Razor Attack at Lynn's Sawmill
A studious sawmill worker turned on his coworkers, slashing a man in a dispute over a poker game.
David Mentzer, a teamster at Lynn's sawmill in the western part of Tacoma, was slashed tonight with a razor by Frank Littler, a fireman at the mill, and is now hanging between life and death. Littler, with others, occupied a mill camp shanty, but he, unlike the rest, was studious and averse to card playing. He desired to study engineering, and when the others bought a lot of poker chips recently, he threw them away. Tonight more poker chips were bought, and Littler again threw them away. Then Dave Mentzer knocked Littler down, and Littler, who had been stropping a razor when the trouble occurred, got up and began to slash Mentzer right and left. Several of the cuts were nearly a foot long. One nearly exposed the liver, another nearly disemboweled Mentzer, while another reached from the backbone to the rear of the abdomen. Mentzer was slashed on both sides of the body, in the face and on the head. Littler was arrested. He is 25 years of age and very industrious.
“He desired to study engineering, and when the others bought a lot of poker chips recently, he threw them away.”
Mill camps and shanties were the backbone of Seattle and Tacoma’s early industry, but these tight quarters often became pressure cookers for interpersonal violence. While the specific mill is long gone, the tension between the 'studious' worker trying to better themselves and the 'rough' culture of laborers remains a common trope in our regional history.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.