The Professional Vagrant Who Could Not Stay Away

A case which aptly illustrates the needs of associated charities in Seattle came to light yesterday. The charitable Seattle public will probably remember an old man named George P. Small, who, with his family, consisting of a wife and four children, lived in a shack over the tide flats last summer and were objects of charity. The old man applied to the city and county for funds to take him back to Kansas, claiming he was decrepit and his relatives would take him in. In September, Commissioner Gasch and the city treasurer gave him a fund to aid the family, and Captain I. W. Peer of the police force bought the old man a ticket East. Nothing further was heard from him until yesterday, when Captain Peer received a letter from him in St. Joe, Missouri, claiming he was headed to Albany, Oregon, to live with his son. However, the Morning Oregonian reported yesterday that a man matching Small’s description—an old man with a 9-year-old boy—came to the city jail in Portland seeking charity. The jailer recognized him as the same man who, a year ago, had arrived in Portland with his entire family before scrounging money to get to Seattle. Upon being confronted, the old man denied his identity and promptly left town, having once again been passed through the system, returning like a bad penny.