The City’s First 'Rogues’ Gallery'
Seattle police modernize their pursuit of criminals by introducing systematic photography to document the local jailbird population.
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.
Eleven criminals who have lately fallen into the hands of the police were conducted to a gallery yesterday and photographed. The process of photographing a criminal is now called by the police 'mugging'; thus when the chief of police desires that a suspect be taken to the gallery he orders one of the officers to 'chase' the unfortunate individual down town and 'mug' him. Already there is quite a number of pictures of jailbirds on hand, and in a short time a creditable rogues' gallery will be one of the features of the department. The policemen and detectives now have a list of the suspicious characters in the city, and at the first opportunity arrests will be made, the 'mugs' of the suspects taken and their photos added to the general collection. On the back of each photograph will be written the name, age, occupation and characteristics of the criminal, together with his record as far as known.
“The process of photographing a criminal is now called by the police 'mugging'; thus when the chief of police desires that a suspect be taken to the gallery he orders one of the officers to 'chase' the unfortunate individual down town and 'mug' him.”
This early attempt at modern biometric surveillance reflects the transition of Seattle’s policing from informal street-level control to bureaucratic state record-keeping. Today, these historical 'mugshots' serve as an essential, if sobering, artifact of how the city first systematized the branding of its ‘undesirables.’
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