Category Archives: The Barneston Site

Issei Life and Work at Barneston

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This post is the final one in a series of three concerning the specific history of Barneston, Washington. The first one can be found here, at “A Brief History of Barneston,” and the second here, “The Nikkei Community at Barneston.” This post draws upon material published in my 2017 article in Archaeology in Washington.

This project’s current knowledge of life and work at Barneston comes from a combination of oral testimonies and census data. The 1910 and 1920 federal censuses include occupational data, which provide some insights into the kinds of labor Issei did at Barneston (U.S. Census 1910, 1920). A synthesis of this data is presented on Tables 1 and 21. These tables are meant to be read left-to-right, row by row. The data reflect a broader industry trend towards hiring Issei largely as general labor (Dubrow et al. 2002; Olson 1927). A more detailed look shows that, while this trend plays out in both 1910 and 1920, it may have been more severe in the later period. Occupations listed on the 1910 census consist of: boarding house operator, driver, grader, planerman, sawyer, trucker, and general laborer (in either the sawmill or planing mill). The 1920 census shows a drop in the diversity of listed occupations, with only general laborer, foreman, and cook represented.

I am still reconstructing what each of these positions may have entailed, but based on a 1972 U.S. Department of the Army (U.S. Army) technical manual on logging and sawmill operation, this shift may represent a loss of responsibility and access to skilled positions for the Issei, possibly in response to rising anti-Japanese hysteria after World War I. Graders, for example, were in charge of classifying the quality of the lumber produced, and sawyers were responsible for the proper operation of sawmill machinery (U.S. Army 1972:Glossary 5). The technical manual remarks that “quality and quantity of lumber sawed depends on [the sawyer’s] judgement, skill, and speed” (U.S. Army 1972:Glossary 10). This does not seem to be the result of any change in how the census is gathered, as an even more diverse array of jobs—including sawyer and grader—are recorded for non-Japanese workers of both periods. The absence of Issei in such positions in 1920, then, may represent the a more severe example of the differential hiring practices already present in 1910.

Table 1. Proportions of workers at Barneston by occupational category and region of birth – 1910
Occupational Category1 Japan U.S. Europe2 Other
Engineering and Repair 44% 56%
General Labor 83% 7% 10%
Managerial 100%
Specific Labor 45% 30% 20% 5%
Other 100%
Unknown 29% 29% 42%
Table 2. Proportions of workers at Barneston by occupational category and region of birth – 1920
Occupational Category1 Japan U.S. Europe2 Other
Engineering and Repair 57% 36% 7%
General Labor 69.5% 18.5% 6% 6%
Managerial 33% 67%
Specific Labor 61% 32% 7%
Other 11% 67% 11% 11%
Unknown 50% 25% 25%

The remaining current knowledge of the lives of these immigrants is based heavily on oral testimonies collected by University of Washington students in the 1990s (Brown and Schroeder 1996; Gilbert and Woodman 1995). These suggest that most of the buildings in the Nikkei community were occupied by four single men. The rest were occupied by families, who occasionally built small extensions of their houses for new family members (with company permission). The bathhouse in the southwest camp was an important corporate structure; communal bathing has strong cultural significance in Japan, and the bathhouse operated in a traditional manner, with men bathing before women and children.  Informants also report that they used the local town store only occasionally, preferring instead to either to go Nikkei shops in Seattle or order food from East Asian-owned companies that made monthly deliveries to the site. Many supplies were ordered cooperatively, including food, which was cooked by an Issei cook working out of the bathhouse, though I am not yet sure if she cooked solely for the bachelors or also assisted the families. These economic connections, plus the fact that Seattle was the port through which most Issei immigrants came, produced strong ties between Barneston and the Seattle Nikkei community (Brown and Schroeder 1996; Gilbert and Woodman 1995).

Notes

1. Occupational categories were created to simply the very diverse array of jobs reported on the U.S. Census. Sawmill operations involve a considerable number of specialized roles, and I have tried to condense these roles as best as possible to illustrate the disparities in hiring and labor among various racial and ethnic groups. Engineering and Repair refers to occupations tasked with the maintenance of the mill (e.g. engineers, millwrights). Managerial are those who have some managerial control over mill operations (e.g. supervisors, foremen). Specific Labor refers to those whose census entry indicated that they performed some specific role in mill operations, such as graders (who graded the quality of the wood) or sawyers (key personnel who ensured that the wood was cut appropriately). General labor refers to those listed as “laborer”, who had no specific task associated with them. Other refers to other occupations (e.g. cook), and unknown to those occupations I could not comfortably classify or for those census entries I could not decipher.

2. “Europe” covers a very broad area, and there’s evidence that the people who operated sawmill towns treated (or would have liked to treat) different groups of Europeans differently (Beda 2014; Carlson 2017). Northern Europeans, for example, were valued for their skill (since the immigrants coming over from Northern Europe often had experience in their own countries’ lumber industries), but were also seen as more likely to be union-friendly. Despite this, I have combined all of Europe together to simplify the table and highlight the degree of labor segregation on the towns.

