The Great 'Sour Grapes' Feud of 1892
When a Tacoma newspaper attempted to trash the San Juan Islands as a speculative wasteland, the locals hit back in print—blaming the insult on petty jealousy over their loyalty to Seattle.
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.
The citizens of San Juan county are very indignant, and justly so, over an alleged 'write-up' of our islands in the Tacoma Ledger. The paper’s circulation would not of itself cut much of a figure, but the sample copies sent broadcast may mislead many into the belief that San Juan county is in the grasp of speculators who are holding all the good and available land at exorbitant prices. A more exaggerated or false statement could hardly be imagined. The land has all been taken up by actual, bona fide settlers, who are clearing the land, making improvements, and are as enterprising and thrifty a class of citizens as are to be found in the Pacific Northwest.
The statement that prices range from $50 to $100 an acre for forest land and costs an average of $100 an acre to clear can only be accounted for by the fact that the writer did not get far enough from one of our bars to know the difference between forests and vast fruit orchards. The people have grown so used to going to Seattle for everything, even to having a tooth pulled, that many of them appear to forget that there is any other place. If we except Roche Harbor, which gets most of its supplies from Tacoma, the other residents go to Seattle. Sour grapes—if Tacoma was not ignored and received the patronage of our citizens we would undoubtedly be enjoying a substantial growth.
“The people have grown so used to going to Seattle for everything, even to having a tooth pulled, that many of them appear to forget that there is any other place.”
The fierce regional rivalry between Seattle and Tacoma for economic dominance in the Pacific Northwest is a century-old tradition. Today, while the specific accusations about 'fruit orchards' vs. 'forest land' have faded, the tension over which city controls the regional economic orbit remains a constant theme in Puget Sound politics.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.