Mercy and Madness

Spokane, Washingtons, first woman physician, Mary Latham moved to the community with her three sonsleaving her husband behind in Ohioin 1887. She sought a better climate for her health and worked tirelessly for the health of all of Spokanes citizens, but particularly women and children and especially the poor. She helped found the Spokane Humane Society and the Spokane Public Library, and she was beloved and respected in the community. Then, in 1903, one of her sons died and she seemingly became unhinged. She would be seen wandering the streets, wailing and wringing her hands, and her behavior became extremely erratic. In 1905, she set fire to a building and would be arrested and convicted of arson, then sentenced to four years of hard labor in the state penitentiary. She escaped into the forests of Idaho, where she hid from a massive manhunt for a week before being captured and sent to prison in Walla Walla. She eventually returned to Spokane a broken woman and died in 1917. Yet today she is honored in Spokane for the good she did in the first part of her life.