A Man Vanishes at Mica, and His Enemies Blame the Man
Charles Gostein of Mica, Spokane County, has been missing long enough that a Cheney paper is now fighting over his reputation: populists and the F. H. P. F. say friends spirited him away, while neighbors who knew him from boyhood believe he was murdered.
The disappearance of Charles Gostein, of Mica, Spokane county, remains as much a mystery as ever. Populists and members of the F. H. P. F. have attempted to blacken the man's character and to show that he was spirited away by friends, but the attempt has failed. Gostein's character was absolutely beyond reproach, as has been testified by responsible persons who knew him from boyhood up to the time he disappeared. From all the evidence obtainable, many are of the opinion that he has been murdered, and we sincerely trust that the whole affair may speedily be brought to light.
“From all the evidence obtainable, many are of the opinion that he has been murdered, and we sincerely trust that the whole affair may speedily be brought to light.”
A vanished man in a railroad hamlet, a hostile faction that prefers to smear him rather than search for him, and a newspaper that ends on a hope rather than an answer. Washington's rural counties still live with unsolved disappearances, and the instinct to discredit the missing person's politics before asking where they went is depressingly familiar.
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