Brutal Attack on Asian Train Passenger
Two railroad employees threw a Chinese passenger from a moving train, causing severe injuries.
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.
George Weikel reports a brutal assault on a Chinaman that was made by the train butcher and an assistant on a Northern Pacific west-bound train, Sunday. The Chinaman had bought a ticket to North Yakima, and hearing the man call out 'Yakima City,' he thought he had arrived at his destination and moved his effects to the vestibule. Notwithstanding that the train was moving at a speed of about thirty miles an hour, the train boy and the other brute threw the Chinaman off. The victim was knocked senseless, and one of his legs was badly hurt. Conveyance was secured and the injured man was brought to this city to receive treatment and care from his countrymen.
This incident reflects the pervasive anti-Chinese violence that defined the 1880s and 90s in Washington, a period of exclusionary hostility that persists in the regional historical memory as a dark chapter of labor and social tension. It is a reminder of the vulnerability of non-white residents against systemic brutality during the expansion of the Northern Pacific line.
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