How Vashon prepared for America’s bicentennial 50 years ago
Published 1:30 am Tuesday, June 30, 2026
Fifteen months before the first bicentennial fireworks cracked across the sky, Vashon had already started celebrating. The first sign came on a flagpole outside the courthouse.
On April 10, 1975, the Vashon Beachcomber reported that the Vashon Kiwanis Club had replaced two flags stolen by vandals and added something new: what the newspaper called the first bicentennial flag known to fly on the island.
It was the first of many reminders that Vashon wasn’t waiting until July 4, 1976, to celebrate.
As the nation marks its 250th anniversary, a look back through Beachcomber archives with Mike Sudduth of the Vashon Heritage Museum reveals a community that spent months — even years — getting ready for America’s 200th birthday, and some of it survives today.
Folded away in the museum archives is a quilt stitched by Vashon Elementary School fifth-graders in 1976. Its embroidered squares celebrate both country and island life: Paul Revere gallops across one panel. Another shows a ferry. Others depict farms, fishing, rainbows and a map of the island, with each block carrying the name of the student who stitched it.
In December 1975, Vashon High School student Roger Douglas won the local Veterans of Foreign Wars Voice of Democracy contest with a speech titled, “What Our Bicentennial Heritage Means to Me.”
In January 1976, an island resident called Washington State Ferries with a suggestion. If the ferry system had painted boats for Expo ’74, why not do something for America’s 200th birthday?
Beachcomber archives don’t say if the idea ever came to pass, but it was another sign that islanders wanted the celebration reflected in their everyday life.
Even local businesses joined in on the festivities. The Wall Flower encouraged customers to vote in FTD’s Bicentennial Flower Election. Vashon Hardware offered a bicentennial tide chart. By the summer of 1976, even shopping locally carried a patriotic theme.
But not everyone viewed the celebration through red, white and blue-shaded glasses.
A Beachcomber columnist in 1975 questioned whether the celebration was becoming too bureaucratic and commercialized. He wrote that “bureaucrats across the water” informed the newspaper that Vashon wasn’t an officially recognized bicentennial city and wasn’t supposed to be flying a bicentennial flag. The columnist responded: “Hell, lady, we’re not even a town.”
The same column also acknowledged criticism from Native American voices who viewed the anniversary through a very different historical lens. Those debates may sound surprisingly familiar today.
As Vashon gets ready for America’s 250th birthday, history suggests islanders aren’t particularly good at waiting for Independence Day to start celebrating.
Eddie Macsalka is a contributing reporter to The Beachcomber.
