Did you know that in 1854, Seattle pioneer Arthur Denny introduced the first women’s suffrage bill to the Territorial Legislature?

That from 1883 to 1888 women in the Washington Territory could vote?

Did you know that women in Washington State won the right to vote on November 8, 1910, a decade before the 19th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified?

Or that in 1926, Seattle became the first major city to have a female mayor, Bertha Knight Landes?

That in 1970, Washington State became the first state in which voters legalized abortion?

Or in 2005, Washington became the only state to elect two female senators, and a female governor?

March is “National Women’s History Month.” In celebration, Seattle’s Klondike Gold Rush Museum is hosting an exhibit about Catherine Paine Blaine, a signer of the Declaration of Sentiments at the First Women’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls in 1848, and Seattle’s first school teacher.

Catherine Blaine came to Seattle with her husband, Rev. David Blaine, as a Methodist missionary, but she didn’t limit herself to the church or schoolroom. The Blaines only lived in Seattle for a few years, 1854-57, before moving on to do missionary work elsewhere, but they returned in 1882, to stay. Catherine’s belief in women’s suffrage and equality has had a lasting impact on our state. Catherine Blaine didn’t survive to see the 19th Amendment ratified, but her legacy, and that of women like her, lives on each time we vote.

The exhibit runs through May 30th.

In addition to the Catherine Blaine exhibit, the Museum has coordinated a number of other entertaining, edifying, and educational events [LINK]:

March 14th – 2:00 PM
Seattle Women in the Women’s Suffrage Victory of 1910 in Washington State
Shana Stevenson discusses the Women’s Suffrage Movement in Seattle. This presentation will have special emphasis on the role of Seattle and King County women in the campaign of 1909-1910, which resulted in Washington women permanently winning the vote in November, 1910.

March 28th – 2:30 PM
Vivien Rose, chief of cultural resources at the Women’s Rights National Historical Park, Seneca Falls, N.Y. will address the women’s rights movement from a national perspective.

April 4th – 2:00 PM
Barbara Callander and Toni Douglass will stage “May’s Vote,” the story of two activists, Emma Smith DeVoe and May Arkwright Hutton, who worked side-by-side to help win the vote for women in Washington State. Afterwards, Barbara and Toni will conduct a voting workshop for children.

April 5th – 2:00 PM
Goodwill Industries and Klondike living history volunteers model women’s fashions from the mid 1800s to the early 1900s, illustrating how the fight for women’s access to the voting booth was echoed in their closets.

May 9th – 2:00 PM
Heidi Walker, local photographer and mountaineer, offers a presentation on three women who dared the mountains while others dared the Capitol. Learn about the adventures of Minnie Peterson, mountain guide, Helen Thayer, adventurer and explorer, and Fay Fuller, the first woman to conquer Mt. Rainier.

*

The Seattle Fire Department and the Seattle Municipal Archives also have a special online exhibit, Strength and Stamina: Women in the Seattle Fire Department. In conjunction with the exhibit is a presentation by retired Battalion Chief Bonnie Beers, the first woman firefighter in the Seattle Fire Department. She will speak about her experiences on March 24, 2009, at 2 p.m. in the Bertha Knight Landes room at City Hall. [LINK]

The Seattle Children’s Health Fair will be held this Saturday, March 14 at the main hospital campus in Laurelhurst.  Bring your children ages 3 to 8 for this free “hands-on” event.  Learn about health, safety and Seattle Children’s through many fun and engaging activities, including the Teddy Bear Clinic, a visit from the Tooth Fairy, ambulance and operating room tours, finger casting and much more.  Free bike helmets and fitting for adults and children; quantities are limited and wearers must be present, so be sure you get there early!

