A Perilous Afternoon near Lake Union
A brush with disaster in the rugged timberlands of 1877 Seattle, where an accidental axe blow turned a day of surveying into a desperate journey for survival.
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.
A man named Bonham, while engaged with surveyor Hall in locating the boundaries of some lots which he owned in the vicinity of Lake Union, met with quite a severe accident on Wednesday afternoon. He was engaged in blazing when the axe slipped and was buried in his left foot, nearly severing the toes. Mr. Hall carried the unfortunate man to town on his back, and medical assistance was procured and his wound dressed. Mr. Bonham had been for some time employed in the Mill Street grist mill.
“Mr. Hall carried the unfortunate man to town on his back.”
In 1877, the area surrounding Lake Union was a dense, treacherous wilderness requiring rugged individuals to navigate its untamed terrain. Today, that same area is a dense urban core of high-tech offices and housing, showing just how rapidly Seattle transformed from a place of literal survival to a global economic engine.
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