In 1888, black men were recruited from the southern states to come to Roslyn, Washington, to work in the mines. What they had not known until their arrival was that they were there to break the strike against the coal company. Upon their arrival on the Northern Pacific Coal Company train, they were met with much violence. When the strike was finally settled, everyone-black and white-went to work. After the mines closed, the blacks migrated across the Pacific Northwest. Arcadia's African Americans in Spokane is about those black families who arrived in Spokane, Washington, in 1899. This collect... Read More
Format: Paperback
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In 1888, black men were recruited from the southern states to come to Roslyn, Washington, to work in the mines. What they had not known until their arrival was that they were there to break the strike against the coal company. Upon their arrival on the Northern Pacific Coal Company train, they were met with much violence. When the strike was finally settled, everyone-black and white-went to work. After the mines closed, the blacks migrated across the Pacific Northwest. Arcadia's African Americans in Spokane is about those black families who arrived in Spokane, Washington, in 1899. This collect... Read More
In 1888, black men were recruited from the southern states to come to Roslyn, Washington, to work in the mines. What they had not known until their arrival was that they were there to break the strike against the coal company. Upon their arrival on the Northern Pacific Coal Company train, they were met with much violence. When the strike was finally settled, everyone-black and white-went to work. After the mines closed, the blacks migrated across the Pacific Northwest. Arcadia's African Americans in Spokane is about those black families who arrived in Spokane, Washington, in 1899. This collection of historic images reveals the story of their survival, culture, churches, and significance in the Spokane community throughout the decades that followed; this is the story of the journey that began once their final destination was reached, in Spokane.
Details
Pages: 128
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing Inc.
Imprint: Arcadia Publishing
Series: Images of America
Publication Date: 25th January 2010
State: Washington
Illustration Note: Black and White
ISBN: 9780738570112
Format: Paperback
BISACs: SOCIAL SCIENCE / Ethnic Studies / African American Studies PHOTOGRAPHY / Subjects & Themes / Historical HISTORY / United States / State & Local / Pacific Northwest (OR, WA)
Reviews
Title: "African Americans in Spokane," Jerrelene Williamson Author: Kevin Taylor Publisher: The Pacific Northwest Inlander Date: 2/19/2010
One might think that this slender volume, with its sepia-toned cover, trades in the dusty currency of a long-forgotten or oft-ignored side of Spokane -- its black citizens.
Yes, dear readers, and no, not at all.
The stories of blacks settling in Spokane have been largely unheard, but author Jerrelene Williamson doesn't offer dry crumbs from the archives. There is a vibrancy to these pages filled with old photographs, and a delight that comes from connecting a familiar name in the way-back to people who are still here in the right now.
"I knew those people. That's what makes the difference," Williamson says.
She needed to look no farther than the people who turned out for her reading at Auntie's last week to see the truth that African Americans in Spokane is a living history. The audience was filled with people whose forebears are in the book.
Of all the people commemorated in a 1989 centennial display put on by the Spokane Northwest Black Pioneers, "only three are left today," Williamson says. Two, Ruth Nichols and the 102-year-old Willie Earthman, were in the audience last week.
"These bones are feeling very pioneer-ish tonight," says Nichols, who feistily resisted revealing her age. "I am very proud of this book, and the people in it -- and looking so good, too!"
Williamson, with the help of her daughter Jennifer Roseman, approached Arcadia Publishing to reprise some of the materials from the centennial display.
African Americans in Spokane, with its format of photographs and captions, is more like a historical yearbook than a weighty tome.
It outlines two main migrations of blacks to Spokane -- in the late 1880s after the coal mines at Roslyn shut down, and again after the Second World War, when many black military men saw the city as a friendlier place to settle down and raise families than places in the East or South.
"I wrote the book because I wanted people to know what it was like. Even though we were invisible ... we were here," Williamson says.
Author Bio
Author Jerrelene Williamson's father was born in Spokane in 1899, where her family has resided ever since. Williamson is a founding member of the Spokane Northwest Black Pioneers, established in 1989. The photographs in this book are from the collections of the Spokane Northwest Black Pioneers, the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, and pioneer photographer Wallace (Wally) Hagin.
In 1888, black men were recruited from the southern states to come to Roslyn, Washington, to work in the mines. What they had not known until their arrival was that they were there to break the strike against the coal company. Upon their arrival on the Northern Pacific Coal Company train, they were met with much violence. When the strike was finally settled, everyone-black and white-went to work. After the mines closed, the blacks migrated across the Pacific Northwest. Arcadia's African Americans in Spokane is about those black families who arrived in Spokane, Washington, in 1899. This collection of historic images reveals the story of their survival, culture, churches, and significance in the Spokane community throughout the decades that followed; this is the story of the journey that began once their final destination was reached, in Spokane.
Pages: 128
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing Inc.
Imprint: Arcadia Publishing
Series: Images of America
Publication Date: 25th January 2010
State: Washington
Illustrations Note: Black and White
ISBN: 9780738570112
Format: Paperback
BISACs: SOCIAL SCIENCE / Ethnic Studies / African American Studies PHOTOGRAPHY / Subjects & Themes / Historical HISTORY / United States / State & Local / Pacific Northwest (OR, WA)
Title: "African Americans in Spokane," Jerrelene Williamson Author: Kevin Taylor Publisher: The Pacific Northwest Inlander Date: 2/19/2010
One might think that this slender volume, with its sepia-toned cover, trades in the dusty currency of a long-forgotten or oft-ignored side of Spokane -- its black citizens.
Yes, dear readers, and no, not at all.
The stories of blacks settling in Spokane have been largely unheard, but author Jerrelene Williamson doesn't offer dry crumbs from the archives. There is a vibrancy to these pages filled with old photographs, and a delight that comes from connecting a familiar name in the way-back to people who are still here in the right now.
"I knew those people. That's what makes the difference," Williamson says.
She needed to look no farther than the people who turned out for her reading at Auntie's last week to see the truth that African Americans in Spokane is a living history. The audience was filled with people whose forebears are in the book.
Of all the people commemorated in a 1989 centennial display put on by the Spokane Northwest Black Pioneers, "only three are left today," Williamson says. Two, Ruth Nichols and the 102-year-old Willie Earthman, were in the audience last week.
"These bones are feeling very pioneer-ish tonight," says Nichols, who feistily resisted revealing her age. "I am very proud of this book, and the people in it -- and looking so good, too!"
Williamson, with the help of her daughter Jennifer Roseman, approached Arcadia Publishing to reprise some of the materials from the centennial display.
African Americans in Spokane, with its format of photographs and captions, is more like a historical yearbook than a weighty tome.
It outlines two main migrations of blacks to Spokane -- in the late 1880s after the coal mines at Roslyn shut down, and again after the Second World War, when many black military men saw the city as a friendlier place to settle down and raise families than places in the East or South.
"I wrote the book because I wanted people to know what it was like. Even though we were invisible ... we were here," Williamson says.
Author Jerrelene Williamson's father was born in Spokane in 1899, where her family has resided ever since. Williamson is a founding member of the Spokane Northwest Black Pioneers, established in 1989. The photographs in this book are from the collections of the Spokane Northwest Black Pioneers, the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, and pioneer photographer Wallace (Wally) Hagin.
