Youths Reflect the Places They Inhabit: Education and Public Housing in Seattle, 1940

• In Event: Contested Spaces: Situated Histories of Desegregation

Abstract

The examination of education is incomplete without understanding the role played by government agencies such as local housing authorities in supporting the educational experiences of youths on the margins of society. This study of the beginnings of the Seattle Housing Authority shows that its leadership understood the crucial place of decent housing in youths’ educational trajectory. Included within the housing complex were classes in citizenship, youth tutoring, and education to aid tenants in “bettering their lives.” Furthermore, at a time when segregation in housing was the national norm, Seattle integrated its projects—surprising African Americans who thought they might be excluded from living there and further surprising them by not separating them in a section within the projects.

Author

• Eileen H. Tamura, University of Hawaii - Manoa