The Madison Street Park Riot
Seattle baseball fans fight, claw, and crush each other to catch a shutout victory against Tacoma.
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 afternoon game was one of the most interesting ever played on the Madison street grounds from a Seattle standpoint. The visitors were shut out by good pitching and perfect fielding, while the home club got in six runs. The two clubs did not arrive from Tacoma until nearly 4 o'clock. They found the grand stand and bleachers packed and the militia parade drill contest in progress. After the last company had drilled, the grounds and grand stand had to be cleared of spectators in order that admission might be collected. Then came a struggle of half an hour or more. No one wanted to go out, and when by the greatest exertion the crowd was removed, a wild scramble to get back again was begun. Women were nearly crushed to death by men who scrambled, fought, clawed and did everything in their power to display the great American hog in his most pic-ish form. It was out of the question for the ticket takers to hold the mob back. A noisy crowd got in and the grand stand and bleachers were filled.
“Women were nearly crushed to death by men who scrambled, fought, clawed and did everything in their power to display the great American hog in his most pic-ish form.”
Long before high-tech stadiums and digital ticketing, Seattle sports crowds were defined by chaos and raw entitlement. This account of the 'great American hog' in the grandstands mirrors the perennial tension between civic excitement and the mob-like behavior that persists in our city's modern sporting culture.
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