Measure for Measure

Something that struck me on my visit to Pike Place Market was the difference between the street level and the lower levels. That and the absence of Will Shakespeare.

Pike market claims to be the oldest continually-operated public produce market in the whole of the U.S.A. - which means about 100 years old as either the native Indian population didn’t have produce markets or had their stalls burnt down long ago by cowboys. It also claims to be Seattle’s biggest tourist attraction which may, or may not, say something about the average tourist and their love for all things Broccoli.

The market is built on the slope that rises from the waters of Elliott Bay up to the streets that today make up the commercial downtown area of Seattle. As a result the market is spread out on different levels that are connected by stairways and ramps, originally built from timber and still so in many places. If you arrive from the downtown side noise, commotion, colour, fruit and vegetables immediately assail you; if you arrive from the bay you enter into the cathedral silence and wooden embrace of what feels like a subterranean grotto of boutiques, art and paraphernalia. Either way, somewhere, you will suddenly come face to face with a busker, probably musical.

The upper level has been rebuilt; the original timber floor replaced by tiles that were financed by individuals and thus each tile bears the name of its sponsor. Initially, in pursuit of my Shakespearean needs and particularly those of Henry V, I preceded head down reading every one, hoping to find a Henry or even Henrietta around whom I could hang this tale. After colliding several times with tourists gaping at piles of Cherries and Apricots I decided that this was an unwise cause of action. And so what, a Henry will turn up somewhere, sometime, soon, surely…..?

It is at one end of this tiled thoroughfare that the Salmon stall commands the biggest crowd. The Salmon, beached in mounds of shovelled ice look, as they should, good enough to eat, but the crowds are drawn by the antics of the sellers who accommodate the publics desire to see large silvery Salmon thrown precipitously from hand to hand across the ice mountains. Sometimes they miss.

I read somewhere that “if you can imagine it” you will find it being sold somewhere in the market. It’s probably true, certainly is for food and also true if you want to sit down and eat. In the back alleys there are food stalls that reminded me of the diversity I have only seen in Hong Kong, somewhere in the busiest part is an old fashioned diner that looks as if it was framed for an Edward Hopper print and in one obscure corner that I don’t think I could find again easily, there was a small café with beautiful views over the waters of the bay.

The market is like that, maze like, disorientating and soon you forget the corporate smugness of the down town area alongside with its chain stores, franchises and insurance offices. It is down in the silence of what could be a ships hold if the market was afloat that the unexpected treasures lie, though one man who would never have found it easy to go down the low passages that lead there was Robert Wadlow.

Despite the last part of his name Robert Wadlow was not; in fact he was very tall, the tallest man that ever lived and he is remembered and celebrated in Pike Market. If you go down the weathered wooden ramp that seems buckled by time and passage you will arrive at the magic shop that in itself is a treasure trove of original illusionist’s posters. Opposite is the Giant shoe Museum, a coin operated, 25cent peepshow museum dedicated to, well, giant shoes of course.

You see Robert Wadlow, born in 1918 with an overactive pituitary gland, grew to the astonishing height of eight feet eleven and a half inches, that’s almost 2.7 meters. And consequently he had BIG feet (otherwise he would topple over). It seems that Robert spent a part of his short life travelling the States as a representative for a shoe company and would leave a pair of his giant shoes behind for the store to display; fairly ironic it turns out as he died at the age of 22 from an infected foot blister.

Anyhow he left a pair in a shop in Seattle and for many years they were on display in the shop window. Somehow they got lost in the sixties when the shop moved location and now the “Peep Shoe” museum of Pike Place Market, which has a good collection of other very big shoe ware (viewable for just a quarter), is offering a reward of one thousand dollars for their return, something that would complete their collection and make me wealthy so I’m looking!

I don’t know how big his feet were but MEASURE for MEASURE they were a lot bigger than mine and everyone else who walks around this market every day.