalism and ties to the Communist Party made the union a target for anti-communist repression. In 1950, leaders and members of the union were arrested and charged with being subversives, subject to deportation. The union fought the deportation hearings all the way to the Supreme Court and ultimately established residency for Filipino immigrants in the United States. Sources:
Anti-Defamation League of the B’Nai B’rith—Fighting Anti-Semitism —Founded in Seattle in 1913, the Anti-Defamation League worked to educate Seattle about the evils of anti-semitism and was often also an ally against other forms of racism. Primary sources: Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith Collection, Accession 2045-001, University of Washington Libraries, The Civic Unity Committee and the 1940s campaign against discrimination— created by Mayor Devin in 1944, the Civic Unity Committee was a quasi-governmental organization charged with educating about race discrimination and civil rights. Not a protest group, its investigations and interventions nevertheless helped build the movement for civil rights. Sydney Gerber and the campaign for Open Housing— Sydney Gerber spent decades trying to improve the climate for Civil Rights. A realtor, he played a key role in the open housing campaigns of the early 1960s. He created an open housing listing service to make it possible for African American and Asian American families to buy homes outside of the Central area. His Harmony Homes project helped break segregation in Kirkland and Bellevue. Primary sources: Sydney Gerber collection. 1960s-70s topicsDevelopment of Women’s Liberation Movement in Seattle, out of the antiwar, civil rights movements-- The women’s liberation movement developed from activists long involved in civil rights and antiwar struggles. In Seattle, a committee within Students for a Democratic Society developed into Women’s Liberation-Seattle, which spread to a chapter at Seattle Central (who published their own newsletter, “Ain’t I a Woman?” Barbara Winslow, a leading member of SDS, was the first history grad student at UW and helped develop the first introductory course on women’s history. In addition to SDS and WL-Seattle, a class on the “Woman Question,” at the Free University in Seattle, involving old activists from CORE and the Communist Party, published a journal Lilith. There’s much more of a history (including Radical Women), but the moment of development from CORE and antiwar work into specifically women’s movement work in the early 1970s would be a great local study.Sources:
May 1970 Student strike at the UW-- After Nixon’s announcement of expanding the war in Vietnam into Cambodia on May 1, 1970, a week of national student strikes was called for campuses all over the country. On May 4, four demonstrating students at Kent State University in Ohio were killed by National Guardsmen firing into the crowd, followed by a similar incident on May 15 killing two students at Jackson State University in Mississippi. Antiwar protests begun on May 1 erupted in Seattle and led to a few weeks of protest, involving a student strike at the UW and a mass march from campus, down Interstate-5, to downtown. The student strike set up alternative universities, organized its own strike committees, and involved all sections of the campus left. Sources:
Mineo Katagiri and the Asian Coalition for Equality (ACE), 1968-70 Rev. Mineo Katagiri was an outspoken civil rights activist who, during his brief time in Seattle, founded and led the Asian Coalition for Equality. ACE successfully fought to have Asian Americans included in the University of Washington’s affirmative action programs in 1969, promoted pan Asian identity, challenged stereotypes about Asian passivity, and helped channel Asian activists into direct action struggles for civil rights. Sources:
Oriental Student Union (OSU) Protest, SCCC, 1970-1971 Co-founded by Mike Tagawa, a former Black Panther, and Alan Sugiyama, a former ACE activist, and modeled after the Black Student Union, the Oriental Student Union at Seattle Central Community College fought for Asian studies courses and the hiring of Asian administrators and professors. In 1971, OSU activists occupied SCCC buildings to dramatize their concerns. It was the first pan- Asian (non-labor union) direct action in Seattle, and one of the first in the nation. Alan Sugiyama oral history, http://depts.washington.edu/civilr/sugiyama.htm. Sources:
Washington Citizens for Abortion Reform The movement for abortion rights began earlier in Washington than in many other states and in 1970 voters passed one of the first state laws securing abortion rights. The campaign was led by the Washington Citizens for Abortion Reform, whose records are available in Special Collections Library.
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