The Beacon Hill School Occupation

On October 11, 1972, Chicano activists led by Roberto Maestas (1938-2010) occupy the abandoned Beacon Hill School. In this episode, Cristina tells Carmen about this historic protest. 

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Sources
https://www.seattlemet.com/news-and-city-life/2022/03/el-centro-de-la-raza-beacon-hill-occupied-protest-seattle
https://www.nps.gov/places/beacon-hill-school-el-centro-de-la-raza.htm
https://historylink.org/File/2588
https://mohai.org/collections-and-research/search/item/2002.46/-.272%23.24/?searchQuery=Civil+Rights&Music&Anderson&modules%5B0%5D=item&pageNum=20
https://depts.washington.edu/civilr/maestas.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Centro_de_la_Raza
https://www.elcentrodelaraza.org/aboutus/history-evolution/
https://www.elcentrodelaraza.org/aboutus/roberto-felipe-maestas/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_Maestas
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_of_Four_(Seattle)
https://frontporch.seattle.gov/2021/09/21/latinx-heritage-month-roberto-maestas/

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hi, everyone. This is Carmen and Christina and this is
Estoria's Unknown, a podcaster where we talk about Latin American history.
Sometimes it's horrible and deals with heavy topics like criticism, corruption,
and genocide. But more than that, it's also bout resistance,
power and community. Christina, Carmen, what are we talking about today? Well, Carmen,

(00:29):
we live an occupation story, like a building physically being occupied. Oh,
that's what we're doing today. I thought. I was like, oh,
in the sense that Hawaii and Puerto Rico are being
occupied by the nice thing, we don't. We do not
like that type of occupation. We actually hate that, but
we love when people take over a building. That's what

(00:52):
I meant by occupying. No, no, we do. Yeah, yeah,
we really do. And that's what brought me to today's topic.
But first, let me tell you what actually brought me
to today's topic. I wasn't seeking an occupation story. It just
became one. So I was walking around Beacon Hill here
in Seattle. I'm exploring the city. You know, Okay, I

(01:13):
am now, I'm a coastal elite, you know, No, no
one of those yes, I am no. Moving on. I
was walking around Beacon Hill and I saw this super
cool emilianos Abata painting which I posted on the Espookit
does Instagram, I need to post it on the estodias,
a known Instagram, And I saw other very like Latino
Latina things, and I was like, what's going on here?

(01:35):
This sounds like a like it's a very Latino area,
and it is. And when I was looking up Beacon
Hill things as we were driving from the Filipino place
we ate at to the bookstore, I was looking up
Beacon Hill and then I came across the nineteen seventy
two occupation of Beacon Hill School in Seattle. Okay, So yeah,

(01:58):
in the year of the occupation taking place, the Beacon
Hill School was just in a bad building and it
had been built back in nineteen oh three because Seattle
had been growing, particularly the Beacon Hill area, and the
building had been slated to be an eight room school
that would cost twenty thousand dollars to build. And over
the next decades the student population was growing, but that

(02:20):
peaked in the mid nineteen sixties. The period that followed
the late nineteen sixties saw the decrease of student enrollment
in Seattle Public schools, which continued into the nineteen eighties,
causing schools to be closed. Side note, but there is
a decrease in enrollment right now. I was just gonna
mention that it's only in Santle. Almost everywhere there's a

(02:42):
decrease in enrollments. Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure that this whole
Department of Education thing going on right now federally is
not helping either. Oh yeah, not that dumb wrestling bitch
is in charge of the Department of Education. Yeah, McMahon,
and have the right last name. That's right, McMahon. Yeah,
came back to me. I'm okay, whatever, who cares nice,

(03:04):
she's a bitch. Yes, that's the point of that. Yeah. So,
but back then, the reasons for the decrease of student
enrollment was like they due to two reasons, the end
of the baby boom era, which was a problem nationwide
with the decrease of enrollment not just Seattle, but specifically
also the growing number of families leaving urban areas for

(03:25):
suburban areas. Do you remember the other name for this,
not the burbs, It rhymes the White flight. Yes, I
was thinking the Great Escape, and I knew that was wrong,
But then it came to me afterwards. But you know what,
they could be the same thing. Gwen Stefani writing The
Great Escape. I don't know if you wrote it, but

(03:46):
I don't know either. Yeah, did I say? I thought,
I said, Gwen Stefani writing the White Flight, and I
was like, no, that it was a way to say, yeah, anyway, yes,
the White Flight. And so by then the my graphics
of this Seattle neighborhood had been changing. The I five
was constructed in nineteen sixty seven, which caused this major change.