What:
Seattle Children’s Annual Health Fair
Where:
Seattle Children’s Hospital
4800 Sand Point Way NE
Seattle, WA 98105
Location:
Whale Building, 4th Floor Entrance
Date:
Saturday, March 14th, 2009
Time:
10am-2pm

7:00 PM – Paul Bannick: Owl and the Woodpecker: Encounters with North America’s Most Iconic Birds
SPL, Central Branch, Level 1, Microsoft Auditorium
The Seattle photographer, author, educator, and naturalist has produced a lovely book about two of the most familiar birds in North America. If you missed him at the Center for Urban Horticulture, back in November, this is another chance to get your copy signed, or to just to learn more about these diverse avians.
[LINK]

7:30 PM – Patrick deWitt: Ablutions
Elliott Bay Book Co.
I’m afraid of this novel. Publisher’s Weekly describes it as “a hellish descent that seems bottomless, and while the character sketches are fascinating in detail, the plotless ramble can make this relatively short novel feel overlong. Fans of Bukowski and the Fantes, however, won’t mind.” What does that mean?
[LINK]

Browsing some unread RSS feeds this afternoon, the husband came across this lovely gem.

Get out there and report some more UFO’s people. Do we really want Los Angeles beating us?

Err, never mind. I just remembered how much I disliked LA the last time I was there and maybe we’ll let them have this one.

So before you go and report those UFO’s, stop and check out the Popular Mechanics link that gives you a few pointers about how to tell if you’re just seeing some routine (or not so routine) military or NASA activity.

Looks like everyone is jobless these days and apparently Fed Ex kinda cares. For today only if you give them the resume you *stole from the internet they will happily make 25 copies of said resume for free. That means 25 possible jobs, possible interviews and possible, “Sorry, but we’re on a hiatus until the economy improves.”

*Seattle Metblogs doesn’t endorse stealing. 25 copies

Ok, so the St. Patrick’s Day Dash isn’t exactly ON St. Patrick’s Day. It’s 2 days earlier, on Sunday. But that’s just an excuse to get out and drink some beer a little early. Go for a 3.75 mile run on the Aurora Bridge.

Afterwards there’s a post dash bash at the Seattle Center. Live music, free food, and a beer garden. Current weather is forcasted to be 49 and showery.

6:30 PM – Student Readings: Hugo Writing Classes
Richard Hugo House
Winter quarter students read from their work and dish out potluck. Hot-dish!
[LINK]

7:00 PM – Earl Emerson: Cape Disappointment
UW Bookstore, U-District
This guy, again. What did I say last time? Oh, yeah: “After a 10 year hiatus, Seattle private eye Thomas Black is back… sort of. Recuperating in the hospital after being severely injured in an explosion which may or may not have killed his wife, Black suffers from flashbacks and hallucinations, in this disturbing addition to the series.”
[LINK]

7:30 PM – Diana Joseph: I’m Sorry You Feel That Way: The Astonishing But True Story of a Daughter, Sister, Slut, Wife, Mother and Friend to Man and Dog
Elliott Bay Book Co.
Sarah Vowell (Assassination Vacation, The Wordy Shipmates, NPR) discovered Joseph through a Kentucky writing prize, and good thing. Joseph is funny in that tragic way that means she writes truth.
[LINK]

7:30 PM – Ian Bremmer: The Fat Tail: The Power of Political Knowledge For Strategic Investing
Town Hall Seattle, Downstairs $5
International risk management and mitigation: Hold onto your hat exciting, or a big yawn? You be the judge.
[LINK]

mount eerie at the fremont abbey. more pics [flickr]

