The End of the Unlocked Door
A White Bluffs resident laments a recent string of thefts, signaling a loss of the community's long-held trust.
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.
During my absence on one of my trips to Othello recently with produce, someone entered my cellar and removed about 30 quarts of canned cherries and about four boxes of Bartlett pears, the latter being sorted and the best taken. Some of my neighbors also report that they had things mysteriously disappear during the last few months. Those of us who have been here for years and have never been in the habit of locking our doors, even when absent several days, regret that this condition no longer prevails and in the future will be compelled to take such measures to protect our property as the law provides.
“Those of us who have been here for years and have never been in the habit of locking our doors, even when absent several days, regret that this condition no longer prevails.”
This reflects the transition from a tight-knit, agrarian settlement where social cohesion functioned as security, to a more anonymous modern society. It marks a moment where a community stops relying on neighbors and starts relying on locks, a common inflection point in the settlement history of the Columbia Basin.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.