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| Year | Stories |
|---|---|
| 1876 | 7 |
| 1877 | 7 |
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186 stories matching smooth
- The Smooth Stranger’s Trap: A Banker’s Warning Against the 'Get Rich Quick' Scam
In 1920s Kennewick, local banks warned citizens that 'smooth strangers' peddling investments were likely frauds, urging residents to keep their money in trusted institutions rather than chasing phantom profits.
- The Art of Keeping Kennewick’s Roads Smooth
A government highway engineer explains why the secret to durable rural roads isn't just construction, but the constant, rhythmic use of the 'road drag.'
- A Creameryman Confesses: 'Our Business Conditions Are Rotten'
In an unusually candid letter to The Ranch, the manager of the Rockwood Creamery Co. says reckless price-cutting and smooth-talking rivals are cheating Washington dairy farmers and quietly ruining the state's butter.
- The Boycott Handbills
After anonymous anti-Chinese handbills appear in Seattle, local laborers write to the Post-Intelligencer to clarify their role—and distance themselves from the movement.
- Three Drowned in the Columbia's Whirlpool
A Seattle official watched a small boat capsize near the mouth of the Methow, drowning two men and a woman in the roiling current.
- The Perilous Climb of St. Peter's Lantern
A daredevil’s afternoon of ‘roof climbing’ in 1876 Seattle turns into a life-or-death struggle when a simple stunt leaves him dangling a hundred feet above the pavement.
- The Vice President's Cousin and the $1,000 Port Townsend Swindle
A smooth-tongued 'loan agent' traded on Adlai Stevenson's name to collect membership fees from Port Townsend's most respectable Democrats — then hid behind unreturned abstracts and 'free stock' worth $100 a share.
- Engineering a Solution for the Fourteenth Street Slide
City Engineer Thomson outlines an expensive plan to halt the recurring, dangerous earth movements in the Beacon Hill district.
- The Bogus Missionary Who Tried to Work Seattle's Christian Endeavorers
A smooth-talking stranger claimed Moody Institute credentials and offered to split the take from a revival. Seattle's Christian Endeavor officers checked the hotels—and caught him in a web of contradictions.
- Log-Rolling Tragedy at Cascade Mill
A foreman is killed in a workplace accident after slipping in smooth-soled shoes.
- The One-Armed Commission Man Who Took Yakima Farmers for $4,000
A Selah farmer travels to Seattle's federal grand jury to haul a smooth-talking produce swindler back from California — and the stationery he left behind may be the evidence that hangs him.
- The Con Artist of the Y.M.C.A.
A smooth-talking grifter exploited the goodwill of Seattle churchgoers by playing on his 'sick wife's' needs, until an umbrella heist landed him in the city jail.
- The Captain of the South Seas Swindle
A smooth-talking grifter poses as a wealthy sea captain in Seattle to fleece hotels and merchants, leaving a trail of unpaid bills and fake credentials.
- The Artful Grifter of Walla Walla
A young woman posing as a disabled orphan solicited funds from sympathetic merchants, leaving local business owners feeling duped.
- The Man Who Walked With a Bolt Through His Foot
John Moore, Seattle's most noted diver, recounts the harrowing moment he was impaled by a railroad bolt in the Mississippi River—and how his tender saved him.
- The Northern Pacific Railroad's War on Seattle
An 1886 rail schedule change reveals a corporate conspiracy to strangle the city's growth in favor of town-lot speculation.
- A Senate Seat, a Caucus, and a Yakima Ditch Deal
In Olympia, Republicans moved to settle the U.S. Senate contest between Ankeny and Wilson—while opponents circulated a story that Wilson had traded a Congressional favor for stock in a Yakima irrigation scheme.
- The Strikebreakers Who Became Policemen
During a four-month strike at Sumner Iron Works, Everett's police commission armed strikebreakers with police authority—and the Labor Journal demanded to know who was protecting whom.
- A Clubhouse Dream Dies on 12th Avenue
In 1923, Seattle’s University Filipino Club thought it had a deal for a $39,500 headquarters. Then the owner added interest charges—and neighbors made clear they did not want Filipino residents next door.
- A Revolver at the Polls: Seattle’s Republican Primary Erupts
Seattle’s Republican primaries collapsed into shouting, challenged voters, fake tickets and a police chief drawing his revolver to declare the polls open.
- The Swindler in the Customs House
A former customs official turned smuggling mastermind uses a fake 'special detective' scheme to trick colleagues and line his own pockets with molasses-filled trunks.
- The Great Seattle Theater Con: A Swindler’s Exit
A smooth-talking promoter claiming to represent an opera company flees Seattle under the cover of night, leaving behind a baffled police guard and a nearly empty safe.
- The Confidence Man of Colby
An elderly immigrant family arrives in Washington only to be swindled of their life savings at the docks.
- ‘You Are Hanging an Innocent Man’: A Condemned Killer’s Last Words Before 4,000 Witnesses
Ezra Snoderly, one of the Cummins murderers, is hanged in Dayton’s courthouse square — insisting to the very end that he dies for another man’s crime, while the crowd judges him ‘game.’
- The Final Tribute to Chief Seattle
A rare eyewitness account of the funeral proceedings for the Duwamish leader and the respect paid by local pioneers to his grave.
Also about this, in other words
- The Smooth Swindler of Springbrook
A serial con artist attempts to swindle hotel keepers and produce merchants with worthless paper.
- The Smooth Talker of Tacoma
A persuasive con man leaves a trail of bamboozled businessmen and empty wallets.
- The Great Table Etiquette Debate
An editorial scrap between the Intelligencer and the Post-Intelligencer over whether eating with a knife is a sign of 'vulgar' breeding.
- Clean Play vs. Rough Tactics in Kennewick-Prosser Basketball
While the Prosser team walked away with a 25-13 victory, Kennewick's local squad earned praise for maintaining composure despite aggressive, unsportsmanlike conduct from their rivals.
- An Eccentric Prisoner's Optimistic Dance
A man awaiting sentencing in a local court baffles reporters by dancing a jig and promising a champagne celebration upon his release.
- The Strict Moral Geometry of the Schoolroom
Teachers debate the merits of strict discipline, the threat of school suspensions, and the 'moral atmosphere' of the classroom.
- The Unlikely Enforcer of a Party Game
A jealous husband at a frontier social insists his young wife receives equal attention—or else he will settle the matter with his fists.
- The Politics of Personality in Prosser
A political defense of County Auditor L. L. Lynn, whose opponents attack his 'pomposity' and musical hobbies rather than his administrative record.