Safe-Crackers Raid Local Steam Laundry
A band of robbers broke into the Tacoma Steam Laundry, held two employees at gunpoint, and used nitroglycerine to blast open the safe.
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.
As the result of a visit from safe-blowers about 1 o'clock this morning, Jaeger & Rehemp, the proprietors of the Tacoma Steam Laundry, at Pacific Avenue and Twenty-ninth Street, are losers to the extent of over $200 in cash and have a wrecked safe on their hands. Entrance was gained to the place through the front door. The glass was broken and one of the robbers reached through and unfastened the spring lock. While one remained on guard outside, the others entered the building. One of them went directly to the bed where two young men were sleeping, and the others commenced operations on the safe. Ed Karle and Ed Miller were the men sleeping in the building. Miller stated: 'I was awakened by the breaking of the glass in the front door. Just as I raised up on my elbow the light from a bullseye lantern was flashed in my face and someone said, "There's the bed over there, watch it," and then I noticed one of the men coming toward me with a revolver in his hand. He told us to keep still and we did so. I don't know how many robbers there were, but I think there were at least four. In a few minutes we heard an explosion. I knew what had happened then and jumped out of bed and ran out the back way to a telephone to notify the police.' The combination knob of the safe had been knocked off and nitroglycerine was poured into the hole where the knob came through. The outside door of the safe was blown off its hinges and the inner door wrecked. Of the cash the robbers secured, $200 was in envelopes that had been prepared for the weekly payroll. The police were at the scene shortly after it happened and are hot on the trail of the men who did the job.
“Just as I raised up on my elbow the light from a bullseye lantern was flashed in my face and someone said, 'There's the bed over there, watch it.'”
The intersection of Pacific and 29th remains an industrial corridor, but modern crime reporting focuses more on organized retail theft than nitro-based safe cracking. This incident highlights the vulnerability of the local 'payroll economy' of 1904, where cash was kept on-site.
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