Domestic Dispute Ends in Fire
A quarrel between a local couple leads to a hurled oil lamp and a structure fire on West Street.
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.
An alarm of fire was sent in for the corner of Front and Pike streets last night, caused by a fire in a shack on West street between Pike and Pine streets. The shack is occupied by Mrs. Etna Johnson and a steamboat man named Jensen, who has been lodging in the place. Last night Mrs. Johnson and her lodger quarreled and the woman threw a lighted lamp at him. The lamp exploded and set the shack on fire. Several buckets of water put the blaze out before the department arrived.
“Last night Mrs. Johnson and her lodger quarreled and the woman threw a lighted lamp at him. The lamp exploded and set the shack on fire.”
This incident occurred in the heart of what is now downtown Seattle, near the current site of Pike Place Market. While the 'shack' is long gone, the volatility of private life documented in the police logs of 1892 offers a glimpse into the precarious housing conditions of transient laborers at the time.
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