The maids hustled the clients into and out of the rooms, calling out “man on the floor” when they walked someone from the parlor to the rooms or from the rooms to the door. This procedure prevented the men from running into someone they hadn’t come up with. Housekeepers constantly kept tabs on the safety of the girls, and they monitored the patrons closely to prevent harassment or abuse. Greer explained:
At the Oasis they had peek holes in the doors. You tell people that [and they say], “Oh I’ll bet you had fun.” Well, it was if you heard something, a noise like somebody’s trying to rough somebody up. Then you could go peek in the door and see if they were okay. Every place should have had it like that. And in the parlors… you know when you open the door downstairs a bell rings upstairs. And there’s a window where you can see down, but they can’t see you. And you always looked for somebody who had a sack, checked that out to make sure there wasn’t any gun or whatever.186
The maids needed to have tough personalities to deal with the customers, who could be disrespectful if they had been drinking too much. Greer told me she caught one young drunk guy pissing on the floor of the parlor room when the door was closed. She kept her cool and grabbed a wash bucket and soap, opened up the parlor door and handed the bucket to the kid, saying, “Now here, scrub that carpet.” The guy pretended to be confused and then denied that he’d peed on the floor, to which Greer responded, “I stood here and watched you through the peek hole, dummy. Now—on your knees!”187
Both Greer and Gnaedinger had stories about men who tried to talk them into sleeping with them while they were maids. Gnaedinger said when she was pregnant she was uncommonly desirable to some of the clients, especially one who liked “really fat women” and another who wanted her to take him back to her place and tie him up. Greer admitted that the men were persistent sometimes, and she told a story about one guy who had come up with four of his friends:
This guy says, “And I’ll have you.”
I said, “Oh, mercy, honey, if you’d seen my husband you wouldn’t want me.”
And he says, “I don’t care. I want you.”
I said, “Oh come on, you can shop [meaning, find another girl you’d like to be with].”
So they all come in, and he says, “No, I don’t want anybody. You can bring everybody in the whole town,” he said. And pretty soon the other four took somebody and the madam comes out and we’re playing music and I’m fixing him a drink. And he says, “I want you.”
I says, “You can’t have me.”
And he got clear up to $500 for a quickie, and Billie’s going, “Diane, Diane [take the money and do it].” Oh no, oh no, oh no. No. My husband is probably standing right around the corner. Nope, and I just went, oh my God. Nope. I knew better.188
The policies were similar in each of the houses. The men would be ushered into the parlor to wait for the available girls to come in and engage them. This process was informal and often referred to as “window shopping.” The houses kept liquor on hand for the men in the waiting rooms, and this was often as far as it went—many of the guys just went up to hang out around pretty women and continue drinking after the bars closed down.
If the men and women were mutually agreeable to having a sexual encounter, they would negotiate rates and services. A “straight lay” or “straight date” was conventional intercourse and usually did not last longer than ten minutes, although it was possible to pay more for a variety of positions or longer time on the clock. An old list of services at the Oasis Bordello Museum lists oral sex as “straight French.” What was known as “half-and-half ” was very popular. That was oral sex plus a straight lay, and it would commonly last about double the time. Gary Morrison, who grew up in Wallace during the 1950s and ’60s, explained that he “was always stunned” about the amount of time typically set on the clocks: “I was like, whoa, what are you going to do in there? Did he pay like fifty cents for a kiss? The timeframes were so short!”189 Some men proudly spent all of their money in the houses, staying there for a night or all weekend. One prominent man in town was known to rent the Lux for a week or two at a time, and Dolores would close down for him, sometimes taking the girls to a lake house for him.
