The Unsanctioned Heavyweight Brawl in Everett
A six-round bout between two Seattle men leaves the local marshal scrambling to explain why the law failed to stop the illegal fighting.
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 prizefight took place in an East Side resort on Hewitt Avenue last night between Jack Holland of Seattle and Arthur Burtin, a colored man, also of Seattle. It is said that the fight was to be six rounds for a purse of $50, the winner to take all, if not interfered with by the police. It is reported that the fight was pretty savage from the first and that the Seattle boy could have finished the colored lad in the second round, but it was desired to prolong the fight. Burtin regained his wind, forced the fighting, and knocked Holland out in the fifth round. Today, Marshal Greene, the Populist candidate for re-election, is busy explaining how this thing could go on under the eyes of the police, since a few weeks ago he interfered in a public glove contest before the Everett Club.
“Marshal Greene, the Populist candidate for re-election, is busy explaining how this thing could go on under the eyes of the police.”
Everett's transition from a rough-and-tumble boomtown of 'resorts' to a modern industrial hub is bookended by this mid-1890s tension between public morality and the illicit nightlife that sustained the local economy. The marshal's defensive reaction to the illegal prize fight highlights the perennial, difficult dance between local authorities and the policing of vice in the Pacific Northwest.
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