Although it’s often described as the oldest profession in the world, firsthand accounts from sex workers in Mendocino are few and far between. Women often remained unidentified unless they were arrested and noted in the newspaper or mentioned in oral histories, which are vague.
Mendocino’s logging boom brought many single men to the remote coast. For entertainment, many visited the local saloons and brothels. In Mendocino, brothels were often located above saloons in the same building. Fashionable Boarding Houses, another name for brothels, were often located in private homes. Lumber companies were sometimes known to hire women to work in lumber towns to “keep their workers happy.”
One local brothel was Miss Molly Murray’s Fashionable Boarding House, located on the corner of Ukiah and Kasten streets. In 1875, Catherine Coyle bought the home for $175. She operated a saloon in the front of the building. While it’s unknown how long Catherine was in business in Mendocino, her establishment is known today because it was the location of a double murder in 1876.Pearl Peck also ran a brothel on Ukiah Street, labeled as “Fem. Board’g” on the 1898 Sanborn Map. On April 15, 1915, the Ukiah Democrat reported that Pearl was arrested for “running a house of ill fame” and was set to appear in court two days later. She likely paid a fine, but there isn’t a record of it.
The 1930 census recorded Pearl as a single woman, still living on Ukiah Street with a boarder named Myrtle McDonald. Neither woman listed an occupation. Pearl was arrested several times for selling liquor after Mendocino’s prohibition law took effect in 1909. Once, Pearl was cited selling liquor with another rumored madame, Nan Wyrick, who owned a building occupied “by women of the demi monde” on Ukiah Street.
In Mendocino County Remembered: An Oral History, Alfred Wicks relayed his memory of a local sex worker. “There was one house of prostitution toward the cemetery where there were just two women there. I used to go to school … she used to always walk to town and the other kids used to call her ‘Big Fat Rose.’ She didn’t like that and she says I was the best kid around. She always gave me a dime or a quarter if I seen her.” These are only a few of the many histories that may never be uncovered.
Averee McNear is curator at the Kelley House Museum in Mendocino, Calif.