Police Clamp Down on Seattle’s Demimonde
City officials arrest several women managing houses of ill repute, marking a routine effort to enforce liquor licensing laws.
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.
Jessie Norton, Emma Norton, Lou Graham, Nina Hyman, Nellie Diaz, Alfoise Seller, Viola Davis and Belle Byrum, all members of the demimonde and proprietors of houses of ill repute, were arrested yesterday on information of Chief of Police Jackson, charging them with selling liquor without a license. Three of the number, Graham, Hyman and Davis, pleaded guilty yesterday before Judge Rivers and were fined $50. Annie Wilson, a fourth, previously arrested, also paid a fine yesterday. The others will be disposed of today.
“Proprietors of houses of ill repute, were arrested yesterday.”
This arrest is a stark artifact of the moral policing that defined the era's view of sex work and nightlife. By framing these women as targets for liquor license enforcement, the city signaled the standard bureaucratic tactics used to control—or at least profit from—the districts deemed 'vice-ridden' in the late 19th century.
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