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These delightful home movies will give you an intimate look at Washington history

Our colorful past is suddenly present again thanks to a local filmmaker

TACOMA, Wash. — A visit to the Seattle World's Fair in 1962. A raging Tacoma fire in '47. A historic 1950 blizzard that dumped nearly two feet of snow. That’s just some of the footage Mick Flaaen has posted to Vimeo in his series "Tacoma Home Movies".

“You know you work on things for years and you never know where they're going on go,” says Flaaen “ and sometimes things fall in your lap.”

Flaaen discovered this cache of films inside an old projector case.

“It's a treasure,” he says. 

A treasure that couldn't have found a better home.

Flaaen is a documentary film maker whose specialty is preserving old film. He worked on the restoration of “Eyes of the Totem”, a 1926 silent film shot in Tacoma. 

Historian Michael Sullivan was also part of that project.

Now they're teaming up again.

“You can almost feel the heat off that,” Sullivan says, looking at fire footage. “Looks like the flame is coming right at the camera.”

The two men are trying, like detectives, to determine exactly what they have on film. Sullivan notes the location along what is now Schuster Parkway and figures it out. 

“The fire was the Pyramid Flour Mill,” he says. “As soon as that spark went off it was an immense explosion. A gigantic fire erupted.”

Another film about a visit to the Seattle World's Fair shows downtown Seattle's less than impressive early-60’s skyline from the Space Needle.

“You're right,” says Sullivan “The Smith Tower just towers over everything.”

The film then cuts to a dancing woman wearing a bra and hula skirt in her front yard. 

“She seems to be mimicking what she saw at the Hawaii Pavilion at the World's Fair,” Sullivan guesses. 

Much of the footage is quintessential northwest: a woman collects driftwood in La Push. A skier tumbles down a mountain. A helicopter takes off from Tacoma’s Stadium Bowl. 

Flaaen spends hours looking for the right music but otherwise posts the films as is.

“I thought let's just leave it alone,” says Flaaen. “Don't do too much to it.”

Their next project involves a Tacoma daffodil parade. It’s 1949, according to a movie marquee, and the Shriners are marching in colorful outfits. Cheerleaders are smiling.  

Suddenly Sullivan says “Oh wait! Go back for a second.”

Flaaen rewinds the footage.

“Right there,” says Sullivan pointing to a store in the shadows. “Menswear? Brotman's? You know who Brotman is? Brotman is the guy who started Costco.”

“No way.” 

“Yep.”

Every film offers moments of discovery and reminders that no matter how quickly things seem to be changing, we all share the same history.

If you have any home movies that you think would interest the filmmakers, contact Mick Flaaen at Mariposa Productions

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