Chinatown Destroyed by Suspicious Blaze in Tacoma
Twenty-five buildings consumed in a massive fire; arson suspected in the downtown quarter.
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.
At 2 a.m. a fire broke out in Chinatown. Before the flames could be checked, twenty-five buildings were consumed, including the principal business places.
The loss was estimated at $15,000, and the fire was supposed to be incendiary.
“Before the flames could be checked, twenty-five buildings were consumed... supposed to be incendiary.”
Tacoma’s Chinatown was repeatedly targeted by arson and exclusionary violence during this period, leading to the eventual 1885 expulsion of its Chinese residents. This fire represents the ongoing, systematic campaign to erase Chinese presence in the city, mirroring historical patterns of dispossession still studied by urban historians today.
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