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Old newspapers, pinned to the places they wrote about — the streets you can still walk today.
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As the town fights to incorporate, two factions clash over who owns the shore—leading to a chaotic 'jumping' spree where men pile claims on top of each other in a desperate grab for Pacific real estate.
When a local newspaper dared to suggest that marriage should be a voluntary contract, the citizens of Port Angeles formed a mob to drive the editors out of town.
“Marriage is no longer held to belong solely to the domain of theology and is a fit subject for state investigation.”
Settlers on the Port Angeles military reserve hang an appraiser in effigy after discovering their land values were arbitrarily jacked up.
“Not only protested in mass meeting against the inequality of the assessment, but hung the local appraiser, Mr. Carrigan, in effigy.”
A state land commission investigation reveals a complex web of fraudulent claims and suspicious inactivity by the Saginaw Mill Company.
“For years past milling companies have been absorbing lands in Sound counties by peculiar methods.”
A simmering estrangement between Port Angeles officials culminates in a broad-daylight shooting that leaves a city doctor dying.
“Dr. Herrick begged his brother physicians to save his life so he could kill the judge.”
A faithful ally to white settlers is murdered in a cold-blooded territorial dispute, exposing the impotence of the Indian Agency.
“I could not help feeling while standing up alongside this murderer... that I would gladly give a pull at the rope that should hang him.”
How a clever land boomer used fake gold coins to manufacture excitement and swindle investors in the late 1880s.
“Hickey hired another policeman, and the two officers escorted him and his fraud down to the boat, where he threw the washers overboard.”
After voters elected a Populist candidate as mayor, the city council took the law into their own hands and recounted the ballots to strip him of the office.
“They claim it would be a disgrace to have Port Angeles presided over by a Populist mayor.”
A pioneer who once lived among the Samish people as a captive, then as a squatter, discovers he is an heir to English estates.
“In the early days of Puget Sound history, he was singularly known as 'Blanket Bill.'”
When a town committee arrived to evict a couple from a disputed lot in Port Angeles, the wife met them with a bugle and two Winchester rifles.
“Mrs. Soper opened the door, blew a blast on a bugle, and stepped out with two Winchester rifles. She then said she was ready to fight in defense of her home.”
After her arrest for opium smuggling, Hattie Hastings of Port Angeles has vanished, leaving the community debating her innocence and her connection to a larger criminal ring.
“It is well known to the customs officials that Port Angeles contains quite an interesting smuggling ring. Situated as this city is it is easy for smugglers to bring their opium or Chinamen across the Straits, landing in the night.”
Before Port Angeles was fully incorporated, a determined association of residents occupied government land to force federal recognition and protect their homes from wealthy speculators.
“The ends to be served were two-fold: First, to secure a survey, and next, to obtain for the squatters the privilege of purchasing their claims at government valuation without having to bid against capitalists and speculators.”
A dedicated movement settles hundreds of Union veterans in a planned colony, promising a new boom for the Olympic Peninsula.
“I reverence men who have fought in battle; men who have lost their opportunities of civil life; men who said 'let my country prosper and I shall be happy.'”
A government land reservation intended for protection is caught in a web of bureaucratic delays, shifting administrations, and local political infighting.
“The delay in the opening of this reservation, it is claimed, produces stagnation in business at Port Angeles.”
A embankment collapse on the Seattle, Port Angeles & Western railroad extension results in a fatal derailment.
“The wreck was caused by a big fill on an extension of the railroad giving way.”
Ella Guptill won the race for county school superintendent, but a Port Angeles judge ruled that Washington law barred women from holding office—setting up an appeal.
“Under law women cannot hold office in this state.”
A trio of adventurers treks into the heart of the Olympic Mountains, documenting a 'land of promise' where cattle have never trod.
“In a semicircle before us, distant ten to twenty miles, the snowy peaks of the Olympic range shine in the bright sunlight like a huge necklace of pearls set in emeralds.”
A steamship crew's desperate battle against a violent storm and a jagged coastline ends in a daring rescue on the Puget Sound.
“The ship now lies at Port Angeles, the only evidence of her narrow escape being the loss of one anchor and a damaged rudder.”
A failed banker faces fraud charges after an elaborate web of double-mortgaged land and missing notes ensnares local ranchers.
“Schwartz finally gave a release of the first mortgage and turned it over to Gay, also stating in writing on the mortgage that the note was lost and had never been negotiated.”
Six years after founding a cooperative colony in Port Angeles, its pioneers reflect on how a vision of shared interests turned into standard business success.
“A large number, since their accumulation of property, seem to have had the scales fall from their eyes, and no longer advocate a 'community of interests.'”
A customs inspector initiates a crackdown under the Chinese Exclusion-era registration laws.
“When Mr. Fisher was appointed inspector by Collector Saunders, he immediately got up a register of all Chinamen within his district and questioned all of them very strictly.”
