Saloon Girls

The saloon paintings of the Wild West were hardly what we would call nudes today. By the standards of the time and place, the were certainly on the edge, but far more revealing pictures commonly appear in high school and middle school text books, and have for years. The paintings usually featured women reclining, with some sort of veil covering her hips.

Those who remember the TV series Gunsmoke (one of the few TV westerns to show a small town in the Old West in some degree of accuracy) have seen what most saloons were like in towns of the Old West. Most of those towns had (and some still have) a church on the main street, and most of the ones that don't have a street named "Church Street." The early saloons, the ones that preceded the establishment of a town, were ramshackle buildings unlikely to have any decoration, but the later ones were often the most expensive buildings in the town (until it was large enough to have a bank).

There were two types of “bad girls” in the West. The “worst” types, according to the “proper” women, were the many painted ladies who made their living by offering paid sex in the numerous brothels, parlor houses, and cribs of the western towns. The second type of “bad girl” were the saloon and dance hall women, who contrary to some popular thinking, were generally not prostitutes -- this tended to occur only in the very shabbiest class of saloons. Though the “respectable” ladies considered the saloon girls “fallen”, most of the girls wouldn’t be caught dead associating with an actual prostitute.

Saloon and Dance Hall Girls

A saloon or dancehall girl’s job was to brighten the evenings of the many lonely men of the western towns. In the Old West, men usually outnumbered women by at least three to one – sometimes more, as was the case in California in1850, where 90% of the population was male.

Starved for female companionship, the saloon girl would sing for the men, dance with them, and talk to them – inducing them to remain in the bar, buying drinks and patronizing the games.

Not all saloons employed saloon girls, such as in Dodge City’s north side of Front Street, which was the “respectable” side, where both Saloon girls and gambling were barred, and featured music and billiards as the chief amusements to accompany drinking.

Most saloon girls were refugees from farms or mills, lured by posters and handbills advertising high wages, easy work, and fine clothing. Many were widows or needy women of good morals, forced to earn a living in an era that offered few means for women to do so.

Earning as much as $10 per week, most saloon girls also made a commission from the drinks that they sold. Whiskey sold to the customer was generally marked up 30-60% over its wholesale price. Commonly drinks bought for the girls would only be cold tea or colored sugar water served in a shot glass; however, the customers were charged the full price of whiskey, which could range from ten to seventy-five cents a shot.

Saloon girls wore brightly colored ruffled skirts that were scandalously short for the time – mid-shin or knee-length. Under the bell-shaped skirts, could be seen colorfully hued petticoats that barely reached their kid boots that were often adorned with tassels. More often than not, their arms and shoulders were bare, their bodices cut low over their bosoms, and their dresses decorated with sequins and fringe. Silk, lace, or net stockings were held up by garters, which were often gifts from their admirers.

The term “painted ladies” was coined because the “girls” had the audacity to wear make-up and dye their hair. Many were armed with pistols or jeweled daggers concealed in their boot tops or tucked between her breasts to keep the boisterous cowboys in line.

Most saloon girls were considered "good" women by the men they danced and talked with; often receiving lavish gifts from admirers. In most places the proprieties of treating the saloon girls as “ladies” were strictly observed, as much because Western men tended to revere all women, as because the women or the saloon keeper demanded it. Any man who mistreated these women would quickly become a social outcast, and if he insulted one he would very likely be killed. -

Most certainly, there were the "wild" saloons in the Old West, but most of those died out with the formation of a town. The earlier saloons were unlikely to be in a location where women lived, let alone walked by, so a door would be unnecessary to prevent them or anyone else from seeing in. The people who founded a town were certainly aware that, in order the town to be successful and businesses thrive, families must attracted, and families meant a certain degree of law and order must be maintained.