Gambling was illegal in Seattle in 1899, but three gambling houses existed in a combine run by gambling kingpin John Considine. The established gamblers paid their fines to the city and county and were prepared to crush anyone who dared enter their territory and open up a gambling house.

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No one opposed the combine until late November of that year, when a Westerner best known for his gun-related activities in Tombstone, Arizona Territory, 18 years earlier made his presence felt in Washington’s largest city. The Seattle Star ran the following item on November 25 about the new gambler in town:

SHERIFF FROM ARIZONA TO OPEN A GAMBLING HOUSE
Considine’s Combine Greatly Disturbed
over the Outlook.
The New Man Refuses to Put Up
Says He Will Run in Spite of Opposition
Won’t Knuckle to Chief of Police
Reed or Anybody Else
Racy Developments.

The “sheriff from Arizona” was Wyatt Earp, who indeed had been a lawman in Arizona Territory, including the post of deputy sheriff of Pima County under Sheriff Charles Shibell. Since then he had been mostly a capitalist—saloon keeper, gambler, horse breeder, boxing referee, etc.—in such places as Colorado, Idaho Territory, San Diego, San Francisco and Alaska Territory. Now, Earp was going to open a new gambling house in Seattle’s tenderloin district. The Seattle Star, in almost purple journalistic jargon, described the new man on the scene: “Wyatt Earp, a man of great reputation among the toughs and criminals, inasmuch as he formerly walked the streets of a rough frontier mining town with big pistols stuck in his belt, spurs on his boots and a devil-may-care expression upon his official face.”

The Seattle Daily Times had a different approach. That newspaper announced in a very small article that Wyatt Earp, who had a reputation in Arizona as a “bad man,” was going to open a gambling house. Both the Times and the Seattle Post Intelligencer mentioned Earp’s boondoggle with the Tom Sharkey–Bob Fitzsimmons fight in 1896 San Francisco, where Wyatt was the referee who awarded the decision to Sharkey on an alleged foul. Fitzsimmons had knocked Sharkey out. Wyatt, among others, was accused of fraud by the Fitzsimmons side. The case had gone to court and although there was no ruling by the judge regarding Wyatt’s role, he had been smeared in the press. The Post Intelligencer described Earp as a “quiet sort of individual, good natured and does not talk much.”

Wyatt Earp took on a partner in his new Seattle venture, Thomas Urquhart. He was a well-known sporting man in Seattle and had supposedly been around the area for several years. Earp and Urquhart opened the Union Club at 111 Second Ave. South, near Yesler Way. Urquhart would continue to run the Union Club after Earp went back to Alaska in the spring or summer of 1900.

Upon learning that Earp intended to open a gambling house, the Considine combine sent a representative to inform Wyatt that he should take his interests outside of Seattle. The gamblers suggested if he really did intend to open in Seattle, he should check with Police Chief C.S. Reed. The assumption on their part was that Reed would not find Earp acceptable. The police chief had taken an extended vacation at this particularly dicey time in Seattle’s history, and Wyatt had no intention of waiting for his return. Earp, according to the Seattle Star of November 11, 1899, told them, “You fellows are paying enough, why should I add any money?” Furthermore, Earp boldly stated, “If Reed closes me up, he will have to close you all up too. See.” The newspaper recognized the threat to the gambling fraternity, stating, “Of course Earp expects a war to the knife to be waged up on [sic] him by the combine, but as his fighting powers are said to be so good and his wind excellent, the chances are that he will put up a pretty strong defense, and may come out the winner.”

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