Federal authorities rule that underage settlers may claim townsite lots, sparking a unique legal experiment.
“I can imagine no good reason why the recipient of a bounty should possess the legal qualifications of a person capable of contracting. A minor may take and hold property... there seems to be no good reason why he may not take from the government.”
A scathing defense against accusations of corruption involving the Port Angeles Town Company.
“Wherever the pruning knife has been laid in, the bleeding victims unite in a verdant exhibition of their several sores.”
Congress orders the transfer of the Port of Entry for Puget Sound from Port Townsend to Port Angeles, sparking local political controversy.
“Port Angeles is the point which Gen. I. I. Stevens was in the habit of referring to in his speeches as the 'Cherbourg of America.'”
A careless picnic party triggers a massive blaze that destroys timber between Port Angeles and Port Crescent.
“The spectacle afforded by the flaming forests when the fire was at its height was sublime.”
After organizing fraudulent banks and fleeing his legal consequences, Benjamin P. Schwartz has been finally apprehended through the diligent reporting of the Post-Intelligencer.
“He maintained, however, with much effrontery that he was backed by a syndicate of San Francisco and other California capitalists.”
Federal ruling confirms that young people can hold title to government land, ending a ten-week legal standoff.
“Their cases are deserving of great sympathy, and recommend them to your favorable consideration.”
A fishing sloop capsized east of Port Angeles. One man clung to the wreck, then swam for shore and vanished; a neighbor had heard the crew shouting for help the night before but did nothing.
“He had not gone fifty feet before he sank out of sight.”
A month after a historic windstorm, four cows were found miraculously alive, fenced in by the very trees that had fallen upon their pasture.
“They had existed in their prison for over a month with no water except what they may have secured in the ruins, and no food except the small area of grass within the barrier of logs.”
A sick sailor refused the ship's hospital, a Dane swam two miles ashore, and six crewmen forfeited their pay to desert the British bark in Port Angeles harbor.
“So long as he was captain the discipline would have to be enforced.”
A local developer triggers a dramatic arrest of a bank president over a missing draft, leading to a day-long court battle and a shuttered bank.
“The bank has been closed all day.”
A New York broker promised a transformative rail line to Port Angeles, but city boosters discovered the 'syndicate' was just a man with a scheme.
“Upon all occasions he had been referred to as 'Mr. Plummer and his syndicate,' which in the beginning had the effect of producing visions of wealth.”
After spinning elaborate tales of Irish estates and gold mines to his neighbors, a local physician flees with stolen instruments and borrowed furniture.
“It is now suspected that he had brought them here from Australia and after all his great gold find in which he succeeded in 'roping in' many was, like himself, a flimsy fake.”
A classroom rule requiring pupils to go home for lunch sparked a bitter feud between a local politician and a school administrator.
“Mr. Mclnnis at once complained bitterly, saying he was a taxpayer and that the proceedings were un-American.”
A second look at Clallam County's accounts turned up altered figures, a $1,500 shortage and bondsmen who refused to keep paying. The treasurer was arrested.
“Upon closer examination it was found that an erasure had been made and figures changed, which indicates that this method was adopted to conceal the shortage.”
A mother and her seven children are rescued from a wilderness cabin after being held captive by an insane husband.
“After terrorizing his family and the neighbors who dared to venture near with murderous threats, the man had finally run wild in the woods.”
Tensions rise at Port Angeles over a federal order prohibiting cattle shipments to Victoria, sparking a heated war of words between the Standard and local authorities.
“We insist that an absolute refusal to enforce it before hearing from Washington would have been more creditable than the resort to such a contemptible evasion of its spirit and intention.”
Port Angeles turned out an ax-and-saw brigade to fell forty blocks of townsite timber before a Michigan colony of veteran soldiers arrived — and the Secretary of the Interior steamed in to bless the work and the squatters' shaky claims.
“He assured the squatters that he would do everything in his power to secure an early approval of the survey and approved of the field notes.”
Led by Judge W. Clark, they told commissioners they had cleared the old Port Angeles reservation but could not make a living on it. Without work, they said, they would demand county support.
“If they did not get work they would be compelled to demand support from the county.”
Frank McGill left town after a drunken night, gave his wife power of attorney, and was last reported heading for San Francisco—leaving the city council unable to pass ordinances.
“As he could not behave himself at home he would leave the city.”
The mayor and clerk deny a Taxpayers' Union charge, defend a hurried trip to Seattle to pay bond interest, and produce an affidavit against a fellow councilman.
“The credit of the city of Port Angeles was protected in so doing.”
Port Angeles appraisers faced 12,000 lots, each with improvements to value, while settlers rushed to establish residence before the appraisal closed.
“There are about 12,000 lots in the reservation, and the instructions require that each lot and its improvements shall be separately appraised.”
