The Kentucky Saloon's Bitter Lesson
A local saloon keeper faces legal consequences after a 12-year-old boy is found in a state of delirium from consuming whiskey and beer.
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.
Upon the testimony of two police officers and of the youngster himself, who positively identified the proprietor in court, Justice Cann fined J. K. Nelson, proprietor of the Kentucky saloon, $50 and costs for selling liquor to Paul Wernstein, a 12-year-old boy. When found by Sergeant Leighton, the lad was in such a state of delirium that it was feared for a time that he would die. He confessed to Leighton that he had drunk a half pint of whiskey and more than one-half of a big batter jar of beer. Young Wernstein took the witness stand yesterday afternoon and identified the proprietor of the saloon as the man who sold him the liquor, and under the severest cross-examination maintained his account. Sergeants Leighton and Stewart gave damaging testimony against Nelson, the latter testifying that on one occasion he had taken a 16-year-old girl out of the Kentucky saloon over Nelson's protests. Nelson entered a nominal plea of not guilty to the charge, his attorney explaining that he could not afford to permit his client to plead guilty for fear the council would take the confession as sufficient ground on which to base a revocation of the proprietor's license.
“When found by Sergt. Leighton the lad was in such a state of delirium that it was feared for a time that he would die.”
This incident highlights early 20th-century efforts to regulate the vice trade in Walla Walla, occurring long before the Prohibition era. Today, the tension between local businesses and municipal ordinances regarding the protection of minors remains a central theme in civic governance.
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