The Art of Professional Loafing
A satirical exchange in the Olympia Democratic about the 'Loafer Club' and the perils of career advice in the frontier.
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.
In a mock-interrogatory correspondence, the newspaper offers tongue-in-cheek advice to a prospective immigrant. The author, identifying as a former merchant and lawyer, describes the local social structure in Olympia: 'There are those here who are broken merchants, ex-editors, lawyers, also runaways of all descriptions, who are too proud and lazy to work, and ashamed to beg, who are compelled to loaf, lie and steal in order to keep soul and body together.' He notes he is authorized by the 'Loafer Club' in town to welcome newcomers, albeit with the intention to relieve them of their money within twenty-four hours and initiate them into the 'art of living without money and labor.'
“I am authorized and instructed by the Loafer Club in this place, to say that, should you conclude to come here, we will welcome you with open arms, and try to fleece you out of every picayune you have in the world in less than twenty-four hours.”
This 19th-century satire on the 'Loafer Club' and the cynical advice given to newcomers captures the classic frontier tension between boosterism—selling the dream of a new town—and the harsh reality of pioneer survival. Today, Olympia still grapples with the same underlying question of who the city is built for, though the modern discourse centers on housing affordability and homelessness rather than 'loafing.'
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