A government townsite project stalls as the surveyor disappears, leaving the Interior Department scrambling to find his missing field notes.
“The interior department is in something of a pickle over the failure to secure the field notes.”
A local committee meeting descends into shouting, proxy-throwing, and rival factionalism as Clallam County Democrats split over patronage.
“Speech after speech was made, five and six talking at a time, in which often the lie was passed, and, in fact, pandemonium prevailed.”
A Port Angeles woman is arrested for running a profitable cross-border smuggling operation.
“She usually brought over nine pounds of opium concealed on her person, from which she realized a profit of about $10 a week.”
Mayor M.J. Maloney of Port Angeles travels to Washington D.C. to lobby for a bill that would keep land sale revenue in the city for local improvements.
“It is hoped to keep the money which the residents of Port Angeles pay for the land to the government instead of sending it here to be absorbed among the government revenues.”
Prospectors are drilling in Port Angeles, hoping that sandstone discolorations signal a rich coal vein beneath the city.
“The formation at the point at which the drill will be operated is sandstone, which is discolored by the sulphur fumes supposed to come from the coal beneath.”
A Populist woman won the county school superintendent's race, a judge ruled her election illegal, and a filing deadline left the door open for her return.
“An effort will be made to install Miss Guptill.”
A valuable Seattle coal vessel runs aground near Port Angeles, signaling a likely total loss.
“The belief was that she would be a total loss.”
A mother and child were severely scalded after a household accident involving a stove and a boiling kettle.
“The child lived forty-six hours. The flesh was burned to the bone.”
Citizens gather on Church Hill in Port Angeles to watch a massive timber fire burning in the Olympic Mountains.
“The effect of the fire was grand beyond description, the flames being in marked contrast with the soft azure background of twilight.”
Port Angeles residents celebrate Senator John B. Allen's success in federalizing local infrastructure projects.
“Our city has been made a sub-port of entry, a telegraph line to Tatoosh has been established, and a large portion of our government lands have been surveyed by his painstaking efforts.”
After his romantic advances were rejected, a Tennessee man took his own life in Port Angeles.
“In the letters he said he could live no longer without his love.”
Citizens unite to investigate city council corruption and the misuse of public warrants after the council voted to pay its own members.
“The object of this society shall be the mutual protection of its members and law-abiding citizens of Port Angeles and Clallam county in general, in any matters concerning the acts of the city or county officers.”
Operating the seventy-six-mile telegraph line to the tip of the Olympic Peninsula was a grueling, low-paying job that pitted the weather bureau against the raw Washington wilderness.
“After a heavy blow or rainstorm the whole force generally takes to the woods for several days to get the ends together again.”
A local man's desperate wrestling match with a wounded buck turns into an endurance test.
“He seized it by its immense horns, when it jumped up and fought him viciously. He was alternately under and on top of the deer, holding on to its antlers like grim death.”
A United States land office agent fears a streak of bad luck after encountering three suicides in three weeks of travel across Washington.
“If I go out any place next week and run across another suicide, I believe that I will be justified in feeling uneasy.”
The controversial Collector of Customs for the Puget Sound District is dismissed, replaced by Fred A. Wilson.
“Poor Victor! thy course was brilliant but brief. Retire to private shades!”
Senator John B. Allen pressures the Land Department to resolve the stalled Port Angeles townsite survey.
“Further delay cannot be tolerated in making returns of Port Angeles townsite.”
A desperate machinist attempts suicide, citing a struggle to overcome a tobacco habit that led to severe insomnia and mental decline.
“It seems that he has been a cigarette fiend and has been trying to overcome the habit, and it has caused insomnia to such an extent as to unbalance his mind.”
A government signal officer takes his own life on the morning his divorce case was scheduled to be heard.
“This act of his wife's preyed on his mind, and in conversation he would continually refer to it. It undoubtedly unbalanced his mind.”
Tide-land owners at Port Angeles say they filled in the harbor in good faith, paid their money, and then learned the state had redrawn the meander line to swallow the most valuable frontage — and that the attorney general now refuses to issue their deeds.
“The innocent tide land improver was very slow to believe and to realize that the state authorities would attempt to make the present meander line the legal one in the face of the fact that it had been very largely formed by recent artificial fillings.”
A dramatic standoff between a local Customs Collector and a naval lieutenant highlights the administrative dysfunction and power struggles in Port Angeles.
“Lieut. Selden immediately wrenched the cane from Moore and hustled him into a boat alongside, sent him ashore, returned to the Anderson and started for Olympia.”
A Port Angeles lumber schooner returns from Honolulu after delivering 650,000 feet of cedar ties, and its manager says California is capturing the island trade that Puget Sound should own.
“The Puget Sound country is missing a splendid opportunity in not securing its share of this trade.”
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