A Brief History of Barneston

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This post is the first in a series of three concerning the specific history of Barneston, Washington. You can find the next two posts at these links: “The Nikkei Community” and “Issei Life and Work at Barneston“. This post draws upon material published in my 2017 article in Archaeology in Washington.

Barneston, Washington, was founded in 1898 by the Kent Logging Company to log the Cedar River Watershed. Located in King County and east of Seattle, the town was one of many that logged the forests there. Its presence coincided with a wider boom in the timber industry (Ficken 1987). After the Great Seattle Fire of 1889, the City of Seattle decided to seek out a fresh water source to help prevent future disasters and to ensure the continued growth of the city. The Cedar River Watershed was chosen as the primary source for water, and the City began buying up land throughout that area (Klingle 2007). After initially agreeing to sell in 1913, the Kent Logging Company managed to extend its mill’s operation until 1924, when the city finally acquired and razed the town (Gilbert and Woodman 1995).

Figure 1. Barneston boiler and planing mill. Courtesy of Seattle Municipal Archives.

Like most mill towns, Barneston cut and processed lumber gathered by loggers in camps (Figure 1). These could range as far as 5 miles away and up to elevations of 3,300 feet above sea level (Figure 2). While life in Barneston was more comfortable than in the distant camps, both situations were dangerous, and accidents, including deadly ones, were common. Large saws, wide fan belts and conveyors, deafening noise, and the movement of tons of lumber made working in the mill towns a hazardous activity. It also didn’t help that towns rarely had doctors in residence. Injured workers were usually kept comfortable until a doctor could arrive, or were themselves sent to Seattle for treatment.

Figure 2. Logged area near Barneston. Courtesy of Seattle Municipal Archives.

A 1911 survey map, made as part of a value assessment by the City of Seattle, provides additional details on the town. Much of the town was organized around the processing and production area, which included a planing mill, kiln, and sawmill, as well as the mill pond. The Euro-American single men’s barracks were also located in this area. To the north and the east were a series of family houses and a school. The Nikkei community was segregated off to the west. A variety of pig pens, gardens, and chicken coops dotted the landscape, particularly in the Nikkei community.

The Nikkei Community at Barneston

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This post is the second in a series of three concerning the specific history of Barneston, Washington. The first one can be found here, at “A Brief History of Barneston,” and the third here, “Issei Life and Labor at Barneston.” This post draws upon material published in my 2017 article in Archaeology in Washington.

As with a number of other sawmill operations in the region, the Nikkei1 community (Figure 1) was spatially segregated from the other workers. Furthermore, and in contrast with the other inhabitants, both Issei bachelors and families lived in the same area. Most houses in the community measured between 15 and 20 feet on a side. There were 54 individuals identified as “Japanese” in the 1910 census, of which 43 were bachelors or married-but-living-alone and 11 were family members (3 families total; United States Bureau of the Census [U.S. Census] 1910). By 1920, the population had risen to 58, 17 of which were bachelors or married-but-living-alone, with the remaining 41 organized into 11 families. This increase in the number of families may have required the construction of additional households beyond the ones noted on our maps (Figure 2). The 1920 census also shows an additional population of 15 Issei railroad workers, however I am not yet sure if they actually lived at Barneston, or if they were merely there to be counted in Barneston’s census enumeration district (U.S. Census 1920).

Figure 1. Photograph of Issei community from the south, facing north. Courtesy of the Seattle Municipal Archives.

There is some question as to the number and location of Nikkei camps in Barneston. An early cultural resource survey of the area suggested that the Japanese immigrants lived in two locations: one near–but not in–Barneston, and another further away in a location called “Hemlock” (Getz 1987:40–45). More recent heritage work found detailed survey maps which placed the Nikkei within the town of Barneston itself; oral testimonies gathered as part of this project showed no recognition of the name Hemlock (Brown and Schroeder 1996; Gilbert and Woodman 1995). The change in the community’s location—from outside of Barneston to the town proper—occurred sometime around 1906 or 1907 (Getz 1987). It resulted from erosion issues and concerns over possible pollution of a nearby river. I will write a bit more about this in a future post, but in effect, Barneston became entangled in wider debates about water quality and the watershed. This resulted in the Nikkei community not only being moved into the town, but also suffering some rather racist characterizations and attacks from local newspapers. Because it is better documented and less likely to have eroded, and because it was established right around the time of the first coordinated anti-exclusion efforts by regional Issei leadership, this project focuses on the camp within the town.

Figure 2. Nikkei community, as per 1911 R.H. Thompson survey map. Digitized and created by David Carlson.

Notes

1. I use the term “Nikkei” here to refer to the entire community. While the Issei are, for the moment, the primary focus of this project, the community included a number of Nissei children.