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Published in The Seattle Times online on April 25, 2024
and in Pacific NW Magazine of the printed Times on April 28, 2024

Beneath downtown, McMahon’s chic characters still tweak vanity

By Clay Eals

When legendary comic Red Skelton played the Puyallup fair in September 1987, he opened with a timeless joke that works for any big burg: “Good to be back in Seattle. Great city — when they get it done.”

His shtick stung because just six months earlier, construction had begun downtown on the Metro Bus Tunnel, disrupting traffic and shopping until its completion in 1990. Buses running in the completed tunnels were replaced later by Sound Transit light-rail trains. But lingering underground today from the late 1980s are eye-popping, publicly funded works by two-dozen artists, including Seattle painter Gene Gentry McMahon.

With “relish and bounce,” McMahon has spent decades poking gentle fun at “stiletto, high-heeled romances in which women on the make mate with underworld thugs,” as one critic opined. That theme was writ large in her 35-by-10-foot transit-tunnel mural installed in 1988 at Westlake Station beneath what was the city’s most elegant department store, Frederick & Nelson.

Today, with Nordstrom above, the mural’s chic characters sparkle in brash juxtaposition as if the piece were brand new. “It’s social commentary about fashion and grooming and how we choose to present ourselves,” McMahon says. “It’s what people wear and bring when they travel, with the mannequins, models and products. I’m playing a little bit on vanity.”

The universal subtext fits a public setting and tweaks an era that is no more, says Greg Kucera, former Frederick’s employee and longtime McMahon champion who after 38 years of operating a Seattle art gallery moved two years ago to France.

“Gene’s art is both literal and very incisive,” he says. “Her mural is an homage to a time of consumerism pre-internet, with the old-fashioned sense of relationship to a salesperson and with products you touch and smell before you buy. The idea of shop-by-mail was quaint. Now everything is delivered to your house.”

These days, McMahon, 81, maintains a studio on Elliott Avenue West, near the P-I globe. There, she conjures lively, provocative art pieces while documenting and cataloguing her countless works. An impish gleam in her eye still conveys edgy enthusiasm.

“I saw the weirdest ad for Nordstrom yesterday,” she says. “It made me want to do [the Westlake mural] all over again. It showed regular white tennis shoes, like Keds. It said they were the most comfortable shoes for the season. Then it showed really high platform heels. Both pairs had gobbledygook flowers. The tennis shoes were $1,200. The platforms were $3,000. I was so revolted. I’m going to use those shoes for something!”

Obviously, neither Seattle nor McMahon is “done.”

WEB EXTRAS

Thanks to Greg Kucera and especially Gene Gentry McMahon for their invaluable help with this installment!

No 360 video this week, but below you will find 7 additional photos and, in chronological order, 18 historical clips from The Seattle Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer online archive (available via Seattle Public Library), Newspapers.com and Washington Digital Newspapers, that were helpful in the preparation of this column.

And here, to note this column’s lead, we present a couple of 1980s articles about funnyman Red Skelton:

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Published in The Seattle Times online on April 18, 2024
and in Pacific NW Magazine of the printed Times on April 21, 2024

Light overcame darkness for pioneer kidney patient Clyde Shields

By Jean Sherrard

I saw my physician father cry only once. At his retirement party, he completely choked up when speaking about a man named Clyde Shields. The admiration was not misplaced.

Neither doctor nor researcher, Shields was the world’s first-ever ongoing kidney dialysis patient, here in Seattle. His contributions helped improve and extend millions of lives.

The Northwest Kidney Centers, founded in 1962, celebrated its 62nd anniversary with a Shields-related double act. On March 14, the long-anticipated Dialysis Museum opened in Burien, and the annual Clyde Shields Award for Distinguished Service, bestowed since 1991, was given to Rich Bloch, former Centers board chair.

Before 1960, a diagnosis of end-stage renal disease had only one possible outcome — death. Existing dialysis machines offered temporary relief from accumulated toxins, but repeated use permanently destroyed blood vessels.

Then Seattle nephrologist Dr. Belding Scribner (1921-2003), agonizing over the loss of a young patient, had a “Eureka!” moment.

“I literally woke up in the middle of the night,” he recalled years later, “with the idea of how we could save these people.”

The solution? A surgically installed tube providing a loop between artery and veins might be opened and closed as needed for repeated dialysis without destroying blood vessels.

With the help of UW mechanical engineer Wayne Quinton, Scribner created the “Scribner shunt,” a U-shaped Teflon device whose non-stick surface helped to prevent blood clots.

Scribner’s first patient was Shields, a 39-year-old machinist dying of kidney failure. On March 9, 1960, the newly improvised shunt was implanted in Shields’ arm and attached to a dialysis machine.

The results were immediate and dramatic. “As the waste was filtered from my body,” Shields said, “it was just like turning on the light from the darkness.”

“We took something that was 100 percent fatal and overnight turned it into 90 percent survival,” Scribner said.

