Symbols of white supremacy confront Redmond teen

Things with past lives filled every corner of the Farmers Co-op Antique Mall in Redmond. Decoy ducks nested among the rusty typewriters, musky clothes, and toys made for children who grew old long ago. The floorboards creaked as customers wandered through the maze of booths on a recent day. At first glance, one glass display case looked a lot like dozens of others: well-lit and full of knick knacks. But, something inside made 15-year-old Lily Gallentine do a double take.

“Am I seeing that right?” she remembered thinking. Then, she said, her heart began to race.

“There were a bunch of different Nazi pins. There was a poster in the background, saying ‘coon’ and ‘monkey.’ There was a black doll in the background, which I thought was weird, that it was right there and not just with like, normal dolls,” Lily said.

Before now, this store had been a refuge for the 10th grader from Redmond: “Just to get out. We go to a few antique stores, poke around, and have some fun.” She said she likes to “see the stories behind certain things.”

On the day described, Lily had been hunting for toy cars to give to her dad, who collects them. When she found the case of swastikas, the price tags were $36 each, the pins neatly lined up under an ashtray with a Blackface caricature from the now-defunct “Coon Chicken Inn,” a restaurant chain until 1957. More of the chain’s racist merchandise was on sale, like a poster marked down to $18.