Seattle Admits It Let Portland Steal Walla Walla's Trade
A visiting Sound trade man says Seattle was too busy with Alaska to notice the Inland Empire — and that Portland salesmen took the cream of it.
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.
"Sound wholesalers no doubt have been remiss in not cultivating to a greater degree business relations with the eastern part of the state, especially the Walla Walla country, but it was not because they did not think the trade worth going after but because they had about all the home business they could attend to." This is the way Charles A. Taylor, of Seattle, representative of the Trade Register, who is in Walla Walla, summed up the situation this morning.
"To begin with, there is no denying the fact that Sound wholesalers have been wofully ignorant of the grand country that lies east of the mountains, but thanks to the enterprise of a few moving spirits instrumental in planning and executing the recent excursion this has been swept aside and a truer understanding of conditions obtained.
"Seattle especially, in attending to her own wants and the Alaska trade, has about had her hands full and the idea of seeking new fields, especially in the eastern part of the state, has in a great measure been overlooked. It is true that many Seattle and Tacoma wholesale houses have their representatives visit Walla Walla once or twice a month, but the more progressive wholesale houses of Portland have seen fit to locate their salesmen here and have been able to control the cream of the trade. What Sound wholesalers will now have to do is to meet the Portland jobbers on their own ground and fight it out. They have seen what a vast amount of trade is diverted to the Oregon city in this manner and I predict that the Sound people will adopt the same measures to obtain a share of the trade that should go to Washington cities.
"There is no use denying the fact that in a great measure the Inland Empire trade is wedded to Portland, but why it should be so is more than I can understand unless it is a question of transportation facilities.
"Walla Walla and the Sound should be in perfect harmony, not alone in a commercial way but in a fraternal way. What benefits one part of the state benefits another."
Mr. Taylor said he felt much gratified that another excursion was being contemplated. He said the Sound people should make it a point to spend at least two weeks in the eastern part of the state studying conditions and getting acquainted with the trade. And on the other hand the people of the eastern part of the state should not be backward about getting up a similar excursion and invading the Sound country. "I think it would do us all good," he declared.
“Walla Walla and the Sound should be in perfect harmony, not alone in a commercial way but in a fraternal way. What benefits one part of the state benefits another.”
The fight over whether eastern Washington trades with Portland or Seattle is more than a century old and still running — in freight rates, port politics and where Inland Empire wheat and wine find their buyers. Taylor's plea that "what benefits one part of the state benefits another" is the same booster language heard today whenever the Cascades are described as a cultural and economic divide. In 1903 the decisive advantage was simply that Portland jobbers had salesmen living here and Seattle's did not.
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