For the next 11 years, Shields underwent dialysis, which entailed three 12-hour sessions per week.

Until his death from a heart attack in 1971, Shields, a skilled machinist, served as research partner as much as patient. “Time after time,” Scribner said, Shields was “the observant patient who

put us onto a new solution.” His courage and insights proved invaluable in solving problems as they arose.

Today, Shields’ son Tom injects a personal note of gratitude for the treatment that extended his father’s life. “Those 11 extra years were so important to me,” Tom says. “If dad taught me one lesson, it’s don’t give up. Get back to work and get her done.”

WEB EXTRAS

Just a couple this time round.

And ending on a personal note – a portrait of Jean’s dad, Dr. Don Sherrard, who choked up talking about his favorite patient Clyde Shields. It’s displayed on the wall at the museum.

BONUS: Here is a panoramic view of the Mount’s April 26, 2024, centennial Group Hug photo.

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Published in The Seattle Times online on April 11, 2024
and in Pacific NW Magazine of the printed Times on April 14, 2024

Presiding over West Seattle,
the Mount’s heart has beaten for 100 years

By Clay Eals

Not for nothing is it known as the Mount.

Perched on one of Seattle’s highest hills is Providence Mount St. Vincent care center. Its promontory along 35th Avenue Southwest oversees northern West Seattle and boasts a commanding view of downtown.

Likewise, though its 9.3 acres are walled off from much of the surrounding streetscape, the Mount holds a reputation and presence as warm as it is lofty.

Anyone who’s lived long in West Seattle probably has known of an elder family member or friend among its 800 yearly rehab patients or 175 others living final chapters under skilled nursing care. Toss in 109 apartments, a 100-child daycare, 200 volunteers and 487 staff from varying ethnicities, and you get an influential chunk of the community’s foundation.

That, of course, derives from longevity. The Mount building marks its centennial April 26, with a morning-to-evening rededication 100 years to the day since the first such public ceremony.

Initially women-driven, the non-sectarian center took root in Catholicism long before 1924. Its founding Sisters of Providence organized in the 1830s in Montreal. In 1858, they launched the first Pacific Northwest hospital, at Fort Vancouver. World War I interrupted plans in 1914 to expand to Seattle, but 10 years later saw the opening of the bluff-topped, dark-bricked, five-story complex, then called the St. Vincent Home for the Aged.

“A woman who gives her life to care for the old is as much a patriot as the soldier who gives his life on the field of battle,” Acting Gov. William Coyle said in praising founders at the dedication. “Your service is as great in peace as in war.”

Seen from above, the Mount’s layout forms an “H,” certainly symbolic of health. At its core, like a rudder, is a grand chapel. As times evolved, so did the institution’s name, services, staffing and outer face (a major mid-1960s rebuild and additional St. Joseph Residence gave it softer tones of tan and brown).

A high point came in 2015 when NBC “Today” showcased the Mount’s innovative Intergenerational Learning Center, pairing seniors with preschoolers, starting in 1991. The clasped hands and blended voices of old and young tugged at televised heartstrings.

Actually, the Mount’s centennial saga could generate at least 100 such heartwarming stories. One could be culled from 1974, when caregivers urged a resident in her 80s to keep moving to stay young in spirit. But she resolutely asserted she was too old for yoga classes: “I’m not going to stand on my head at my age.”

No wonder. She might not have been able to enjoy the view.

WEB EXTRAS

Thanks to Molly Swain and Veronica Couto of Providence Mount St. Vincent and Cynthia Flash of Flash Media Services for their invaluable help with this installment!

To see Clay Eals’ 360-degree video of the “Now” prospect and compare it with the “Then” photos, and to hear this column read aloud by Clay, check out our Seattle Now & Then 360 version of the column.

You also will find a commemorative booklet, 10 additional photos (including several then/now pairs submitted by the Mount) and, in chronological order, 29 historical clips from The Seattle Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer online archive (available via Seattle Public Library), Newspapers.com and Washington Digital Newspapers, that were helpful in the preparation of this column.

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Published in The Seattle Times online on April 4, 2024
and in Pacific NW Magazine of the printed Times on April 7, 2024

For first world flight, from Seattle to Seattle, hope took to the air

By Clay Eals

Charles Lindbergh, Amelia Earhart, the Wright Brothers. We all recognize those aviation icons and their deeds.

But what about Army pilots Frederick Martin, Lowell Smith, Leigh Wade and Erik Nelson? Their names have eluded cultural literacy, though they were the initial pilots leading the inaugural round-the-world voyage by air, a six-month U.S. military feat that began and ended in northeast Seattle 100 years ago.

This weekend marks its centennial. On April 6, 1924, some 300 onlookers witnessed four two-seat, open-cockpit Douglas biplanes named Seattle, Chicago, New Orleans and Boston taking off from Sand Point Airfield. Using interchangeable wheels and floats for periodic landings, the armada headed northwest — clockwise if you could eye the route from above the North Pole.

