Excerpts on regular social events are also in this file.

Go back to Player Contributions.

These are excerpts from The West That Was, Edited by Thomas Knowles and Joe Lansdale and published by Wings Books. The article was written by Lenore Carroll.

"Prostitues were so numerous on the frontiers that they may well have made up 25% of the female population of California by 1850. They usually outnumbered respectable women in mining towns 25 to 1. As the western population grew, most towns got big enough to support regular brothels staffed by 4-5 women."
    "Painted ladies tended to be between 14 and 30 with an average age of 23."
    "There were all levels of the profession. Expensive and intelligent courtesans often married well or retired with enough money for a comfortable and respectful lifestyle. Others used their profits to open their own 'sporting houses'."
    "At the turn of the century the Everleigh sisters in Chicago could demand from their clients $50 and a formal recommendation. On the frontier, prices ranged from 5 dollars at posh establishments to a dollar or less for run of the mill service."
    "A soiled dove might split 50/50 with the madam of her parlor house, or she might pay a flat fee per night or week. Other expenses included fines levied by the local law enforcement, often used by frontier towns to raise money for civic development. Public officials not only tolerated trade but often profited from it, and fines fell heaviest on freelancers."
    "Prostitutes were often generous with one another, chipping in to support a sick colleague or to make the monthly payment to the 'baby farm' that cared for a friend's child."

Excerpts from The American Frontier, 1800-1899, William C Davis, SmithMark Books.

"Initially, it was peoples of English-speaking background who came west: Englishmen, Scots, few Welsh, along with a few Swiss and Huguenots, some Germans in Missouri and Texas, and a smattering of other peoples. But rapidly as the west opened up, more and more immigrants from across the Atlantic arrived to stake their claim. More than 15% of Californians by 1870 were Irish and German."
    "Iowa, Missouri and the northern tier of Dakotas to Montana hummed more to the musical speech of Swedes, the Norwegians and the Danes."
    "In 1870, the Chinese population in California reached more than 70,000."
    "The most expensive part of a sod house would be its windows, and could cost $1.25... the price of 1 acre of land."
    "As soon as churches formed, often meeting initially in some pioneer's soddy, dozens of settlers in the locality became attendees, regardless of their denominations in former days."
    "Even more savored the days set aside for pure frolic. The 4th of July, the 'harvest home' party that signalled the end of the harvest season, the passing through of travelling medical shows, dramatic troupes, even lecture and debating societies, all produced an inevitable picnic and an afternoon of respite from grueling work and sleep."
    "Frontier people needed these entertainments to keep them sane in the face of cyclones, tornadoes, drought, crop blights, livestock epidemics, the almost inevitable loss of a child to diphtheria or undiagnosed fevers, the dust storms, prairie fires in the summer, and blizzards in the winter... Death and tragedy were constant companions. Indeed, even funerals rated highly among social gatherings, so precious was the need to be with others for a few brief moments of solitude."
    "Livingston, Montana had 3,000 people in 1883 and 33 saloons."