The Great Seattle Opium Bust of 1885
Customs officers seize a boat and $1,200 in illegal opium near Duwamish Head, leaving the smugglers to flee into the night.
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.
Customs officers made a seizure of about $1,500 worth of opium near a wharf yesterday, according to the page. A sailboat containing the opium was taken along with the contraband.
The report identifies two customs officers as involved and says the officers and the boat’s captain went ashore, leaving bags behind.
“The officers and the captain of the boat are ashore, having left their baggage behind.”
Customs enforcement along the Duwamish waterway and Elliott Bay remains a constant of Seattle's geography. While the commodity has changed from 19th-century opium to modern-day contraband, the challenge of policing Seattle's sprawling, fog-shrouded maritime borders persists.
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