Chinatown–International District, Seattle
The Chinatown–International District is a neighborhood of Seattle, Washington. It is the center of the city's Asian American community. Within the district are the three neighborhoods known as Chinatown, Japantown and Little Saigon, named for the concentration of businesses owned by people of Chinese, Japanese and Vietnamese descent, respectively. The geographic area also once included Manilatown.
It was the third community for the city's Chinese and Japanese immigrants, who were driven out of other locations around modern-day Pioneer Square during the late 19th century. A new Chinatown was established shortly after the Jackson Regrade in 1907, which leveled terrain near King Street Station, alongside a Japantown in the same vicinity. The city's Japantown declined following the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, while Vietnamese immigration after the Vietnam War led to the establishment of Little Saigon in the 1970s. The construction of Interstate 5 through the neighborhood in the 1960s and the Kingdome nearby in 1976 led to further strain on the area.
The Seattle Chinatown Historic District was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986. The area was named the "International District" by the city government since the mid-20th century, but the term's use is controversial among the Chinese American community. Like many other areas of Seattle, the neighborhood is multiethnic, but the majority of its residents are of Chinese ethnicity. It is one of eight historic neighborhoods recognized by the City of Seattle. CID has a mix of residences and businesses and is a tourist attraction for its ethnic Asian culture and landmarks.
Location
The CID boundaries are defined as 4th Avenue South to Rainier Avenue and from Yesler Way to Charles Street/Dearborn. The CID is bordered by the neighborhoods of Pioneer Square and SoDo to the west of 4th Ave S; Rainier Valley on the east side of Rainier; Beacon Hill and the Industrial District to the south of Charles/Dearborn; and downtown and First Hill to the north of Yesler.Within the CID are three distinct neighborhoods: Chinatown, Japantown, and Little Saigon. The Seattle Chinatown Historic District, so designated by the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1986, is roughly south of Jackson and west of I-5, with Hing Hay Park at its heart. In the present day, Japantown is centered on 6th Avenue and Main Street and Little Saigon's main nexus is 12th Avenue South and South Jackson Street.
History
Predecessors in Seattle
Chinese immigrants first came to the Pacific Northwest in the 1850s, and by the 1860s, some had settled in Seattle. The first in the city was Chin Chun Hock, a domestic worker who arrived in 1860 and later founded a general store and hotel. Many of the first Chinese immigrants to Washington came from Guangdong province, especially Taishan. By 1873, there was an estimated 100 Chinese residents in Seattle, out of the city's total population of 2,000. The first Chinese quarters were near Yesler's Mill on the waterfront, which included several business that opened in the late 1860s. The Chinese quarter grew to include residences and shifted uphill from the waterfront into leased buildings around Washington Street. The influx of Chinese immigrants was slowed by the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. Following an economic crisis a few years later, a group of white Seattle residents drove out the city's Chinese population in February 1886. However, some took shelter with Native Americans on the reservations while others came under the protection of white employers and a judge.The Great Seattle Fire of 1889 further hindered the community. Eventually, the Chinese re-established new quarters farther inland, along Washington St. and Second Avenue South. This was the second Chinatown. Land values rose, especially with impending construction of the Smith Tower, and the people of Chinatown moved again, to the present and third location along King Street. Only the Hop Sing Tong managed to retain its building on 2nd and Washington. It sold this building about 2006 in order to purchase the former China Gate building at 516 7th Ave S in the current Chinatown.
Near the end of the 19th century, Japanese immigrants also began arriving, settling on the south side of the district on the other side of the railroad tracks. Part of present-day Dearborn Street, between 8th and 12th avenues, was known as Mikado Street, after the Japanese word for "emperor." Japanese Americans developed Nihonmachi, or Japantown, on Main Street, two blocks north of King Street. By the mid-1920s, Nihonmachi extended from 4th Avenue along Main to 7th Avenue, with clusters of businesses along Jackson, King, Weller, Lane, and Dearborn streets.
