By Georgie Bright Kunkel

At one time in the early days of Seattle you could not find all night entertainment or high level dining for those who thought of themselves as worldly. Yes, Seattle was considered to be out in the boondocks. If you don’t know what boondocks are just look it up in the dictionary and you will find that it means out of the mainstream—a backwoods or marsh area or a remote rural area. When cities burgeoned on the horizon they became the places that corporations called home and anyone who wanted to move up the ladder needed to move there to find work.

In my earlier life there was always a slight tension between my rural relatives and those of us who chose the greater career choices found in Seattle. My children were often teased by their farm cousins about living in the big bad city. Seattle became a so-called liberal stronghold probably because all the free thinkers who went west to find even more freedom had to stop when they reached the Pacific Ocean. Many early experiments in free thinking and cooperative living sprang up around this area—Freeland on Whidbey Island, for example. I can imagine that anyone fleeing from the law or from a bad marriage or just looking for excitement and new land to conquer found themselves here.

Even though it is usually men who create cities, Seattle elected the first female mayor of a major US city. Bertha K. Landes was acting mayor in 1924 and in 1926 was elected for two years. Her roots were in the Eastern part of the US where she was educated and married Lewis who supported her in her political aspirations. Women got the vote in Seattle before those in the rest of the nation did in 1920. There was a mood of cleaning up the city and Bertha Landes certainly cleaned up the saloons. Finally the mood changed and a relative unknown opposed her and won allowing her only one two year term in office.
No matter how our rural relatives teased our children for living in the big bad city they loved to come up to be shown the zoo, the aquarium, and the Space Needle with its exciting surroundings of bumper car rides and other entertainment which is now being removed. This area reminiscent of the Seattle World’s Fair will always be a gathering place around the wonderful fountain and room for exhibitions such as the WA Women in Trades Career Fair every spring.

I have fond memories of my women’s movement days when I initiated a meeting with the black feminist activist, Flo Kennedy, in one of the large meeting halls at Seattle Center drawing 900 people. Every office holder who wanted to be seen at a large public meeting was present. Flo lambasted every politician who took corporate money, no holds barred. She said that there was so much dirt to remove that it was like trying to remove a pile of manure with a teaspoon. What a woman she was. She is no longer alive and neither is the woman who helped me mount this great meeting, Jean Hueston, who was active in greater Seattle politics for many years.

Seattle has seen a lot of changes beginning with the Denny regrade and the building of the Smith Tower that was once the tallest building this side of the Mississippi. Now we must settle for tunnel talk and finding ways to funnel the cars through downtown Seattle. So glad that I live in West Seattle, my small town not far away from my real small town home of Chehalis. My mind was circling the globe but my body never wanted to wander away after I settled in West Seattle.

Georgie Bright Kunkel is a freelance writer who can be reached at gnkunkel@comcast.net or 206-935-8663.