The emphasis on cleanliness was solidified, even fetishized, in practice as the years went on. When any of the women acquired a sexually transmitted infection—and that doesn’t appear to have happened very often—she was temporarily suspended from working and treated. The Shoshone County Sheriff ’s Office files verify this. Morrison described the cleanliness procedure much like everyone who spoke with me about the post–World War II economic boom era. After the parties negotiated rates, the guy paid his cash and was then asked to drop his pants and submit to “a pretty rigorous examination, trying to find any sign of rash, or, as they called it back then, a drip.”190 Gnaedinger, speaking about the 1970s and ’80s, explained that the washing helped maintain the image of cleanliness and also had a pragmatic purpose: “They cleaned the guys before they performed, and they’d clean them afterward. It was part of the ritual to get washed. And part of that washing was they were checking if they had any discharge, sores,” she explained, adding that they didn’t wear condoms until AIDS became a concern. The washing also made the experience more pleasant for both parties.191
Oasis price list, 1988. Oasis Bordello Museum display; photo by Heather Branstetter.
“Peter Pan” washing basin used in many of the houses. Oasis Bordello Museum display; photo by Heather Branstetter.
Tim Johnson, who manages the hotel now located in the rooms that had been the Lux from 1977 to 1986, told me Dolores had a room dedicated to the washing process. She taught her employees they could speed things along there to avoid taking the man back into a room if they possibly could.192 “Larry,” who grew up in Coeur d’Alene, related the following story about a high school experience: “The whole defensive line of our football team came over and went up to the U&I once. One guy didn’t know how it worked, paid thirty-five dollars to go up, and the gal put the warm washcloth on him and that was it.”193 The bubble bath was an incredibly popular service, even though it was also one of the most expensive.194 Terry Douglas, who maintained the “coinoperated amusement devices” in the bars and jukeboxes in the houses, told me a story about his boss giving him money for a bubble bath experience, which he’d been hesitant to try out because of the cost. Douglas closed his story by saying with a smile, “And I’ve never forgot it. And we’re thirty years later.”195
“THERE OUGHT TO BE A STATUE
OF THAT LADY IN THIS CITY”
The most famous and widely admired brothel manager was Dolores Arnold, who was largely responsible for the brothels’ relatively strict operating procedures and shift toward civic contribution. Dolores’s impact on Wallace, like her identity—an invented persona she assumed for forty years—is a mix of fact and fiction that became its own reality. She was born Mary Giacolone and died Maria Greer. But for most of her life, she was known as Dolores, a savvy businesswoman who quickly ascended from working girl to owner and manager of a successful brothel franchise. She led the madams’ successful acquisition of increased economic independence, which eventually enabled the sex industry to exert greater influence on the social, political and economic life of the town. Dolores helped embed the industry within residents’ sense of town identity to such an extent that one of my research participants characterized the brothels as “the United Way of Wallace because they gave back so much to the community,” adding, “there ought to be a statue of that lady in this city.”196 Dolores moved quickly from an outsider position into a central role in the community; she knew small-town small talk could reveal, shape and solidify shared values.
Dolores promoted the idea that the brothels served the best interests of men and women alike. For example, “Dolores often said that she saved more marriages than any clergyman ever did.”197 She knew that stories repeated often enough could create a believable myth, and she harnessed this power to create a
world where the sex industry could be relatively safe and supported by the vast majority of the community, despite its illegal nature. Those who knew her describe her as charming, funny, graceful and elegant. She made everyone feel special. She also had a reputation for professionalism in all of her business dealings, prompting a higher standard of excellence among subordinates, colleagues, clients and community members. Dolores had striking beauty, even well into old age. “People were in awe of her,” Higgins told me. “She could have been a movie star earlier in her career.” Another man said she looked just like the actress Hedy Lamarr.198 People responded to her unguarded, empathic demeanor and confident way she carried herself, all of which she expressed through her eyes. Taller than the average woman, Dolores had long dark hair and a wide smile. She sensed the motivations of others and noticed details overlooked by most people.
Like many women drawn into the sex industry during the 1940s, Dolores suffered a traumatic childhood. Her parents were Italian immigrants who met in New Jersey before moving to Spanaway, Washington, where they bought a farm worth $2,600 in 1930.199 Her mother died when Dolores was six, leaving her husband to raise Dolores and her three siblings, including her younger sister, Janet, and two younger brothers. Before Janet died, she met with local historian Dick Caron to talk about her childhood. During this conversation, Janet said they were left to raise themselves after their mother’s premature death and dealt with “adverse conditions” as a result. They found out later that their mother had relatives they never met. Janet assumed they stayed away because they didn’t want the relatives to feel obligated to take in the kids. “[We] were better off for being alone,” Janet claimed; it “made us tough.”200 It did not, however, make them close. While Janet did not interfere with her sister’s life, she refused to condone it.
