The Tragic End of Oscar Larson
A logger’s desperate attempt to reconnect with his family ends in tragedy after his savings are stolen.
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.
Since the attempted suicide and subsequent death of Oscar Larson, a logger, who passed away Monday afternoon at the county hospital after being brought fatally injured from Kapowsin, it has developed that the man's demented state of mind was not caused wholly by the loss of his small fortune, stolen from him by a woman in a Tacoma resort. Larson tried to kill himself because of unrequited love which he bore his divorced wife and 14-year-old daughter. His former wife, who is now Mrs. W. R. Morris, could not live with Larson in destitution. Therefore the husband secured a divorce and came west in search of gold. When he had saved $650 he sent for his former wife, and it was arranged that she should meet him in Tacoma. Before they met, however, Larson lost his money. Finding him destitute, the woman would have nothing to do with him. He killed himself to end his misery.
“He killed himself to end his misery.”
This story highlights the brutal realities of the laboring class in the Pacific Northwest at the turn of the century, where poverty and the 'gold rush' mentality often collided with tragic personal consequences.
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