The Land Grabber of Kittitas Valley
A sick man discovers his homestead has been stolen out from under him while he was confined to his bed.
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.
We learn that Charles Wilcox, a well-known stockman of Kittitas Valley, while sick in bed, had his farm of 160 acres, orchards and houses jumped by some unprincipled land grabber. We did not learn the name of the jumper. The mills of justice grind sure, but they grind fearfully slow nowadays.
“The mills of justice grind sure, but they grind fearfully slow nowadays.”
Land disputes and 'claim jumping' were common in the frontier era, mirroring modern anxieties about predatory real estate practices and the vulnerability of individual property rights against anonymous, well-resourced developers.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.