Dolores did not finish high school and moved to Wallace in 1943 at the age of twenty-three after working for the navy in the shipyards at Bremerton, Washington, where she had been a “Rosie the Riveter.”201 Dolores had heard that Wallace was the place to go if she wanted to take advantage of an atmosphere that was friendly to illicit and lucrative sex work.202 Morrison, who befriended Dolores in the 1960s when he delivered groceries to the Lux Rooms as a teen, said she was “like a family member” to him, and he characterized her move as “a business decision.” According to Morrison, Dolores explained it in the following way:
I made up my mind that I could do that. Once I agreed that I could do that and just set that part of me aside, and say, “Okay this is business”… once I’d decided I could accept that, I got in the car and drove to Wallace. Somebody had told me about Wallace, having these—I had to hunt around and ask people—I didn’t know where the houses were.203
Timing contributed to Dolores’s successful career in Wallace. She heard Wallace was a place with business opportunities for enterprising women, and she arrived at an opportune moment for the sex industry, after the introduction of penicillin, which cured most sexually transmitted infections, but before AIDS.204 During this era, the brothels were open twenty-four hours a day, doing “booming business” serving military men.205 The shore patrol from Farragut would walk the streets of Wallace, which was off-limits during the war.206 The men came frequently nevertheless, traveling from the naval base near Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, and Fairchild near Spokane, Washington. They would get a bus pass for Missoula and then instead of going to Montana, they would get off in Wallace so they could visit the houses without leaving a paper trail. Then they would catch the bus as it came through again on its way back from Missoula.207 Sailors were not allowed to wear anything but their issued uniforms, and the madams wouldn’t let them upstairs unless they were in street clothes. But they found a way around this obstacle as well. A dry-cleaning business in the lot next door to the brothels would rent civilian clothes, so the military men could go in the back door with their uniforms on and out the front door in their rented clothes.208 Even when shore patrol was present, sailors were invisible without their uniforms on, according to custom.209 Most of the people in town knew exactly what was going on, but open secrets such as these permitted the sex industry to thrive while maintaining the appearance of propriety.
Dolores in 1943, when she first arrived in town from western Washington. Barnard-Stockbridge Collection, University of Idaho Library Special Collections and Archives.
Such word-of-mouth business practices offered Dolores insight into the importance of community perception in the small town of Wallace. As Higgins put it, “One thing Dolores was sticky on was regulations. Military men couldn’t visit—she would not allow you up there in uniform.” This pairing of a supposed rule with the answer to how you could bend it illustrates how small talk enabled insiders to distinguish strict rules from flexible ones while maintaining appearances in alliance with community values. During her early years in the town, Dolores easily identified the kind of information that circulated in local gossip: stories about people and their relationships, kids, family, sexual activities, work history, appearances, perceptions and social hierarchies all provided useful clues for fashioning herself into an eventual role as madam. The values and commentary accompanying the stories revealed the town’s moral code. As an outsider, she needed to appeal to these norms in order to persuade people to sponsor her entry into the social and economic life of the town, which was historically self-protective and insular.
