A Disappearance on the Railroad Front
A successful contractor vanishes in Seattle, leaving behind a trail of suspicion and a family waiting in Wisconsin.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
P. P. Burke, a railroad contractor of Seattle, has mysteriously disappeared, and nothing has been heard of him since Friday, January 23. The missing man was formerly foreman for Shepard, Henry & Co., but recently secured a contract for putting in the masonry work along the line of the Great Northern road, and he was making money on his contracts. On January 22 he was at the Western hotel in this city and telegraphed to Mr. Frisby, bookkeeper for Shepard, Henry & Co., at Snohomish. He paid his bill at the hotel and departed, whither no one appears to know. It was his expressed intention to go to Snohomish or to some point along the line of the road, but he told several parties at the hotel that he would return to Seattle at the latest by Wednesday. Mr. Burke's friends say that not long since he discharged a man with whom he had quite a quarrel, and they believe that this man has had a hand in his disappearance. Mr. Burke was about 42 years of age, systematic in business, and regular in his habits. He did not drink and was free from any apparent vices. His wife, three sons, and one daughter live at Sparta, Wisconsin, and he had been working with might and main for some time to so fix himself that he might have them with him. John Nolan, an employee of the Great Northern, is a brother-in-law of the missing man and is distressed beyond expression at the mystery surrounding the disappearance of his relative. If the missing man is not heard of in a few days the probate court will be asked to grant letters of administration, so that the man's estate may not suffer from neglect.
“He was not a flashy man in appearances and he carried very little money on his person.”
The rapid expansion of the Great Northern Railroad in the 1890s brought both opportunity and volatility to Seattle's labor market. Today, the city’s rapid growth continues to draw workers to the region, and while contract labor is more formalized, the human cost of being a transient worker far from one’s family remains a hauntingly familiar theme in Pacific Northwest history.
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