Firebug Terrorizes North Walla Walla
A series of mysterious barn fires and a woodshed blaze keep police on high alert.
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.
The Walla Walla police have another cunning 'firebug' operating in the north part of the city to deal with. Two barns in Jefferson Street, burned Wednesday night, are now known to have been intentionally set, and at 2:15 this morning a deliberate attempt was made to burn the woodshed at the Enos Palmer place. A dazzling light shining through a window awoke Mr. Palmer's mother, and she aroused the family. The woodshed, located 30 feet away from the house, was found to be blazing briskly. Members of the family, headed by Mr. Palmer, formed a bucket brigade and the fire was soon put out before any serious damage had been done. A few minutes delay would have resulted in considerable damage as valuable household furniture was nearby. Since the arrest of Andy Lee, the Chinese cook, on a charge of arson, the city has been remarkably free from a number of petty fires of unsuspected incendiary origin, but now it seems the police have another person with 'fire on the brain' to cope with.
“The police have another person with fire on the brain to cope with.”
The fear of arson in residential neighborhoods remains a visceral urban anxiety. This 1903 account captures how quickly a community turned to suspicion of outsiders, specifically targeting a named immigrant, to explain local trauma.
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