The Newspaper Imposter of Mount Vernon
A traveling con artist posed as a Post-Intelligencer agent to swindle residents in British Columbia and Skagit County.
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.
Cyrus Cushman, alias John Sinks, who is in jail here upon a charge of obtaining money under false pretenses by representing himself as the authorized agent of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, is the same man who operated extensively in British Columbia during August, representing himself as one George J. Alexander, a salaried employee of the Post-Intelligencer and authorized to solicit subscriptions and write-ups at cut rates. H. Windebank, of Mission City, proprietor of the Mat-qui hotel, arrived in Mount Vernon Sunday and identified the prisoner, Cushman, alias Smith, as the same person who collected money at Mission City and burglarized the hotel's bar-room, assaulting a Chinese porter before carrying away thirteen bottles of whisky, five bottles of gin, and a quantity of beer. The people at Mission City are very bitter against the swindler, and if he is brought across the line he will be vigorously prosecuted upon several charges.
“Representing himself as one George J. Alexander, a salaried employee of the Post-Intelligencer and authorized to solicit subscriptions and write-ups at cut rates.”
Identity theft and media-adjacent fraud were common scams in the late 19th-century frontier, where local newspapers were the primary source of civic trust. This case underscores how quickly an 'official' badge could be weaponized against immigrant populations, like the Chinese porter targeted in this crime.
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