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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1876 | 1 |
| 1877 | 3 |
| 1878 | 1 |
| 1880 | 1 |
| 1883 | 1 |
| 1884 | 1 |
| 1889 | 1 |
| 1891 | 6 |
| 1892 | 1 |
| 1894 | 4 |
| 1895 | 4 |
| 1898 | 1 |
| 1903 | 2 |
| 1909 | 1 |
| 1917 | 1 |
29 stories matching poorer
- The High Cost of Packaging
Yakima Valley fruit shippers consider a major shift to marketing apples without paper wraps to offset rising production costs.
- Domestic Violence in 1878 Seattle
A man is fined for a violent assault on his partner, highlighting the grim reality behind the era's dismissive legal language.
- The 'Charitable' Boycott of Seattle's Chinese Laundries
A Seattle letter writer wants customers to register with charity officials so their washing can be steered to white women—an economic boycott wrapped in the language of neighborly aid.
- Tacoma’s Railroad Thralldom
A neighboring city struggles under the shadow of the Northern Pacific Railroad's monopoly and the local 'aristocracy' that supports it.
- The Wealth Gap and the Labor Question
A critical look at the ethics of extreme wealth versus the necessity of creating work over charity for the poor.
- The Political Machine Topples in Walla Walla
Voters hand a crushing defeat to the local political machine, rejecting entrenched interests and the influence of gambling money.
- The Lumber Land Swindle
A band of unscrupulous swindlers is targeting the local labor force with promises of massive returns on timber land investments.
- The Great Seattle Straw Hat Swindle
A smooth-talking grifter fleeced the crowds of Seattle by promising cheap hats, only to leave them holding handfuls of worthless paper.
- The Clerk Who Stole His Boss’s Fortune to Gamble Away
Leander Miller returns from a political trip in Olympia to find his confidential clerk, J.H. Corcoran, has drained his accounts through gambling debts.
- The Growing Divide: A 1889 Look at Wealth Inequality
A century before modern debates on income disparity, a Seattle newspaper reflected on a New York attorney's grim statistics concerning the extreme concentration of American wealth.
- The High Price of 'Luxury' Gloves
An editorial in the Tacoma Times calls out Congress for a proposed tariff that would hit poor women's glove purchases harder than the rich.
- Vigilante Justice on the Sound
When a steamer full of card sharps tried to fleece a group of shingle weavers, the workers fought back—and won.
- The Unrest of the American Dollar
A 1880 editorial from the Seattle Intelligencer examines the nation's obsession with wealth accumulation and its hidden costs to the soul of a young nation.
- Bricklayers Refuse to Take a Pay Cut
Workers hold a tense meeting with the City Council, arguing that cutting wages during a depression will only lead to poorer infrastructure and personal poverty.
- A Warm Haven in the Heart of the Skid Road
While Seattle’s winter chill drove men to the fringes, one mission at Second and Jackson offered a rare sanctuary of light and literature for the city's struggling laborers.
- The Fisherman’s Daughter Who Kidnapped a Preacher
A young minister fresh from the city finds his future decided by a bold Kuan woman on the moonlight-swept waters of the harbor.
- The Great Harrison Street Heist
A pair of enterprising burglars—and their young apprentice—pulled off a sophisticated grocery store robbery in Seattle, only to leave their loot neatly stashed in a canyon tent.
- The Hyena of Seattle: A 'Herculean Woman' Leaves a Man Sprawled in the Dust
In a rare display of physical dominance that defied Victorian gender norms, a local woman engaged in a public brawl so fierce it was described as 'fiendish delight,' leaving her male opponent screaming for mercy.
- No Monopoly on Gaslight: Spokane's Council Draws a Line
Council granted a gas company the right to lay pipes—but pointedly refused an exclusive franchise, warning that monopoly would 'cinch the consumers.'
- Tacoma’s New Business Plan: Import High-Grade Opium for the Whole North
With the tariff cut, Tacoma entrepreneurs predicted they could supply wealthy opium users from Oregon to the Atlantic—and collect thousands in customs duties.
- The Great Timber Land Swindle: How Seattle’s Elite Claimed Farmable Soil as Forest
A federal commissioner rules that the lands held by Bailey and Hawley are actually fertile agricultural soil, not timber land, overturning decades of speculative entries in the Samish Lake district.
- The 'Lazy' Reservation: A White Settler's Rant Against Indian Farming
In May 1877, a Seattle correspondent published a vitriolic letter in the *Intelligencer* challenging claims of Native agricultural success on the Suckley Reservation, arguing that federal land policies encouraged 'idleness' and demanding the lands be opened to white settlers.
- Who Should Judge? Washington’s New Jury Law Under Fire
A Seattle paper defends a legislative overhaul that ended the professional juror and required jurors to be householders, as critics charged it handed the courtroom to property owners.
- Mrs. ‘Jumbo’ Cantwell Comes Home: Swollen Feet, a Stolen $100, and the Remains of Coxey’s Army
The Tacoma woman returns from the Commonwealers’ march with dropsy-swollen feet, $1.15 to her name, and a story about the Seattle branch secretary who ran off with her daughter’s stocking money.
- A Fortune in Strawberries: The Grower Who Says Thurston County Is Sleeping on Its Own Soil
Olympia closed the fruit season with its biggest shipments yet, but veteran orchardman George B. Hartman says the county's trees are thriving on forty years of neglect — and that proper cultivation could out-earn Oregon and California combined.
Also about this, in other words
- The Price of Poverty in 1877 Seattle
When the County Commissioners opened a new poor house, they explicitly designed it as a workhouse to deter the 'dissolute class' from seeking public assistance.
- The Price of Poverty in Pioneer Seattle
King County officials put out a call for bids to house and feed the 'indigent poor,' treating human welfare as a municipal contract.
- The Tragedy of the 'Professional Beggar'
A man sentenced to three months in the county jail for vagrancy writes a desperate letter from his cell, claiming he is dying and pleading for the bail money he cannot afford.
- Why Do We Pity the Rich Criminal?
An editorial questioning the double standard applied to wealthy fraudster C. D. Hillman compared to the swift punishment of the poor.
- Sixteen Paupers, a Clay-Bed Well, and a Farm Not Fit to Live On
County commissioners tour the county poor farm and find cracked fences, filthy bedding, horses bleeding on barbed wire and water unfit to drink. The old place will be sold, they say — but only if a poor farm is worth having at all.
- Associated Charities Weeds Out the 'Unworthy'
Seattle's charitable bureau meets to handle a growing caseload, drawing a rigid line between the 'deserving' poor and those deemed unworthy of aid.
- The True Cost of Living
A haunting poem from the era exposes the impossibility of supporting a family on a mill worker's starvation wage.
- Kennewick Women Organize to Aid the Needy
A local charitable effort reveals hidden poverty in the community, prompting a call for the destitute to set aside pride and seek help.