The Last Beaver Near Town
A hunter traps a 50-pound beaver just south of town, signaling the disappearance of local wildlife.
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.
For some time Mr. Wooten has noticed beaver signs something like half a mile south of town. Last Thursday he set a trap for the animal, and the next morning found it securely caught. After killing it, he weighed it and found it tipped the beam at fifty pounds, and measured three feet in length. This is the first beaver that has been caught near town for some time, and it was almost a pity to kill the last of his kin.
“It was almost a pity to kill the last of his kin.”
The rapid loss of natural habitat in the 1890s as the Seattle region expanded is captured here in a small, melancholy note. While beavers have made a comeback in many Pacific Northwest watersheds today, this story highlights the 'vanishing frontier' sentiment common in early settler society.
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