It’s unclear how long Dolores worked before she was able to buy the Lux Rooms because there are conflicting stories about how she came into the means. These stories reveal what Wallace residents both admire and believe to be true as they locate local values in the figure of Dolores: she was pragmatic and hard working. There are rumors asserting that she received the money from Hank Day, the affluent mining executive with whom she was connected. According to local gossip, “Everybody used to talk about Hank Day visiting Dolores at the whorehouses. And the story was that his wife drove him.”210 But many people around town believed that Day was apparently in love with Dolores, who was herself married to Lonnie Greer, the mayor of Mullan. One woman told me she thought Day and the madam had “a very special relationship.”211 Dolores likely invited the image of connection with Day, recognizing that the patronage of a well-known mine owner would be seen as endorsement. Two research participants told me Dolores saved her money and then rented the Lux Rooms until she could eventually afford to buy it.212 Another man who worked at a bank told me she tried to get a loan but was turned down.213 Others guessed she invested in mine stocks.214 The written record shows that she and Lonnie Greer bought the building from Mary Albertini in 1953 for $7,000.215
Dolores in 1947, as she transitioned into a management position at the Lux. Barnard-Stockbridge Collection, University of Idaho Library Special Collections and Archives.
Dolores quickly became well respected around town as she worked hard to build her business into an operation often referred to as “classy.” She expanded into the Jade Rooms and turned it into the Luxette after her friend Loma retired and moved away. The walls of her personal room at the Lux, where she entertained especially privileged guests, were adorned with eighteen-karat gold-fleck paint imported from Italy for the price of $200 per gallon, and her closet was full of fur coats.216 Dolores began advertising by giving away Playboy-style pin up calendars personalized with her business name, and other houses followed her lead by passing out similarly styled matchbooks. She was said to drive a 1958 baby blue Coupe Deville with a standard poodle named Mike riding in the passenger seat wearing a diamond collar.217 Dolores cultivated an image as community caretaker and promoted prostitution as a profession as legitimate as anyone else’s.218 “In today’s era,” Higgins explains, “she would easily be a top executive in a large corporation. She was that good. She was instrumental in forming a consortium with the other madams” to support the community, developing a reputation for her business savvy and generosity.
The madams and women who worked in the houses emphasized—verbally, physically and
spatially—the positive. Although there’s no doubt that Dolores was generous, she was also very aware of public relations, and she purposefully tried to appeal to the classic “whore with the heart of gold” image.219 Men and women alike continue to echo the ways that the houses were “symbiotic” with the town. Most of the people I’ve interviewed make sure to mention how the madams tipped large amounts for deliveries, bought most of the raffle tickets for various fundraisers and donated money to the local government and schools. Dolores was the biggest contributor, renowned for winning all the raffles and then turning the prizes into donations, passing along her Demolay turkeys to families in need.220 A 1973 New York Times article discussing a temporary closure of the houses makes note of how Dolores donated baskets of food to the families of the ninety-one miners who died in the tragic fire at the Sunshine Mine.221 Dolores knew she wouldn’t be able to control what people said about her, but she wielded what power she did have, romancing the city leaders and civic clubs in the community with her visible good deeds, well-placed words and a consistent image.
“Dolores Arnold and her contributions to the town of Wallace are legend, and most of the legend is true,” one newspaper reporter claimed, adding that a “rumor—that she has solid-gold bathroom fixtures in her apartment at the Lux and Luxette Hotel—needed clarification. Gold plate, Dolores explained, not solid gold.”222 This article, written during the 1980s, also corrects a popular legend about her Cadillac that nevertheless continues to be repeated: “The house madam seemed amused by another story that she orders a new Cadillac in Spokane every year and pays for it in cash. ‘That’s a lie.... My Cadillac is 14 years old.’”223 Dolores’s willingness to offer accurate information enhances her credibility even as it somewhat detracts from the image of luxury she sought to promote. The article reveals Dolores’s ability to connect with mining-town values; in spite of her gold-plated bathroom fixtures and showy car, she comes across as self-deprecating and down-to-earth. “People always think the worst of these places. But we do it right,” Dolores added.224 “Doing it right” probably contained some sexual innuendo, but she was explicitly referring to background checks and doctor’s visits. When the women first arrived to work at the houses, police officers would run background checks and call the brothel managers with the information to ensure they weren’t employing underage girls or anyone who appeared to have connections with organized crime.225 “Doing it right” meant discretion as well. The working girls would never come up to a guy around town and let on that she knew him, several people told me. In short, “they kept their personal life personal and their business life professional.”226
Selling Sex in the Silver Valley Page 8
