The Tragic Decline of Ben Bainbridge
A local man's descent from a $150,000 fortune to life as an indigent vagrant serves as a cautionary tale of vice and misfortune.
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.
Ben Bainbridge, recently arrested as a vagrant in Tacoma, was once a man of wealth, arriving on the North Pacific coast ten years ago with a fortune of $150,000. Within five years, that money was spent on 'wine and women.' Two years ago, while in Everett, Bainbridge lost his leg while heroically stopping a runaway team of horses, an act that saved the wagon's female occupant. Despite this past bravery and his education, Bainbridge has struggled to maintain employment and has drifted from town to town, finding himself repeatedly run out by police departments.
“The story of the past ten years in the life of Ben Bainbridge... is another illustration of the fact that truth is stranger than fiction.”
Bainbridge's story highlights the historical intersection of homelessness, addiction, and the criminalization of poverty—a recurring theme in the history of the American West that continues to challenge modern city policy.
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