(04:09):
I don't know if you it's I think it's. This
story of I five being constructed is the same in
a lot of places where it went through like black
and brown neighborhoods and then isolated them and then polluted them. Anyway,
So yeah, the construction of the I five in Seattle
in nineteen sixty seven changed this area completely. It cut

(04:31):
off Beacon Hill from the rest of the city, and
then middle and upper class residents began to leave for
the surrounding suburbs, and people of color began to move
into the area and even greater numbers. It was already
a very diverse part of Seattle, but then it grew
in those diverse numbers, those beautiful diverse numbers. I know
this is going to sound dumb, but when I think
of Seattle, I don't think the diverse at all. Oh yeah, no,

(04:55):
that's a very common It's the whitest city. It's one
of the whitest cities. This is llianed Okay, I'm not
surprised to hear that. But then yeah, that's why it
doesn't clock to me. I hate how that's an part
of our the siconga I love saying it. So yeah,
it doesn't clock to me that Seattle being one of
the whitest city that there's a diverse side. But of course,
I mean where everywhere as diverse people. Yeah, there's pockets

(05:18):
of diversity that Beacon Hill being one of them, Central District,
and then this area so South Seattle basically, and then
there's like cities that are very close that are also
very very diverse, like Beeran, where that pizza place is
that I am obsessed with, that's where a lot of
the Latino population is at. And then also White Center.
But I mean, even before moving to Washington, I did

(05:39):
not think it was a very I thought it was
only white people, but of course not first there's always
indigenous people. This was course indigenous land first and foremost. Yes,
but no, there are there has been Black Chinese, like
Asian Filippine course of course activism like of course we're everywhere,
and so yeah, there's pots of diverse areas, Beacon Hill

(06:02):
being one of them, one of the most diverse in Seattle.
And as you and our listeners know, the sixties and
seventies were it was a time of movements in the US. Yeah,
I think we just said literally that sentence last. We
were in the same timeframe, aren't we. Yeah we are,
Oh my god, wow. And yeah, like the fight for

(06:25):
black civil rights is in full throttle, the fight of
all the pressed groups really in this country grew at
the same time, like really off the back of the
civil rights movement, including the Chicano movement. And we've talked
about different instances during the Chicano movement involving California, Texas,
even Denver. We talked about our high school walkout in
Denver some episode like episodes ago. But Washington, there was

(06:50):
a movement here too, of course, but again they just
don't come to mind. But the Latina community was growing
in this area primarily because of the VASSETO program is
why it started growing. During the rest of the program,
mostly Mexicans went to places like Yakima and eastern Washington.
And then from there people keep moving. People keep it moving,

(07:11):
that's what we do. And so from there they left
for the big city to Seattle looking for work. And
that's how most of them ended up in Seattle. And
one of those many Mexicans who moved from the Yakama
Spokane areas of Washington was named Roberto Maestas, who would
go on to leave the occupation of Beacon Hill School

(07:32):
in nineteen seventy two. Okay slain and Roberto Maestas was
born July ninth, nineteen thirty eight, in the small rural
farming community of Getting ready for this name of San
Agustine del Vage, the Nuestra Senora de Lures. This is
like hardly a town. It's a village really, it's so

(07:53):
small and it's a border town in New Mexico. His
mother died of tuberculosis when he was six months old,
and his maternal grandparents, don Isidro and Donia Emilia Hil
raised him and his sixteen siblings. Listeners, I just fell
out my seat. She did, I saw her. She's getting
back up right now. It's trugling. And his passion for

(08:18):
social justice had been instilled in him from pretty much birth.
He and his family were pushed off their land in
New Mexico, and he always described his time working in
the fields as quote having been treated like slaves. Like
so many before and after him, He went from where
he was and then just made his way north following

(08:39):
the work in the fields. So he left his New
Mexico home at thirteen thirteen or fourteen, I saw both
ages after being kicked out of his school in New
Mexico for speaking Spanish. Bullshit, that's already another radicalizing event
in his life on top of that, and so he
headed to the beat for in Colorado, then the lettuce

(09:01):
fields in California, then potato and hop in Idaho and Yakima.
And in Yakima he was like, oh, I want to
see the edge of the ocean. That was like his
dreams seeing the edge of the ocean. And he hit
shiked his way from Yakima to Seattle in the nineteen fifties.
That's two and a half, no almost three hours, and

