The Opium Smugglers of University Street
A customs inspector corners two French laborers on a Seattle gangplank with a heavy cache of illicit opium.
Customs Inspector Leonard Stenger, Jr. effected an important capture last evening when he arrested Eugene Le Lair and Gean Bernollin on the gangplank of the steamer State of Washington, docked at the foot of University Street, with about $1,000 worth of smuggled opium in their possession. A short time before the steamer left Bellingham Bay, two laborers with old-fashioned hand bags went on board. They were seen conversing with a third man of a more genteel appearance, though it was doubtful they were traveling together. Stenger, having received a tip from Whatcom, boarded the boat and kept them under surveillance. When the steamer docked in Seattle, the third man walked off empty-handed, but the two laborers carried the heavy bags. When stopped, they claimed not to understand English. Inspector Stenger seized the bags, which were found to contain seventy-seven pounds of opium tucked among clothing, a cake of fancy toilet soap, and a bag of coffee. The prisoners were French and spoke so brokenly that their story remained a mystery; they were held in a stateroom on the boat for the return trip to Whatcom.
“They answered in such broken English that a skillful interpreter would have been puzzled to give a literal translation.”
The waterfront near University Street has transformed from a bustling steamship hub into a modern urban core, but the role of Seattle as a point of entry for illicit trade and the subsequent cat-and-mouse games with authorities remain a persistent thread in the city's history.
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