Research the archive
Narrow 27,002 newspaper stories by words, years, place, newspaper and subject. See when and where they ran, then download what you find.
Put a phrase in quotes ("rent strike") or leave a word out with a minus (strike -baseball). Old scans misspell names, so when little is found, near-spellings are offered.
Refine1 on
Show the numbers
| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1858 | 1 |
| 1877 | 2 |
| 1883 | 109 |
| 1884 | 42 |
| 1885 | 1 |
| 1886 | 1 |
| 1887 | 4 |
| 1888 | 2 |
| 1889 | 23 |
| 1890 | 5 |
| 1891 | 11 |
| 1892 | 51 |
| 1893 | 35 |
| 1894 | 39 |
| 1895 | 35 |
| 1897 | 5 |
| 1898 | 12 |
| 1899 | 3 |
| 1900 | 4 |
| 1902 | 19 |
| 1903 | 74 |
| 1904 | 16 |
| 1905 | 3 |
| 1907 | 3 |
| 1908 | 9 |
| 1909 | 31 |
| 1910 | 16 |
| 1911 | 1 |
| 1912 | 3 |
| 1914 | 5 |
| 1915 | 1 |
| 1916 | 11 |
| 1917 | 6 |
| 1922 | 1 |
| 1923 | 9 |
| 1924 | 5 |
| 1925 | 1 |
599 stories
- The Hunt for 'Red Bob'
A notorious freight car thief is finally apprehended in Spokane after a tense manhunt across the territory.
- The Hidden Mortgage Loophole
A new judicial ruling surprises attorneys and lenders by declaring that assigned mortgages do not need to be filed on record.
- Apple Butter and Giant Powder: A Smokehouse Stove Explodes Near Spokane
A woman and a little girl lit a fire to make preserves — not knowing the stove was packed with sticks of blasting powder.
- The Helen Grier Murder Case Stumbles in Court as the Body’s Identity Remains Unproven
Defense attorneys pounce on a legally flawed exhumation, and a Hoodsport woman is reportedly set to testify against her own mother in a Spokane murder trial.
- Fire Devours Spokane Church Block as Lodging House Keeper Leaps for Her Life
An early-morning blaze consumed All Saints' Episcopal parish property, including the new rectory and tenements, injuring a lodging-house keeper and causing $30,000 in loss.
- 'Only Another Name for a Sort of Annual Picnic': Washington's Road-Tax Fight
A good-roads convention hears that farmers resent paying their road tax in cash instead of working it out, that the money vanishes into 'graft or rake-off,' and that Spokane County's section-line roads were laid out so badly they must be rebuilt from scratch.
- Spokane Had Mining Fever, and the Men Selling the Stock Had the Only Sure Thing
A Yakima correspondent visits Spokane and finds a city where hotel clerks, newsboys and waiter girls are all buying mining shares — and where even Ezra Meeker has traded hops for a stock prospectus.
- The Night the Chickens Sang Backup: Spokane’s Poultry Show
Spokane’s annual poultry exhibition drew hundreds of birds, a towering silver trophy, and an orchestra the chickens refused to let finish alone.
- The Milk Inspector Spokane Loved to Hate
Dr. James Bullivant fined five Spokane dairymen for selling milk below standard. The dairymen said he was less interested in public health than in collecting half the fines.
- 2,400 Miles by Horseless Carriage, Arrived Weary but Whole
W. W. Fordham drove an automobile from Michigan to Spokane — forty or fifty miles a day, one lake crossing, and the first motorist ever to make the northern route.
- A Land-Fraud Prosecutor Warns the Homestead Loophole Is Closing
Fresh from prosecuting land fraud, F. M. Goodwin opens a Spokane law office and predicts Congress will tighten the Timber and Stone Act and the homestead commutation loophole.
- A Schoolteacher's Last Note: 'God Knows I Am Not the Cause of This'
Rosa Baumberger, 24, came to Spokane from the Metaline schoolhouse and died by her own hand in a hotel room, leaving a note that insisted on her innocence and a friend who begged the papers not to stain her name.
- Spokane Grants the Right to Speak on Its Streets
After two years of fighting, Spokane lets citizens take the soapbox — and the first permit goes to a woman evangelist and slum worker.
- Dynamite Blast Near Spokane Kills One and Points to a Safe-Blowing Plot
Police believed three men were extracting nitroglycerine from dynamite for safecracking when the charge went off; one died, another was near death, and a third landed in jail.
- A Spokane Judge Blows Smoke Through Washington’s Cigarette Ban
The state’s new cigarette prohibition was unconstitutional, Judge Sullivan ruled, because a law titled as regulation could not impose outright prohibition.
- Spokane Taxpayers Revolt Before the Bonds Come Due
After selling $1.2 million in bonds, Spokane's council kept planning improvements. Property owners talked injunctions and credit, and the Ledger saw a lesson for every taxpayer.
- The Money Lenders Take Another Spokane Block
A foreclosure suit on the Kaele block reveals a family that paid nearly $11,000 in interest — and still stands to lose the property to a Dutch mortgage bank.
- The Wreck That Nearly Came Through Newport
A loose rail derailed an engine near Hillyard just as two soldier trains were passing through the region. Speed—or the lack of it—was all that prevented a disaster.
- Spokane Digs a Street Beneath Its Streets
The Spokane Inland Railway breaks ground on a four-thousand-foot concrete tunnel under Front Avenue, with two underground stations and a three-year timeline.
- A $56 Check Sends a Housekeeper to Prison for Up to 14 Years
Mrs. Maybelle Coitrell, desperate for work, forged a Spokane millionaire's name—and drew a sentence that outweighed the theft many times over.
- Great Northern Refuses to Pay the Salary Loan Sharks
The railroad tells a Spokane court that an employee's wage assignment is usury, setting up a test case over predatory lending.
- Spokane County Clerk Accused of Turning Court Funds Into His Own Interest Account
C. E. Atkinson was arrested after a grand jury indicted him for depositing litigants’ money to his personal credit and collecting the interest.
- A Rough Ride for Pleasure Seekers
A buggy ride through Spokane ends in a tumble when a team of horses takes fright.
- Two Drunk Diners Dug Their Way Out of the Spokane Calaboose
After refusing to pay at Carson's restaurant, two prisoners cut a tiny hole through the jail floor and slipped away in broad daylight.
- A Petition Vanishes and the Fight to Carve Up Spokane County Turns Nasty
As Olympia weighs a bill to split off the new 'Sprague County,' Spokane Falls editors cry foul over a petition with 300 names that disappeared from an office — and defend a rival editor accused of inventing the theft.
Download all 599 as a spreadsheet (CSV) · Show them on the map