By Jerry Robinson

Jerry Robinson wrote a column for this publication for decades called Borderlines, derived from the fact that White Center was located literally next to the City/County line. This one was written in the late 1950's

      When I told my Mom I hitched a ride to the stockyards in Portland with a man I did not know, when I was 10, she was shocked. When I told her he had a badge with his name Albert Wiesendanger (rhymes with anger), she did not believe me. It was okay, he was a park ranger.  

I also told her I knew a man named Elmer Slotboom she didn’t believe me and never wanted to know about a boy named Booger something.

When I bought the White Center  News in 1952 I was stunned when my foreman told me that as a schoolboy at Highline High said he and his friends called it Rat City.

He  said it was called that because his buddies believed it was named as a Restricted Access Territory for U.S. Navy personnel during the second world war. 

Editor's Note: 

The U.S. military did establish Restricted Alcohol Territories during World War II, though they weren’t always called that formally. These restrictions were part of broader efforts to regulate alcohol consumption among service members and maintain discipline near military installations.

I had never heard that and ignored it but set about working hard to improve the image by helping get improved parking, paved streets, and a generally nicer place to live. 

I ran an article about the very poor conditions on 16th avenue where pot holes filled with water every week. I asked a staff member to create a cartoon groundhog in one of the puddles to draw attention to the puddle depth and the problem it created.

I was new in town. It did not sit well with the town leaders but before I could say J. Robinson, a LID (Local Improvement District) was formed and the streets were paved. Maybe I just had good timing.

 It helped attract several new banks, some chain groceries, three furniture stores, three dress stores, several men's stores and we gained better low income housing too (I was on the Housing board for 15 years).

Our efforts to rebuild White Center’s image included participating in the Seattle SeaFair events and even winning the grand sweepstakes for a huge float the newspaper staff built in 1958.

So much for image repair. It started fading in the mid-60's. By 1990 it was a just a service community. The heart had melted out of it and moved to SouthCenter. 

About five or six years ago I noted that a new business opened calling itself Rat City brewery. It had a sign on Roxbury. Still caring,I offered to give the owner a full page ad if he would take the sign down and call it something else. He chuckled but was not interested.

Then later I was visiting a friend’s house. His daughter came in and mentioned her plans to join a skating team called the Rat City Roller Girls. 

I guess my efforts were for naught. I was a voice in the dark.

     For a while we had housewives coming down evenings to shop. This was long before Southcenter or Westwood Village. It was a nice town. We dressed up the sidewalks in holiday style in December. 

     I hated having five or six taverns on main street. It was always a struggle since we were just over the city line at Roxbury where booze was easier to get in the county. They're still there for the most part. 

We had some others who helped. County Commissioner Ed Munro was a dear friend. He arranged a bunch of flower planters down main street. He okayed a handball court at the field house. Andy Hess was state Senator and Democrat who could have been U.S. congressman if he had told the voters his opponent was an alcoholic. Attorney Norman Ackley was popular state representative. We had some clout but just about the time we got rolling on a new image in White Center, Burien blossomed and most of the big new chain stores closed up. 

Much of White Center's new shopping power failed. Even the venerable White Center department store on 16th SW and Bunge Lumber and Hardware had a tough time making it. Roxbury and Clemans Furniture stores folded.

The famous Epicure Restaurant eventually closed its doors too. Some say it folded because their beautiful German born waitress quit and became my bride.

There was a chance. The Chamber of Commerce held a big meeting at the Epicure and held a vote to change the name of White Center to Westwood.

Roy Velling, White Center dentist and chamber prexy called the meeting. 

The Epicure was noisy and jammed. It was a tie vote between keeping the White Center name or calling it Westwood.

The plan had fizzled. Roy called me at home later and told me he had forgotten to vote in the uproar. I played golf with him many times later and it was like pulling teeth to make him admit he missed the gimme that changed history. He would have vote for Westwood. We got it used anyway down on Roxbury when Westwood Village was built. Alas, too late for White Center or Rat City which somehow stuck all these years.

My mom never liked it.