The Tragedy on the Jackson Street Trestle
An elderly man, fleeing police custody, fell through a gap in the wooden street bridge and plunged thirty feet to his death.
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.
At about 4 o'clock yesterday afternoon, an elderly man named P. S. McInnis fell from the unplanked Jackson street bridge and received injuries from which he died in less than half an hour. He had been drinking at a South Third street saloon, and became quarrelsome with another man. Officer Philbrick was called to make an arrest. The other man submitted quietly, but McInnis ran away from the officer and staggered down toward the waterfront. After lodging the other man in jail, Officer Philbrick returned, followed McInnis, and retrieved him on the Jackson street bridge. McInnis remained in custody, but the old man, in his desperate attempt to escape from the officer, turned and fell through a place where there was no planking to the muddy ground below, of about thirty feet. Philbrick was at the old man's side a moment later, but he was unconscious. He was soon on the path and to his head, which showed that he had struck head-first on a pile of saw wood. He was carried out to a nearby street and Dr. Von Wedelstaedt was summoned. It was not until his arrival that he opened his eyes, and the doctor gave it as his opinion that he could not live more than an hour. McInnis was lifted into a wagon and taken to the police station. The old man was about sixty years of age and had lived in Seattle for several years, working most of the time as a common laborer. He was addicted to drink, and lived a very dissipated life. He leaves a wife and four children, somewhere in Atlanta. As he had no friends here, his body will probably be buried in the potter's field at county expense.
“In his desperate attempt to escape from the officer, [he] turned and fell through a place where there was no planking to the muddy ground below.”
This story from the 1890s serves as a grim reminder of Seattle's early infrastructure, which was notoriously dangerous and unfinished as the city grew rapidly. Today, the geography of Jackson Street remains a major thoroughfare, but the 'gaps in the planking' have been replaced by the complex challenges of urban safety and the persistent issue of social support for vulnerable, transient populations.
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