AAPI Heritage Month: 40 years of legacy for Pike Place flower farmers

After the Vietnam War, long before Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month was ever observed, Seattle’s Pike Place Market partnered with King County and Washington State University to help Asian refugees resettle.

Today, that program has bloomed into a 40-year legacy at the market, and now, a second generation is taking over.

"100% of that single stem of that flower is us," Scott Chang, one of the second generation flower farmers at Pike Place explained, as he assembled a bouquet that would sell less than 10 minutes later. "There was no one else we hired to pick it. Every process of it is the entire family, our blood, sweat and tears went into the farm."

Scott’s parents came to America from Laos, where his mom, Cheu, farmed produce.

His dad was in the military.

During the war, they had to flee to a Vietnamese refugee camp before they eventually made their way to the states in the early 80s, according to Scott. Then they had to find a way to survive. That’s where the market’s Indochinese Farm Project comes in.

"It pioneered a lot of Hmong farmers to start coming into the Pike Place Market," said Scott. "The market provided a place for marginalized people and immigrants to actually be able to thrive."

The program started in 1982 when King County, the Pike Place Market Preservation and Development Authority and Washington State University combined funds to give farm land to immigrant families.

The Changs were one of those families. They got about 20 acres of land to share with two other families, and originally grew vegetables until they lost access to most of their water. That’s when Cheu switched to flowers. Scott says it gave his family a livelihood and a sense of purpose. Today the family’s "See Lee Gardens" flower stand is one of many Hmong and other Asian-owned farms selling bouquets that end up all over the country.

"We never really had any formal education when it comes to bouquet arranging — it’s more of monkey see, monkey do. It’s mom who taught me, and then for her, I think she just kinda picked it up on her own," explained Scott.

Every flower they sell at Pike Place starts as a bud at their farm in Woodinville, where Cheu still does her best to oversee that same 20-acre plot, but it's getting harder for her to get around.

"I retired, I retired, and also my knees are bothering me, so I can’t work much," she told FOX 13 News.

"We’re at a strange time where it’s kinda like the changing of the guard right now," said Scott. "The older generation of Hmong farmers are starting to retire and the second generation like my brother and I are taking over."

Scott and his brother have plans to continue the farm until they can’t anymore, and his brother’s children are already well on their way to keeping the legacy going for another 40 years.

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