Pictures of the year: Our favorites from 2019
We asked Megan Farmer, staff photojournalist at KUOW, to select her favorite images from this year — and we threw in one of our own as well.
These images paint a picture of a region that grew, celebrated, grieved and changed together.
Remember when it snowed in Seattle last winter?
In January of 2018, DaShawn Horne was the victim of a brutal, unprovoked, racially motivated hate crime. The attack lasted a matter of minutes but left DaShawn in a coma at Harborview Medical Center for six weeks.
He suffered a traumatic brain injury and had to relearn everything he once knew, including how to walk and how to talk. Almost two years later, he is still recovering today.
Photojournalist Megan Farmer documented the process of DaShawn's recovery for over a year.
Littleneck clams have sustained the Jamestown S’Klallam and other Northwest tribes for centuries.
The S’Klallam have returned the favor, in a way: by restoring and renaming a beach on Sequim Bay, near the northeast corner of the Olympic Peninsula, for the clams.
Who remembers the Viaduct? Why does its demolition feel so long ago?
Photos: Tribal canoes land on Lummi shore, honor missing and murdered indigenous women
Canoe families from Alaska, Washington state and Canada landed on Lummi shore in July culminating the annual tribal canoe journey.
Every year, tribes and nations paddle along ancestral waterways, stopping along the way before reaching the final destination. The annual journey is a way to honor and celebrate the heritage of the Coast Salish people.
‘Our relatives under the water.’ Lummi release salmon to ailing orcas
In April, Lummi tribal members released one live chinook salmon into the Salish Sea as a spiritual offering to J17, otherwise known as Princess Angeline, an orca matriarch who had been ailing.
The ceremony they performed is considered sacred and ordinarily something kept within the tribe. But given the dire state of the killer whale population, tribal members decided to share it with journalists to get the word out about the whales’ risk of extinction.
23 couples, one mass celebration in Washington farm town
At Our Lady of the Desert church in Mattawa, Washington, chaos descended one day in early summer when 23 couples gathered for a mass wedding.
Each couple chipped in $100 or so, but the venue, the band, the chairs, even the cake, were all donated by the community. This was a communal, campesino wedding.
The blind horsewoman of Washington state's high desert
"Because the horse sees, it makes me feel like I'm not blind," said Julie Hensley. "It makes me feel a real freedom."
Julie grew up on a large ranch in Okanogan County, the daughter of a rodeo calf roper, and has been a horsewoman all her life. And it was a horse that took her eyesight away.
You'll never see this view again:
He's in. Washington Gov. Jay Inslee is running for president (And then he wasn't.)
We don't talk much about postpartum anxiety as a society, which is why so many moms interviewed for this story said, "Why didn't anyone warn me?"
7 Seattleites in outfits that say something
"The way that I dress is a literal portrait of my identity," said David Rue.
"I'm obsessed with the fact that I can use things like color, pattern, textile, and drape to communicate who I am, where I come from, and what I believe in."
A late paycheck and three days' notice: Inside the threat of eviction
For Jordan, it all started with a late paycheck. His paycheck was being mailed and was delayed by snowstorms. A three-day "pay or vacate" notice was posted.
His case is not unique. Thousands of people face evictions in Washington state every year. Housing advocates say the process happens fast, disproportionately impacts people of color and can land people on the streets.
Goodnight, Seattle. A story in pictures
In Seattle at night, there was a high-rise janitor, and a karaoke party with a night Lyft driver.
And three KUOW reporters, setting out to explore a darker side of Seattle — the one that comes to life after most of the city tucks in for the night.
Serial rapists targeted women on Aurora Avenue. This woman got justice
Since 2016, at least five men have been investigated for serially targeting and raping women who sell sex on Aurora Avenue, according to law enforcement.
"And then it kind of hit me: how horrible would it be to not play any part in stopping him from getting any of my people?" Robin Curtis said.
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Megan Farmer
Visual Journalist
Megan Farmer joined KUOW Public Radio as a visual journalist in 2017.
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