(09:26):
once he was in Seattle, he decided to finish his education,
so he was working and attending the Cleveland High School.
And he worked several different jobs until he graduated. He
was a gas station attendant and elevator operator at the
Smith Tower, a factory worker in Boeing. Then he enrolled
After graduating in high school, he enrolled in the University
of Washington and graduated with the bachelors in Spanish and

(09:49):
journalism in nineteen sixty six, and he was one of
the first Chicago graduates of the University of Washington. Noise, Yeah,
like top ten in the top ten graduate, Like first
ten to graduate from this university. And then he went
back for a master's in Romance Languages in Literature in
nineteen seventy one, and then it was one of the

(10:10):
first Chicanos to receive a master's degree in the university
as well. Damn or to earn, I should say, not
receive earn, just out here making history trail based. Oops,
trail blazing. Yeah, my bad, I don't have a degree.
So and he began to teach Spanish at Franklin High
School in the city, where he was further radicalized. On

(10:35):
March twenty ninth, nineteen sixty nine, he unintentionally joined what
would be his first school occupation on accident. Really, black
students were outraged at the unfair treatment they were receiving
from school administrators, and one hundred of them marched into
the principal school and refused to leave until they were

(10:55):
listened to. Okay, yeah. As the city in was taking
other teachers were fleeing, like screaming out of the building
because they were scared because of the sit in. Oh
it's so scary. Which people sitting down? Stupid? Mm hmm. Yeah,
Oh no, the black students are sitting down. I'm so scared, insane. Oh,

(11:16):
there's being so aggressive just sitting there. Yeah, cannot And Roberto,
on the other hand, was just standing there in the hallway,
like what's going on? Why is everyone running away? And
that's when Larry Gossip, one of the black student union
leaders of the University of Washington, came out and spoke
to Roberto, and Roberto told him that he was quote

(11:38):
interested in why all my black students are so upset?
I want to learn what the issues are and a
quote okay, And he joined the protesters inside the principal's office,
sat with them and just listened and wow. Yeah. The
sit in lasted basically that day until the next morning
it was and then the next morning it was over.

(11:59):
And from the moment that the sitting was over, Roberto
announced that he would no longer tolerate being called Bob
or Robert Good. Yes, he told other teachers he would
only go by Roberto. But when he said this, he
was like, you will call me Roberto. He was bowling
the ours on purpose, and yeah, he was like he

(12:19):
learned that from the black students, and he was like, no,
I'm not going to conform to whiteness just because it's
easier for them. M M. In nineteen seventy two, he
was teaching ESL at styles Piano Community College and was
regularly participated in activist movements. He became part of what
became known as the Gang of Four. The Gang of

(12:41):
Four was made up of himself, Larry Gossi who I
just mentioned, Bernie Whitebear, and Bob Santos. They would all
be known for their racial justice activism and then they
were called the Gang of four because of how much
they work together in all these movements, Like this was real. Yes,
I was like, what, that's the worst solidarity? Yes, And

(13:03):
by this point, Chicano students in Washing all of Washington
really had already been expressing their concerns of the failure
of the educational system to cope with cultural differences and
the problems of the bilingual child. This is already like
on the top of their concerns. On top of that,
the ESL program at the college was suddenly cut due

(13:25):
to federal budget cuts. But this wasn't going to stop Roberto.
He and his group began to look for alternative locations
to house their ESL program, but it wasn't going well.
It seemed like the city was giving them the run around,
and it was getting old to them. And they had
already been eyeing the abandoned Beacon Hill School. And after

(13:48):
a while of looking and trying to find a different
place for their ESL program, and having trying to inquire
about the Beacon Hill School, they were like, they're not like,
the city's not at they're not all listening to us.
We have no choice but to occupy the building to
get things rolling. And so they began to organize, and
the main like mastermind behind the occupation was Roberto. And

(14:12):
so they began to organize this occupation and on October eleventh,
nineteen seventy two, they had a meeting with a district
facilities manager from the school district, and this meeting was
supposed to be an inspection to see if the school
was a viable option for their program, Like it was
supposed to be just oh, let's look at it. Once

(14:34):
the district employee unlocked the door, one hundred students and
staff from the ESL program showed up and entered the building.
Us like the yeah. He was very confused. Actually, we
were taking this building pretty much. She said, we're occupying
this building now until our de management or yes, like
until we're heard, until we're yeah, and so then Chicano

(14:57):
students from the University of Washington showed up. Then Robertta
called Larry Gassid, who shut up with twelve other Black
SERN activists. Then the employee was like, what is happening?
And he immediately left to report this to the district.
And the meantime, Bob Santos was called as well, and

(15:18):
he got the support of the Human Rights Commission, and
now the occupation was official. Robertta already had the media
on the phone like, Hey, this building occupied, these are
our demand Baton yeah, we're here. And at first their
school district was very willing to let them have the building.