In this nascent era, among relentless complications, two planes perished. The Seattle crashed into an Alaskan mountain. Its two-man crew hiked five days through snow, holed up in a trapper’s cabin three days and walked one more day before their rescue and return home.

The Boston sank near Iceland, replaced by a backup, the Boston II. The original Boston crew later joined the crews of the Chicago and New Orleans, and the three planes came full circle, landing Sept. 28 at Sand Point, greeted by an adoring crowd of 40,000.

The 175-day sojourn touched 22 countries, some of which had never seen a plane. The purposes, outlined by Major Gen. Mason Patrick, were lofty:

• Demonstrate aerial communication with “all countries of the world.”
• Prove flight as practical “through regions where surface transportation does not exist or at least is slow, dangerous and uncertain.”
• Show that aircraft could operate “under all climatical conditions.”
• Prompt aircraft to adapt to “the needs of commerce.”
• Showcase the “excellence” of American aircraft and byproducts.
• Honor America as “the first nation to finally circumnavigate the globe.”

Indeed, hope filled the air for the April 6 launch. “Seattle has an interest in the gallant effort of the Army airmen not felt by other cities,” The Seattle Times editorialized that day. “It is here that they make their adieus and receive the expressions of goodwill from an admiring city.”

The same hope imbues this year’s six-month First World Flight Centennial celebration. The Friends of Magnuson Park group plans big events at Sand Point and the Museum of Flight around the Sept. 28 return date. But fittingly the party already has begun in the intangible air of the internet, with a “Follow the Journey” campaign on Instagram and Facebook.

“It’s a daily experience,” says Elisa Law, executive director, “to drum up global recognition and collective memory.” Through it, the Friends seek to unearth photos and other artifacts from the flight’s 74 worldwide stops.

As for Martin, Smith, Wade and Nelson? We could call them “The Boys in the Sky.” Hollywood, anyone?

WEB EXTRAS

Thanks to Jade D’Addario of the Seattle Room of Seattle Public Library, Wendy Malloy of the Museum of History & Industry, Phil Dougherty of HistoryLink and to Elisa Law and Cynthia Mejia-Giudici of Friends of Magnuson Park for their invaluable help with this installment!

To see Clay Eals’ 360-degree video of the “Now” prospect and compare it with the “Then” photos, and to hear this column read aloud by Clay, check out our Seattle Now & Then 360 version of the column.

You also will find 2 more videos, 64 additional photos and, in chronological order, 8 historical clips from The Seattle Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer online archive (available via Seattle Public Library), Newspapers.com and Washington Digital Newspapers, that were helpful in the preparation of this column.

And don’t miss these in-depth HistoryLink stories on the First World Flight by Phil Dougherty:

• Seattle to Seattle: The First Aerial Circumnavigation of the Globe (Part 1) – HistoryLink.org
• Seattle to Seattle: The First Aerial Circumnavigation of the Globe (Part 2) – HistoryLink.org
• U.S. Army Air Service airplanes land at Sand Point Aerodrome to complete the first flight around the world on September 28, 1924. – HistoryLink.org

And this link for a long-running dream:

• The Seattle World Cruiser Project

The following panels are from a free exhibit commemorating the six-month 1924 feat, open weekdays at Mercy Magnuson Place, 7101 62nd Ave. NE, at Sand Point.

The following panels are the initial Instagram posts for the First World Flight centennial celebration.

The following images are of the 2021 aviation murals created by students at Building 41 at Sand Point. The Friends of Magnuson Park hope to make it a visitor center.

The following photos depict an aviation display at Magnuson  Community Center, 7110 62nd Ave NE.

The following photo and video are from Magnuson  Community Center’s dedication July 7, 2023.

The following photos depict the First World Flight commemorative monument at the entrance to Magnuson Park.

The following photos are from the collection of Ron Edge.

The following panels are from the May 2023 newsletter of Friends of Magnuson Park.

The following photos are from a photo album given by the Navy to Tiburcio V. Mejia at Sand Point in 1956. Here is a remembrance from his daughter, Cynthia Mejia-Giudici, board member of Friends of Magnuson Park:

“My father, Tiburcio V. Mejia, was a chief petty officer in the Navy, then a steward as that was the highest level Filipinos could attain at that time. We transferred here December 1956, and he retired during the 1965 school year. I was 12 or 13 in the group photo below. My brother, Ted, was about 10, and my sister, Leslie Ann, was 5 or 6. My mother, Connie, was a proud wife.

“My brother said that the photo album was most likely presented to my dad when he retired, possibly as a commemorative gift. Dad enlisted at Glenview, Ill., in 1942. He served admirals on aircraft carriers. We have slippers from his travels to Algeria and photos of him wearing a Scottish kilt. He was in the European theater and didn’t see ground combat. One of his assignments was on the USS Missouri. My father kept a file of programs of dinners that he who most likely coordinated, also recipes. Precious stuff!”