The Phantom Bicycle Robbers of Tacoma
A young girl claims two masked men bound her in broad daylight, yet police remain deeply skeptical of the theatrical account.
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.
A report that Anna Striker, the twelve-year-old stepdaughter of Charles Munding, of 2311 Pacific Avenue, was bound and gagged in broad daylight at 10:30 a.m. yesterday by two men—one long and the other short—who trespassed through the house and stole money from an upstairs bureau drawer, was telephoned to police headquarters. Detectives Whitney and Thompson were detailed to follow the matter up. The police, however, are disposed to look upon the story with a great deal of incredulity.
Munding is an engineer at Tabe's mill and was at work, and Mrs. Munding was out shopping at the time. When Mrs. Munding returned home, the girl told her that while she was sewing, two men entered the house by a back door. She stated that one of them threw a bandage over her eyes and placed a gag in her mouth, threatening her with instant death if she attempted any demonstration. She said that while he stood guard over her, the other ransacked the bedrooms, upstairs, and found money tied up in a handkerchief in a bureau drawer. They overlooked a gold watch belonging to the girl, which was in a drawer of a room where she was at work.
After this, said Miss Striker, the two left the premises, and, going to a vacant lot near the corner of Twenty-Third Street and Pacific Avenue, mounted their bicycles which they had left standing up against the ice cream factory on the Pacific Avenue corner, and rode off into the avenue. She said she did not get to look at their faces at any time because they wore masks.
“The police, however, are disposed to look upon the story with a great deal of incredulity.”
This 1900 report captures the classic 'true crime' allure that still grips local news cycles today. While the police skepticism suggests the story might have been an imaginative fabrication by a child, the detailed description of the route and the specific 'ice cream factory' landmark anchors this mysterious event in a turn-of-the-century Tacoma that was rapidly urbanizing.
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