(15:41):
The Seattle School District said that they would allow the
former school to become a Chicano Multi service center. And
on October twenty second, nineteen seventy two, so what is this,
eleven days into the occupation, the city council agreed to
lease the building from the district for one dollar a
year or this Chicano Multi Service center. And it seemed

(16:03):
like everything was gonna work out. But but within a
few days, the city Council's Finance committee voted no on
this measure because they were worried about having to pay
to fix the building up because they had been abandoned
for a while, and they were like, well, who's going
to pay for that? So they were like no, And
then the coalition was like, okay, well we're gonna stay

(16:25):
here then until someone says yes, they're going to continue
to occupy the building. And one of the biggest complications
with the occupation of this building was the lack of
heat and water. Oh no, but the community flooded them
with support. They not only donated money towards the cause,

(16:47):
they also brought Chinese food, Japanese food, soul food from
like surrounding restaurants. They brought groceries, they donated electric heaters,
sleeping bags. Every day they would receive buckets of water
that they ferried in from nearby restaurants and gas stations. Oh,
because the plumbing and the building didn't work, so every

(17:09):
day people would just like pass down buckets of water
for them. And then one month of occupation turned into two.
During the second month of the occupation, Roerto Maestas and
Estella Ortega got married. Oh wow, in the basement of
the school. What a beautiful story. Yeah, And the day

(17:30):
after the wedding, Roberto began a liquids only fast to
further protest the city council's nonsense. Then the two month
occupation turned into three months during a record cold winter
in a building that has no heat. Like, that's commitment.

(17:52):
At the same time that they were occupying this building,
they also staged a sit in at the city council's
chambers and a sit in the Mayor's office, which then
resulted in the leaders of both protests being arrested. And
it wasn't until after seventy five days of this that
the City finally agreed. They finally caved. They acquired the

(18:15):
building from the Seattle School District in June nineteen seventy
seventy three and sublease it to the organization for one
dollar a year for five years was the contract, and
since nineteen seventy two it became El Centro. Well, once
this was all finally done twenty nineteen seventy two because

(18:35):
it settlement occupation, well, I guess nineteen seventy three. Anyway,
it became El Centro de la Rasa or the Center
for People of All Races in English, and they're still
providing services to the community today. They support youth with
various programs, childcare, education, housing costs. They have cultural events.

(18:59):
During the early name teen eighties, when the regular administration
and the whole contra you remember that, the Iran Contra, Yeah,
Iran Contra scandal, the reagular administration was supporting the Nicaraguan contrast,
which was the right wing militia group. El Centro played
a major role in convincing the Seattle City Council to
adopt Managua as a sister city. Wow, I didn't even

(19:22):
know it was a sister city. But I also didn't
know until like the PNW hunts and homicides. Girls told
me that Guadalajara is a sister city with Portland, and
I was like, are you serious? So, yeah, you're like
tenth year living there. You're like what nine? I was
just guessing you were close anyway. Yeah, So Managua is

(19:45):
sister cities with Seattle. Okay, that's cool, And the city
council was strongly opposed to this, but because of El
Centro's work they were they finally agreed to make that happen.
And El Centro's bond with Nikara what happened even before
the Sandinistas took power in nineteen seventy nine. Once the
nineteen seventy two Nikanaiua earthquake happened, they were able to

(20:08):
coordinate relief efforts from the Santle area as Central was
and there is a Nikadaigua population here too. Cool. Because
of all this and another direct action that happened when
the Washington Natural Gas Company cut off in Central's heat,
teachers and children of the Child Development Center staged a

(20:30):
sit in at the CEO Washington Natural Gas at the
office until they restored the gas. And they also built
affordable housing. It has one hundred and ten units that
houses three hundred and fifty people. In twenty fifteen, that's
still there and it's designed for people that make twenty
four tho to forty nine thousand dollars a year, which

(20:51):
obviously that's not enough to live like literally anywhere, but
people have to make it work, and thanks to programs
like this, they are able to. I love affordable housing.
And yeah, that's the history of the occupation of Beacon Hill,
which became El Centro la la Rasa, which is still

(21:11):
there today doing good work. How cool that they're still
around helping the community. Yeah. I passed by the building
and I was like, what is this? Let me That's
when I was like googling. Yeah, there's like a very
beautiful murals everywhere, like the one I posted on our
stories and just more I didn't Seeah, I'll repost it.