20th century
The Jackson Regrade began in 1907; workers leveled hills and used the resulting fill to reclaim tidal flats, making travel to downtown easier. As downtown property values rose, the Chinese were forced to other areas. By the early 1900s, a new Chinatown began to develop along King Street. In 1910, Goon Dip, a prominent businessman in Seattle's Chinese American community, led a group of Chinese Americans to form the Kong Yick Investment Company, a benefit society. Their funding and efforts led to the construction of two buildings—the East Kong Yick Building and the West Kong Yick Building.Meanwhile, Filipino Americans began arriving to replace the Chinese dock workers, who had moved inland. According to Pamana I, a history of Filipino Americans in Seattle, they settled along First Hill and the hotels and boarding houses of Chinatown and Japantown beginning in the early 1920s. They were attracted to work as contract laborers in agriculture and salmon canneries. Among them was Filipino author Carlos Bulosan, who wrote of his experiences and those of his countrymen in his novel America Is In The Heart. By the 1930s, a 'Manilatown' had been established near the corner of Maynard and King.
In 1942, under the auspices of Executive Order 9066, the federal government forcibly removed and detained people of Japanese ancestry from Seattle and the West Coast in the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Authorities moved them to inland internment camps, where they lived from 1942 to 1946. Most of Seattle's Japanese residents were sent to Minidoka in Idaho. After the war, many returned to the Pacific Northwest but relocated to the suburbs or other districts in Seattle. A remaining vestige of the old community is the office of the North American Post, a Japanese-language newspaper founded in 1902. Another is the Panama Hotel, which was proclaimed a National Treasure in 2015 with a prior listing on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. Maneki, one of the oldest Japanese restaurants in the United States, reopened in its storage space after its original building was looted and vandalized during the war. Uwajimaya, originally a Japantown store, moved down the hill into Chinatown.
African Americans moved to Seattle in the Great Migration, mostly out of the South, to work in the war industry during World War II, occupying many of the houses left vacant by the internment of the Japanese Americans. They filled the empty businesses along Jackson Street with notable jazz clubs.
In 1951, Seattle Mayor William D. Devin proclaimed the area "International Center" because of the diversity of people who resided and worked in the vicinity. Businesswoman and later city councilwoman Ruby Chow and others criticized the use of "international" for masking Chinese American history. The use of "International District" by the city remains controversial.
Seattle's first neighborhood advocacy group, the Jackson Street Community Council, opposed the construction of an interstate highway through the area. Despite protest, many Chinese and Japanese buildings and businesses were destroyed for the construction of Interstate 5 in the 1960s. Ethnic Asians formed new civic organizations serve needs ranging from community health, care of the elderly, information and referrals, counseling, historic preservation, marketing of the area, and building low-income housing. The construction of the Kingdome in 1972 further boxed in the neighborhood, leading to renewed protests over the community's lack of representation, including an impromptu demonstration at the stadium's groundbreaking ceremony on November 2, 1972.
With the fall of Saigon in 1975, a new wave of immigrants from Vietnam and Southeast Asia established Seattle's Little Saigon east of I-5. Many of these immigrants were of Chinese descent. Vietnamese pho was introduced to the city in 1982 with the opening of Phở Bắc, a restaurant most famous for its boat-like shape. Meanwhile, Little Saigon gained its first grocery store with the opening of Viet-Wah in 1981; it was joined by Lam's Seafood Market in 1991 and Hau Hau Market in 1995.
The worst mass murder in the history of Seattle took place at the Wah Mee Club on Maynard Alley on February 18, 1983. Thirteen people were killed.
In 1986, a portion of Chinatown and Japantown was listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the "Seattle Chinatown Historic District." That year the Wing Luke Memorial Museum moved to 7th Avenue, a location it would occupy for two decades.
In 1999, the City Council approved the "Chinatown/International District Urban Village Strategic Plan" for the future of the neighborhood. This plan, agreed to by all major organizations in the CID, led to City Ordinance 119297. This ordinance enshrined the three neighborhoods of Chinatown, Japantown, Little Saigon and the Chinatown Historic District into one larger neighborhood with a compromised name. Since then, the often conflicting interests of development, preservation and the conversion of old buildings to low-income housing have clashed as office developments and market-rate housing developments are overwhelmed by drastic increases in low-income housing stock. In addition, controversy erupted over vacating S. Lane Street as part of a large redevelopment by the private business Uwajimaya. Protesters formed the Save Lane Street organization and insisted as business owners they supported re-development, but opposed vacating a public street for a private business use. After losing a lawsuit filed over the matter, the Save Lane Street group dissolved. Activist groups also fought an attempt to build a McDonald's at the entrance of the neighborhood, which resulted in the company's withdrawal.