One of the driving forces of the Civil Rights Movement in Seattle, Washington was the desire to end unfair employment discrimination in the city. The Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) was at the forefront of the Seattle struggle to ensure equal employment in the 1960s. … Read MoreDrive for Equal Employment in Downtown Seattle (DEEDS)
On May 8, 2009, Ronald Cordell Sims became the Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Sims now second-in-command of the federal agency will oversee day-to-day operations of the Department which has an annual budget of $39 billion and some 8,500 employees. … Read MoreRonald Cordell Sims (1948- )
The career of Seattle-based jazz vocalist Ernestine Anderson is noteworthy both for its prolific output of more than 30 albums, and the more than 60-year span of her career. Born in Houston, Texas on November 11, 1928, as a child she joined her father and … Read MoreErnestine Anderson (1928-2016)
Alice Augusta Ball, a pharmaceutical chemist, was born in Seattle, Washington in 1892 to Laura and James P. Ball Jr. Her grandfather was J.P. Ball, the well known daguerreotype photographer and her father was a promising lawyer. James P. Ball Sr. moved to Hawaii for … Read MoreAlice Augusta Ball (1892-1916)
George Rawles was born in South Carolina to a young slave mother owned by Benjamin Rawles II. At the age of 17 and now living in Perry County, Mississippi, he was given to his master’s son, Benjamin Rawles III to be his body servant during … Read MoreGeorge Washington Rawles (1845-1922)
In the following article, Henry W. McGee, Jr., a Seattle University Professor of Law and Central District resident, discusses the recent dramatic transformation of the area from a predominately working class African American community into an area of high income white, Asian American and African … Read MoreGentrification, Integration or Displacement?: The Seattle Story
During World War II, Lydia Sims moved from Newark, New Jersey, to Spokane with her husband, James Sims, an Army Air Force soldier stationed at Geiger Airfield. At the end of the war, the Sims family decided to remain in Spokane. For 10 years they … Read MoreJames & Lydia Sims
Future mayor of Seattle, Norman B. Rice was born in Denver, Colorado. He migrated to Seattle in 1970 to attend college. In 1972 he earned a bachelor’s degree in communications and two years later a master’s degree in public administration both from the University of … Read MoreNorm Rice (1943- )
Championship cross country runner Edward Gardner was born in Birmingham, Alabama in December 1898. Shortly after his birth, his family moved west and eventually settled in Seattle. Gardner returned to Alabama in 1914, to attend Tuskegee Institute, where he learned a trade as a steam … Read MoreEdward Gardner (1898-1966)
Described by those who knew her as exotic, flamboyant, and colorful, Zoë Dusanne, was an art dealer and collector who opened Seattle’s first professional modern-art gallery, the Zoë Dusanne Gallery in 1950, and who worked tirelessly to both introduce modern art to a northwest audience … Read MoreZoë Dusanne (1884-1972)
