A Man Held in Quarantine
Pierce County officials scramble to find a solution for a Korean man suffering from leprosy.
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 county commissioners have a problem on their hands in the case of one Chun, a Korean, who is at Puyallup and who has been discovered to be afflicted with a case of leprosy in its first stages. An effort was made to ship him back home, but the boat would not take him. A special guard has been detailed to keep him in quarantine. Arrangements will be made to ship him home as soon as possible.
“The county commissioners have a problem on their hands in the case of one Chun, a Korean.”
This brief, dehumanizing report highlights the xenophobic and exclusionary atmosphere of early 20th-century Washington, where public health concerns were frequently weaponized against Asian immigrants. Today, the treatment of such cases would fall under modern healthcare and civil rights frameworks rather than the immediate deportation and forced isolation practiced here.
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