Ballard's Post Office Moves Next Door to a Saloon—And Residents Are Furious
When the post office relocated to a building owned by saloonkeepers Cors & Wegner, Ballard citizens cried foul, accusing the mayor and postmaster of putting a public office in a den of vice.
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.
The postoffice at Ballard was removed on Monday from Ballard Avenue, where it has been located for over four years, to the brick saloon building of Cors & Wegner, on Second Avenue. Cors & Wegner own the building and run a saloon next to the postoffice, which is separated from the saloon by a partition. The postmaster, Theodore Tiedeman, Jr., the mayor, Edmund Peters, and all the parties named are accused of being instrumental in locating the postoffice next door to a saloon, which has been the scene of frequent boisterous brawls that disturbed the public peace. It is reported, though Mayor Peters denies it, that that official took off his hat in a saloon and said: 'Hurrah, boys! I will see that the postoffice is placed next to Cors & Wegner's saloon.' Considerable indignation among a large number of residents of Ballard is openly expressed over the removal of a public office to a place where women and children will be exposed to the insults of any drunken loafer who may patronize the saloon. An opponent of the present location said yesterday: 'A saloon was not allowed to go near the postoffice in Seattle, but in Ballard the postoffice goes to the saloon. If this be a sample of Democratic administration I want none of it, and we will see what effect a petition to the postmaster general will have.'
“A saloon was not allowed to go near the postoffice in Seattle, but in Ballard the postoffice goes to the saloon.”
In 1894 Ballard was an independent city; today it is a Seattle neighborhood. The fight over a post office next to a saloon echoes modern debates over the siting of public services and the influence of alcohol outlets in residential areas—and reminds us that civic scandals are nothing new.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.