Theft Allegations and Anti-Asian Tropes
A railroad worker is accused of absconding with company funds in a case reflecting the xenophobic framing of the era.
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.
Billey Lene Leuke, a Chinaman, who has been acting as agent for Tong Ye Chong & Co., a China firm of this city in the railroad work they have been doing, got away with $1200 belonging to his employers on Saturday. It seems that the Columbia Puget Sound Railroad Company were indebted to the above-mentioned firm in the sum of $1200, and on Saturday Billey Lene Leuke called on Mr. Romer and demanded the money. This Chinaman had been in the habit of drawing money for the firm, and Mr. Romer saw nothing unusual in the matter, and paid him the money. Yesterday Leue King, a member of the firm, called at the railroad office for the money, and was informed that Billey Lene Leuke collected it and signed the firm name, Tong Ye Chong, to the receipt. The police were at once notified of the affair, and they are now searching for the thief, who has skipped out with the $1200.
This report displays the routine, casual racism of 19th-century Seattle newspapers, which frequently used crime reports to bolster anti-Chinese sentiment. While the financial theft described is a factual event, the narrative framing serves as a stark historical artifact of how immigrant communities were pathologized by the local press.
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