A Cold Wind From Idaho
by Lawrence Matsuda
Drawing on his own personal experience, author Lawrence Matsuda shares poems about the experiences and legacy of the forced incarceration of Japanese Americans in American concentration camps. Born into a World War II Concentration Camp in Minidoka, Idaho, along with many of his relatives, Matsuda went on to become a leader in his field, earning a PhD, becoming a public school teacher, principal, professor, writer, and poet.
Heartbreak City Seattle Sports and the Unmet Promise of Urban Progress
by Shaun Scott
How the city's marginalized communities have historically used sports as a tool for resilience and resistance
To cities, sports have never been just entertainment. Progressive urbanites across the United States have used athletics to address persistent problems in city life: the fights for racial justice, workers' rights, equality for women and LGBTQ+ city dwellers, and environmental conservation. In Seattle, sports initiatives have powered meaningful reforms, such as popular stadium projects that promoted investments in public housing and mass transit. At the same time, conservative forces also used sports to consolidate their power and mobilize against the civic good. In Heartbreak City Shaun Scott takes the reader through 170 years of Seattle history, chronicling both well-known and long-forgotten events, like the establishment of racially segregated golf courses and neighborhoods in the regressive 1920s and the 1987 Seahawks players' strike that galvanized organized labor. At every step of the journey, he uncovers how sports have both united Seattle in pursuit of triumph and revealed its most profound political divides. Deep archival research and analysis combine in this people's history of a great American city's quest to become even greater—if only it could get out of its own way.
Heartbreak City was made possible in part by a grant from 4Culture's Heritage Program.
A Michael J. Repass Book
Homewaters A Human and Natural History of Puget Sound
by David B. Williams
Not far from Seattle skyscrapers live 150-year-old clams, more than 250 species of fish, and underwater kelp forests as complex as any terrestrial ecosystem. For millennia, vibrant Coast Salish communities have lived beside these waters dense with nutrient-rich foods, with cultures intertwined through exchanges across the waterways. Transformed by settlement and resource extraction, Puget Sound and its future health now depend on a better understanding of the region's ecological complexities.
Focusing on the area south of Port Townsend and between the Cascade and Olympic mountains, Williams uncovers human and natural histories in, on, and around the Sound. In conversations with archaeologists, biologists, and tribal authorities, Williams traces how generations of humans have interacted with such species as geoducks, salmon, orcas, rockfish, and herring. He sheds light on how warfare shaped development and how people have moved across this maritime highway, in canoes, the mosquito fleet, and today's ferry system. The book also takes an unflinching look at how the Sound's ecosystems have suffered from human behavior, including pollution, habitat destruction, and the effects of climate change.
Witty, graceful, and deeply informed, Homewaters weaves history and science into a fascinating and hopeful narrative, one that will introduce newcomers to the astonishing life that inhabits the Sound and offers longtime residents new insight into and appreciation of the waters they call home.
A Michael J. Repass Book
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet
by Jamie Ford
Jamie Ford's historical novel Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet unfolds in two parallel timelines: one follows 12-year-old Henry Lee during World War II, while the other takes place 44 years later, focusing on Henry as a widowed father with a college-aged son. The story revolves around the forced relocation of Japanese Americans to internment camps, exploring the emotional hardship and trauma of separation through the bond between Henry, a Chinese-American boy, and his Japanese-American friend Keiko.
New Land, North of the Columbia
by Lorraine McConaghy
This colorful and fascinating collection documents the story of Washington Territory--when it was the "new land north of the Columbia River--all the way to today's NASA Landsat map of the State of Washington.
