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I recently ran across a book called _Native Seattle: Histories from the
Crossing-Over Place_ by Coll Thrush, Univ. of Washington Press, 2007.
I haven't read this book, but I thumbed through it a bit and it looks
pretty interesting, talking about the history of native peoples, and
their interactions with whites, in Seattle. I looked in particular in
the index for anything about Chinuk Wawa. There were a few places
where it talks about the use of Jargon by whites, by native peoples, in
place names, etc. Most of it seemed pretty much what you might expect
and not terribly interesting. But there was one story that I was worth
passing on (on p. 64-65), so I quote it here:<br>
<br>
Sometime in the 1870s, a Chinese man named Ling Fu was brought before
Judge Cornelius Hanford in Seattle's courthouse, accused of not having
the proper citizenship papers. Facing deportation, Ling Fu argued that
he did not need to carry papers: he had been born on Puget Sound. To
test him, Judge Hanford quickly shifted his inquiry into Chinook
Jargon, which had become nearly as common as Whulshootseed or English
in Puget Sound country. "Ikta mika nem? Consee cole mika?" (What is
your name? How old are you?), he demanded of Ling, who in turn replied,
"Nika nem Ling Fu, pe nika mox tahtlum pee quinum cole" (My name is
Ling Fu, and I am twenty-five years old). Clearly surprised, the judge
responded, "You are an American, sure, and you can stay here." He then
turned to the bailiff and decreed, "Ling Fu is dismissed."<br>
<br>
Ling Fu's brief trial symbolizes the ways in which settlers--Boston,
Chinese, and others--had been transformed by their life in Seattle
Illahee. Accounts of Seattle's "village period" are full of settlers
speaking Chinook Jargon and sometimes even Whulshootseed; of white men
and women learning indigenous subsistence practices form their Native
neighbors and employees; and of people from places like Illinois and
Ireland, Gloucester and Guangzhou, learning to accomodate Indians'
insistence on participation in urban life. Nearly thirty years after
Seattle's founding, Native people were still in town, and their
participation in urban life had changed the Bostons as well. The mad
house known as the Illahee might have been destroyed, but the larger
Seattle Illahee, in which indigenous lives were woven into the urban
fabric, remained, even as Seattle stood perched on the brink of an
urban revolution.<br>
<br>
<div class="moz-signature">-- <br>
<br>
<img alt="Portland State University logo"
src="cid:part1.08050801.05010105@pdx.edu" align="left" height="35"
width="165"><br>
<br>
<p
style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;"><b>Tom
Larsen</b><br>
Database Management and Catalog Librarian<br>
Portland State University Library<br>
PO Box 1151<br>
Portland, OR 97207-1151<br>
<br>
Phone: 503-725-8179<br>
Fax: 503-725-5799<br>
<br>
email: <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:larsent@pdx.edu">larsent@pdx.edu</a><br>
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