A Candidate's Disreputable Journey
A political traveler's penchant for whiskey and poker leaves his campaign coffers dry.
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.
That L. Jay S. Turney's morals and habits are not of the best, a fair illustration was afforded on the occasion of his trip down the Sound last week. It seems that he left Olympia in company with a Methodist preacher named Franklin, in a small open boat, and soon after starting, took from his valise a bottle of whiskey, from which he extracted frequent draughts of comfort on the journey. This surprised and disgusted Franklin, who is an earnest advocate of temperance. At Port Townsend, we learn, Turney got drunk, engaged in a game of poker, lost $200 given him by Cole's friends to defray his election expenses, and finally had to beg for enough money to get away with.
“This surprised and disgusted Franklin, who is an earnest advocate of temperance.”
Political character attacks in the 1860s were as vitriolic and personal as modern campaigns, often leveraging allegations of vice to discredit candidates. The mention of 'election expenses' also highlights the early role of private funds in frontier politics.
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