The New Life of a Seattle Street Kid
Once a fixture of the police courts, a young boy explains why he is trading in petty mischief for an honest job at the bowling alley.
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.
From time to time, inquiries reach this office as to the whereabouts of Patsy Carroll, the little, ragged, bare-footed fellow who used to keep himself before the public by his frequent appearances in the police court and various acts of mischief. Meeting the careless-looking little chap on the street yesterday, a reporter said to him, 'Well, Patsy, what are you doing now-a-days?' 'Nothing, fishing,' was the prompt reply. 'I have been catching tomcod on the wharf lately, and selling them to Mr. Kickards. I can only make four bits a day at this and I am going to quit it, because there is nothing in it. It costs too much for hooks and lines.' 'What do you intend going into next?' asked the reporter. 'Oh, I'm going to work for that fellow who runs the bowling alley. I don't know how much he will pay me, but I know it will beat fishing, 'cause there's no expenses attached to that job. I quit stealing a good while ago; it always kept me in trouble, and I found out it didn't pay, and so I thought I'd be honest and work for my living. Some folks are good to me and give me things. This cap I have on the barkeeper down at the hotel gave me; it used to belong to his wife. If I get the job at the bowling alley I think I'll be all right again.' At this juncture, Patsy saw a vegetable wagon passing and put off at the top of his speed to get a ride with the Chinese driver.
“I quit stealing a good while ago; it always kept me in trouble, and I found out it didn't pay, and so I thought I'd be honest and work for my living.”
Patsy’s story captures the precarious childhood of the frontier era, where street kids occupied a gray space between criminalized mischief and survival labor. Today, this resonates with how Seattle continues to struggle with supporting its most vulnerable youth populations through social services rather than policing.
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