Puget's Sound A Narrative of Early Tacoma and the Southern Sound
by Murray Morgan
With the same ability to make personalities and events come alive that characterizes his classic Skid Road, Murray Morgan here tells the colorful story of Tacoma, “the City of Destiny,” and southern Puget Sound, where many major events of Washington’s history took place. Drawing upon original journals and reports, Morgan builds Puget’s Sound around individuals, interweaving portraits of well-known historical figures with a raucous parade of saloonkeepers, politicians, union organizers, schemers, and swindlers. His account begins with the landing of Captain Vancouver in Puget Sound in 1792 and ends with the founding of Fort Lewis in 1916. Between are the arrival of the transcontinental railroad, the boom-and-bust of lumber mills, the anti-Chinese riots of 1885, and more distinctive Northwest history that will intrigue both new arrivals and longtime residents.
With a new introduction by historian and historic preservationist Michael Sean Sullivan, this redesigned edition of Puget’s Sound brings new life to Morgan’s landmark history.
Seattle's Locks and Ship Canal A History and Guide
by David B. Williams and Jennifer Ott
How one canal reshaped Seattle’s history, economy, and environment
Seattle’s waterways are central to the city’s identity, and none more so than the Lake Washington Ship Canal and Ballard (Hiram M. Chittenden) Locks. Seattle’s Locks and Ship Canal: A History and Guide offers an accessible introduction to this engineering marvel and its ongoing significance. Adapted from the acclaimed Waterway, this portable edition distills decades of history into an engaging format ideal for both residents and visitors.
David B. Williams and Jennifer Ott chart the vision that drove the canal’s creation and the dramatic changes it brought to the city’s economy, neighborhoods, and natural environment. Along the way, they highlight the political struggles, industrial ambitions, and ecological consequences that shaped one of Seattle’s defining projects.
Enhanced with a map of the locks and another featuring key sites along the ship canal, this edition doubles as both a history and a practical guide. It illuminates how the locks, once designed for commercial shipping, have evolved into one of Seattle’s most popular destinations, where recreational boats, salmon ladders, and historic structures draw crowds year-round.
Clear, informative, and visually rich, Seattle’s Locks and Ship Canal is both a primer on the city’s past and a companion for exploring part of its present-day waterfront.
A Michael J. Repass Book
Stomp and Shout R&B and the Origins of Northwest Rock and Roll
by Peter Blecha
Finalist for the 2024 Washington State Book Award in General Nonfiction
Parking lot rumbles, teen dance riots, and the rise of the Northwest Sound
Long before the world discovered grunge, the Pacific Northwest was already home to a singular music culture. In the late 1950s, locals had codified a distinct offshoot of rockin' R&B, and a surprising number of them would skyrocket to success, including Little Bill and the Bluenotes, the Wailers, Ron Holden, Paul Revere and the Raiders, the Kingsmen, Merrilee Rush, and the Sonics.
With entertaining accounts gleaned from hundreds of interviews, Peter Blecha tells the story of music in the Pacific Northwest from the 1940s to the 1960s, a golden era that shaped generations of musicians to come. The local R&B scene evolved from the area's vibrant jazz scene, and Blecha illuminates the musical continuum between Ray Charles (who cut his first record in Seattle) and Quincy Jones to the rock 'n' rollers who forged the classic jazz-tinged "Northwest Sound." DJs built a teen dance circuit that the authorities didn't like but whose popularity pushed bands to develop crowd-friendly beats. Do-it-yourself enthusiasts launched groundbreaking record companies that scored a surprising number of hit songs.
Highlighting key but overlooked figures and offering a new look at well-known musicians (such as an obscure guitarist then known as Jimmy Hendrix), Blecha shows how an isolated region launched influential new sounds upon an unsuspecting world.
Stomp and Shout was made possible in part by a grant from 4Culture's Heritage Program.
A Michael J. Repass Book
The Good Rain: Across Time & Terrain in the Pacific Northwest
by Timothy Egan
In this mesmerizing book, Egan retraces a journey made in 1853 by Theodore Winthrop, the author of the first national book about the Pacific Northwest. As he travels Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia by unconventional means, Egan reflects on Winthrop's predictions for the northwest, mourns the loss of so much natural beauty, and casts visions of the landscapes that have escaped the march of modern development. Winner of the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Award