1. The Fremont Abbey is just a beautiful place to see a show. On Saturday night, when we arrived zipping up from the EMP, they had candles and strings of lights on the floor, folding chairs arranged around a small stage, and a smoking volcano in the back next to the concession stand. The space, formerly occupied by a Lutheran Church and situated in the upper reaches of Fremont — the part where snow sticks on the ground, the Buckaroo has a boarded up window, and more insulated from the odd evening tranfsormation of eclecticville to barcrawltopia — is large and has a high ribbed ceiling. The amplified sound fills it up, wanders around, and makes itself comfortable.
2. The above is helped by the audience, who sit hushed poses through all Mount Eerie‘s set. As we sneak in and pull up floor pillows of our own, the show has already started and I’m suddenly relieved that I didn’t have to explain to my friend what we were seeing ahead of time. First, because I’ve seen tons of Microphones/Mount Eerie/Phil Elverum shows and they’re all pretty different. Sometimes he’s teaching a Japanese band how to be his back-up band on the spot. Other times he’s getting the audience to sing along for a recording session (“Singers” is likely to be my one and only career record credit). Or maybe it will feature Julie Dorion singing from their collaborative album, “Lost Wisdom”. On top of that, the material is almost always new, from a forthcoming record or from something that just showed up on the merch table. So no matter how many years you’ve had the bits of “the Moon” been stuck in your head, consider yourself insanely lucky if you’re at the First Unitarian Church when he plays a reworked version of it [youtube] .
   Secondly, I realize that if I had to describe it, it might sound downright awful like “it’s this really quiet, sensitive-seeming guy who sings his free-verse, non-rhyming poetry about nature and the meaning of life in alternative keys over distorted guitar while fans soak it up with reverent attention.” While that’s accurate, it misses how well all of that fits together into something movingly compelling. Description and structural unpredictability aside, the really certain thing is that however it turns out, it will be its own kind of beautiful that the crowd will be so silently attentive that they might forget to laugh at the little self-effacing jokes thrown in between songs.
3. Phil just published another really nice-looking book called Dawn through Buenaventura Press. It’s a lovingly crafted object, a small volume bound in birch-like wood. Square photographs are squirreled away inside the front cover and a CD is in the back. In between are journal entries from the 2002-2003 winter living above the arctic circle in a cabin in Norway. I haven’t read much beyond the introduction, but I think this coincides with the “getting out of the romance” phase, where “the Microphones” went away and “Mount Eerie” emerged. For a fan, reading this source material is irresistible, a little terrifying and/or intimidating, and definitely worth the approximately $30. [pwelverumandsun]
4. The What the Heck Fest has been scheduled for 17-19 July. Tickets will be on sale soon; so if you’re looking for a reason to go to Anacortes, add it to your calendar now and buy early.

Armageddon is descending on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and like all end times scenarios, there are wars and there are rumors of wars, plagues, pestilence, and… wait, is that a savior descending from the clouds? Could there actually be a person or a group stepping up to buy it? And are they insane, or just need to drain their swimming pool full of money?

Meanwhile, while rumors of a Fisher-online-P-I hookup are mooted, no one is sure when the P-I stops printing.

Oh, and the online P-I project is suddenly in jeopardy because Hearst’s lowball offers were rejected by some of the most critical people needed for an online-only launch — like their web geek. You stay classy, San Simeon.

And yes, the 60-day clock runs out tomorrow. People are packing up. The new heaven and new earth that is the online-only P-I is supposed to descend tomorrow as well. But from the looks of it on the outside, I don’t think anyone knows how this ends, not even Hearst.

So, tune in tomorrow for what could be the stunning finale of As The Globe Turns. Or maybe it’s Wednesday. Or next week. The sooner we get closure on this mess, the sooner we can all move on.

by seattle daily photo [flickr] via our group pool [#]

• The Rem Koolhaas documentary playing as part of the Northwest Film Forum’s ByDesign Festival might irritate you as much as the architect aimed to do with his design for our central library. [seattlest]
• Peter Steinbrueck hasn’t yet caved in to facebook pressure and declared a run for mayor. It seems like the only reason to hope that he does is that you can’t bear the spectacle of seeing Dan Savage enter the race as a doomed performance candidate. [slog]
• Former Sonic James Donaldson, however, sounds about ready to take the plunge into an exploration of a candidacy running against Nickels on a “change” agenda. [publicola]
• Add this to the rising tide of twitter backlash: Mars Hill’s encouragement of livetweeting during sermons. [myballard]; maybe that’s how Seattle earned a spot among the tweetiest cities in the world. [grader]