The United States celebrated its 200th birthday in 1976. Communities across the nation, including those in Thurston County, found creative ways to both celebrate their country’s history and look forward to its future.
Planning America’s 200th Birthday Party
Thurston County’s Bicentennial celebrations contrasted with how the American Centennial had been celebrated locally in 1876. “The Centennial Fourth,” the Washington Standard admonished its readers afterwards, “was the most quiet day we ever experienced in Olympia. From early in the morning until nearly night hardly a sign of life appeared.”
Bicentennial events in Washington were coordinated by the Washington State American Revolution Bicentennial Commission, formed in 1972. In Thurston County, Bucoda, Littlerock, Tenino and Yelm became official “Bicentennial Communities” with their own organizations coordinating events. Olympia, Tumwater and Lacey joined together to form the “Capital Area” Bicentennial committee.
Several local organizations received matching grants from the State Bicentennial Commission. The Governor’s Mansion Foundation received funds to purchase antique furniture for public rooms.
Tenino used a grant to help move their historic train depot to Tenino City Park. A “Forevergreen” grant helped with landscaping.
America’s Jubilee
Many events adopted a Bicentennial theme in 1976. In May, for example, St. Peter Hospital Auxiliary sponsored “Jubilee ’76” at Saint Martin’s University’s Capital Pavilion (now Marcus Pavilion).
Lasting from May 7 to May 9, community organizations and individuals sponsored over 80 booths selling crafts and food. The Pavilion was set up to look like a historic Western village. Girl Scouts demonstrated colonial-era crafts, the Campfire Girls sold cotton candy and the Boy Scouts built a log cabin outside.
Proceeds from the event went to buy beds for the hospital’s new 10th floor.
America Bicentennial Fun For Kids
The bicentennial was a great opportunity to interest kids in America’s history and schools found creative ways to get children involved in celebrating America’s birthday.
Students learned about the American Revolution through fun activities like arts, crafts and music. South Bay Elementary School even turned February into “Bicentennial Month,” setting up a colonial-style “dame school” where students could experience how kids learned during the American Revolution.
Others held parties. Chinook Middle School turned its annual carnival into a “Bicentennial Birthday party” while L.P. Brown Elementary School students shared a giant birthday cake with 200 candles.
Other organizations found ways to get kids excited about the Bicentennial, too. The Pacific Peaks Girl Scout Council, for example, put together an hour long musical called “If I were a Girl Scout in 1776” at the Capital Pavilion in April. With a cast of 2,800 scouts and their leaders, scouts also staffed booths about colonial life. Participants worked to earn their bicentennial badges.
High School Students Honor Bicentennial
Older students were also active in participating in bicentennial programs. In January Olympia High School band and chorus united for a bicentennial concert. A month later, the Tumwater High School Bicentennial Committee held a free dance for senior citizens at the Community Center.
Another group of students decided that the bicentennial was a time to honor one of the most important events in Washington’s history: the signing of the 1854 Medicine Creek Treaty.
Students in Timberline High School’s Indian Studies class designed a monument. Located on the bluff above the Nisqually Delta, a railroad rail on top of a cement sphere points towards the Medicine Creek Treaty tree, where the treaty was signed. The tree fell in 2006, but the marker remains. It can be seen – with difficulty – from I-5.
Celebrating the 200th Fourth of July
Bicentennial celebrations reached their climax on the Fourth of July, America’s birthday, 200 years after the Continental Congress voted to adopt the Declaration of Independence.
The Associates of the State Capital Museum, a volunteer organization, sponsored a celebration at Sylvester Park. Activities centered around the new bandstand, sponsored by Patrons of South Sound Cultural Activities and constructed by the Olympia Master Builders. The Olympia High School band opened the program of speeches and music, which included square dancing and a reading of Daniel R. Bigelow’s famous 1852 Fourth of July speech by his descendant, Daniel Bigelow.
Braving intermittent rain, crowds enjoyed food and historic booths in the park. There was a hot air balloon demonstration and kids enjoyed old-fashioned games like sack races and an egg toss. Basketmaker Hazel Pete of the Chehalis tribe and her daughter, future Evergreen professor Yvonne Peterson, demonstrated Native beadwork.
VFW Post 318 hosted a fireworks show at Ken Lake that night.
America Time Capsule: Honoring the Past, Hoping for the Future
Bicentennial events continued throughout the rest of the year. The nation’s 200th birthday was a celebration for the record books. While many criticized it as overly commercialized – as the Olympian’s Totem Tidings editor put it, the “Buy Centennial” – others saw it as a chance to reflect on the nation’s hopes and dreams for its next 100 years.
On December 28, the state placed a time capsule in the state capitol’s foyer. In the box were items from the bicentennial including a can of salmon, a prize-winning quilt, a Makah fishnet weight, and a can of Olympia beer.
The capsule is set to be open in 2076, for America’s Tricentennial. “We trust that you will find the contents of the time capsule,” the plaque on the floors reads, “to be informative of Washington’s past and present as we knew it and of its future as we saw it. These items from the past and out vision and hopes for the future we entrust to you.”
