The Missouri-Washington Migration
An editorial reflection on why newcomers should give the Palouse time before retreating to the East.
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.
Of the hundreds of people who are coming to this state and this county, there will in the very nature of things be a few who will not be altogether satisfied for different reasons. They will not stay, some perhaps not long enough to find out anything about the country other than just as it looks to them from the railroad, which everyone who lives here knows is no criterion. The fact is, an easterner cannot judge of this country by simply looking at it or even by staying all night in a railroad depot. In my residence of seventeen years, I have had the opportunity of forming some idea of what this country is, and how it will compare with other countries. Right here I want to say for the benefit of those migrants lately from Missouri that the only country I know more about than Missouri, for I happened to be born and reared in that state, is Washington. I think likely that after Washington, Missouri is the best state in the union for the man of moderate means, but Washington leads every time. One proof of what I say is this: there is not more than one in fifty who ever lived in this country two years that was ever satisfied to live in the east afterward.
“The best description that was ever written of this country cannot give an adequate idea of the country to a man who never saw it.”
Early Ritzville was a hub for Midwestern migrants, particularly from Missouri, seeking to reinvent themselves on the high plains of Washington. This editorial captures the perpetual tension of a 'boom' town: the initial culture shock of the arid climate versus the deep, slow-grown loyalty of those who chose to stay.
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