(21:33):
I need to look more into this because I didn't
write down his name, but there's a I think he
wasn't He was from like the Midwest and the US.
Somehow he became trained in art in Mexico and he
changed his name to Bablo and Bablo or hair or
something like that. I need to look at this more.

(21:55):
But his name is Bablo. His new name became Bablo,
and he is like a super well known Mexican muralist.
He's not Mexican. He was like an honorary Mexican. Oh.
Interesting because he was trained under the goor Riveta and
he has there's a painting at the University of Washington
of his that was I want to say it was

(22:16):
at El Central Rasaur. It was somewhere, and then it
was moved to the University of Washington, University of Washington.
But I would just find it so interesting that he's
just like this white ass honorary Mexican. Yeah, but he
trained under the gor Riveta over there, and he's like
he's I mean, he's basically a Mexican and that painting
is at the University of Washington. I gotta go look
at it. We should go. Well, no, we have too

(22:39):
much to do when you're here. I have to figure
out I'm still I haven't looked at flights yet, but
I'm going to. Okay, Well, the event is November first.
We have an event, y'all. We haven't said on said no, no, God,
we haven't. No, we haven't Okay, Yeah, November first, twenty
twenty five, we have an event in Yakima and Yakemy
what Yaka Ukamians Andians out there. I don't think that's

(23:07):
the thing has to be. I mean even Seattle lights
like make the drive okay, yeah, but yeah, we're gonna
be there telling scary stories. It's called the Cuckoo is
going to get you a bilingual, ish, cultural rooted parormal
night of storytelling, sustos and spirits, blending spooky stories, folklore,

(23:30):
audience interaction, and immersive activities to waken your spooky side.
Featuring I'm sure a lot of people know who he is.
He means, he's way more homes than us, so don't
know him before us. But Jonathan Perez from Latinos against
Spooky Shit on TikTok is also on Instagram and then
us mm hmm. Yeah, we're gonna be there. I mean
we're gonna be there under a spooky tales. But if

(23:51):
you're an histori as a known fan and the area,
come through, come see us. It starts seven pm November first,
So tickets are not insane like other events. It's like
literally thirty something dollars or forty dollars at most and yeah,
we're going to be there, so you know, even if
you're not, if you're there only for the history of

(24:13):
we're just gonna be there in the spooky capacity. Yeah,
but yeah, I'm excited. So yeah, we're gonna be there.
And I'll put the link in the show notes for
the tickets. All right, is there anything else you want
to add? Oh my god, we still didn't get together
a book and an update. Oh my god, you know
what it's coming, we swear yes, and yeah. Other than that,

(24:37):
if you want to support us over on Patreon, we
have these episodes early in ad free, and then we
also have bonus episodes. We end up doing them almost weekly.
Sometimes things happen and we do like two a month,
but it ends up almost being weekly where we just
yap about like current events, really news, but also sometimes
like TikTok drama or whatever comes to mind. Sometimes Carmen

(25:01):
has spent the whole time talking about religious fundy influencers. Yeah,
or oh my god, it's so need to upload it.
But we spend some time discussing the NOSO discourse. You
still need to upload it. Yes, I forgot that talking
about it. I forgot I forgot, we talked about it.

(25:23):
It's relevant always because it's going to come up again anyway.
That's true. It's never ending. At the time of recording it,
it will be up for sure. But yeah, those end
up being like almost an hour long or sometimes more.
And yeah, we do that over there on Patreon, and
once in a while we have a spontaneous book club.

(25:43):
We talked about defectors and other than that, you can
just keep up with us on Estonias Unknown and yeah again,
if you're in Washington, no matter where, you can drive
to Yakima and see us November firs, first, seven pm.
Be there or be square square yea by. We hope

(26:07):
that this was one last story Unknown for you, Sorry,
yes for you, for you, Yes, my bad now bye
my My Astoria Unknown is produced by Carmen and Christina,
researched by Carmen and Christina, edited by Christina. You can
find sources for every episode at estorias Unknown dot com

(26:29):
and in our show notes. Creating the podcast has a
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