Jim Kershner’s this day in history

From our archives, 100 years ago

Spokane’s city government was settling into its new City Hall at Wall Street and Trent Avenue (now Spokane Falls Boulevard). 

The six-story building not only included all of the city offices but the “humanitarian institutions” of the city: the emergency hospital and the dental clinic. A feature story about the new City Hall noted that it was “not an expensive building, but it looks substantial and businesslike.”

The story also noted, sardonically, that it had more space than needed, but “this oversight will doubtless soon be corrected.”

From the cartoon file: A large cartoon on the front page of the sports section serves as a stark reminder of the anti-immigrant sentiment in Spokane and the Western states in 1913.  The cartoon shows six boys, around age 10 or 11, making faces and yelling, “Rats! Rats” and “Chink, Chink Chiny-man” outside of a Chinese laundry. The angry proprietor is glaring at them. The subhead says, “Baiting the Chinaman.” 

Why was this on the sports page? The title over the cartoon reads, appallingly, “The Days of Real Sport.”

Also on this date

(From the Associated Press)

1973: The espionage trial of Daniel Ellsberg and Anthony Russo in the “Pentagon Papers” case came to an end as Judge William M. Byrne dismissed all charges, citing government misconduct.