Discovery Park
Forested former Army post transformed into a sprawling bluff-top park above Puget Sound.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to Discovery Park in Seattle turns on a predawn morning in March 1970, when activist Bernie Whitebear climbed the fence at the old Fort Lawton and led more than a hundred people onto the bluff, turning the same right of discovery that European explorers once used against Native land back on the Army itself. You'll hear how the moment echoed the recent occupation of Alcatraz, and how military police answered with nightsticks and tear gas as Whitebear's group kept scaling the cliffs and returning. It traces the standoff through the months that followed, before the city ever agreed to a lease.
This audio guide was created using AI.
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