Dig offers peep at long-gone brothels

What a find today, The Boston Globe had an article in the Metro Section about items found during a 1993 archeological survey linked to the Big Dig and the vanished row houses on Endicote Street, show the trappings of a busy brothel aimed at the middle class customer.

It is so sad that Bostonians don’t want to add this collection to the History Museum. It is apart of Boston’s history though historians don’t want you to know. Three-thousand items were found and have not been publicized outside the academic and archeological circles. It would give us a window of what it was like in that trade. It seems Religion, Politics, and Prostitution seem to be our foundation roots, in that order, seems like a curse that keeps on giving.

In the biz they call this “cock-blocking”.

Mary Beaudry, Boston University professor, stood in front of the site of what was once a Boston brothel. Uncovered artifacts include a spittoon, carved bone toothbrushes, and a cosmetics jar.

A spittoon was also found at the site. During the last half of the 19th century, the Endicott Street brothel would have faced serious competition for neighborhood customers. As many as 30 to 40 brothels were located in the North End.

Numerous carved bone toothbrushes imported from London were found. The excavation site would have been 27 and 29 Endicott St. between 1860 and 1875. Housing records show this address probably was used as a brothel between 1852 and 1883.

This cosmetics jar would have been used for face powder. Many of the prostitutes were farm girls or immigrants, usually under 25 years old, who had moved to Boston in search of jobs. A list of female tenants at Endicott Street in 1855 included Mary Colby, 20, from Ireland; Elina McMahon, 22, from Vermont; and Jane Clark, 19, from Massachusetts.

The Endicott Street brothel was located where the access ramps to Interstate 93 are today. More than 3,000 artifacts have been found at the site.

The Famous Beehive on the North End

I have been reading Uneasy Virtue and found this passage about the famous Beehive Brothel, besides being a brothel it was a dance hall and did not serve liquor.

The Beehive was a 3 story, coned shaped building on North Margin Street, owned by a widow named Marm Cooper, who lived with her two daughters, and a rotating population of prostitutes and their patrons. It was the first brothel to be attacked by a mob. in 1825 which grew to over 300 persons and went on for three days and nights along Ann Street (now North Street).

The brothels didn’t move far!

I have found some interesting information tonight, here is another. Really liked this from a blog I was reading.

The red light district then just slid down the hill to Boston’s first Combat Zone, old Scollay Square, now home to City Hall and the JFK Federal Building. How appropriate. At least people still get screwed there.

The brothels didn’t move far!

Male Brothels

I was doing research tonight and found that there were male brothels here in Boston.

Peg-Houses: Brothels go by many names: whore house, brothel… This one’s very special, though, for it comes from sailors circa the 1800s, who called a boy brothel “peg-houses,” and I can only imagine what “peg” means; I’m sure you can, too.

Things Gay Say

Create your own visitor map!

The Original Mount Whoredom aka Red Light District 1775

“Mount Whoredom” was a name attached to the place by the occupying British. David McCullough wrote in 1776: “For their part, the British had assigned an experienced cartographer, Lieutenant Richard Williams, who, with the help of a small crew, moved his surveyor’s transit and brass chains from one vantage point to the next, taking and recording careful sightings. The result was a beautifully delineated, hand-colored map showing ‘the True Situation of His Majesty’s Army and also those of the Rebels.’ All fortifications were clearly marked, all landmarks neatly labeled, including ‘Mount Whoredom,’ Boston’s red-light district. Lieutenant Williams had been appalled to find prostitution so in evidence in what was supposedly a center of Puritanism — ‘There’s perhaps no town of its size could turn out more whores than this could,’ he noted in his journal — and accuracy demanded that this, too, be shown on the map.” (p. 27)

Known as Mount Vernon today.

Bad Girls and the Men Who Hate Them: A Discussion of the Boston Bawdyhouse Riots of 1825

Bridget Allison, Bad Girls and the Men Who Hate Them: A Discussion of the Boston Bawdyhouse Riots of 1825 (1998)

In mid-July 1825, Boston men tore down notorious bawdy houses in the North End of the city. The area was home to numerous brothels, saloons and dance halls. When city leaders did not close the “Beehive,” an infamous house of prostitution there, about 200 working class men descended on it and tore it to the ground piece by piece. Mayor Josiah Quincy urged the rioters to desist, but they rioted again. Quincy and the Board of Aldermen offered a reward for information regarding the rioters, but only 15 men were tried. Seven of them were sentenced to serve from one to three months in jail.

It is unclear what specifically triggered the riots, but a confluence of factors seems to have been at their core. Boston was founded by Puritans as a “Godly commonwealth.” Its natives envisioned the city as a moral community. In this environment prostitution was unacceptable. Public censure and town meetings were not the only forms of governing behavior. Prior to the 1825 riots, Bostonians had formed mobs and rioted to protest social problems. Citizens were not afraid to use violence to protest government action or inaction. Collaboration between public and private parties was a frequently used method of city planning. Citizens used such joint efforts to influence the city’s moral and economic development.

As the population grew in the 1800s, economic classes solidified, crime increased and the government began to regulate vice. The once prestigious North End became poor and overcrowded, while the West End became home to Boston’s elite. Mayor Quincy strove to contain poverty, crime and vice. When he was elected in 1823, the center of vice in Boston was on Beacon Hill in the West End. Quincy removed the liquor licenses of many establishments, and organized a posse to raid the West End’s bawdy houses. Still, prostitution continued to run rampant in the North End.

The Founders’ beliefs in republican government based on civic virtue, commitment to the public good and use of government power to address social problems persisted in Boston long after the Revolution. When the rioters saw that Mayor Quincy closed down houses of prostitution in the West End, they expected him to do the same in the North End. When he failed to do so, they perceived his inaction in their neighborhood as an indication that control of morality was not going to be handled equally in all sections of the city. It gave them an excuse to take the law into their own hands.

During the 1800s, women were regarded as physically weak but morally strong; the home was their domain. This ideology left no room for poor women who entered the work force out of necessity. The drive to end prostitution became a moral crusade in the early 1800s. Single women and widows were believed susceptible to prostitution. Unwed mothers who sought public assistance were placed in workhouses with minor criminals. Some women chose to become prostitutes rather than go to workhouses. Social aid, offered to some deviants and vagrants, was withheld from prostitutes. They were targeted because they violated contemporary standards of womanhood and diminished Boston’s reputation and economy.

By the 1820s, Boston’s Puritan foundations had relaxed, but Bostonians were caught up in the Great Awakening and other religious revivals of the time. These revivals were part of a large set of moral reform movements, including abolition and temperance, as well as the crusade to end prostitution. The religious fervor of the time, combined with the era’s perception of women, Boston’s tendency towards citizen involvement in government, and rioting to protest government action all played a role in bringing about the bawdyhouse riots of 1825.

The Brothel Myth

We are often asked to produce the law or ordinance which prohibits more than a certain number of unrelated females from living together, as such an arrangement would be considered a brothel. As far as we can determine, no such law exists, but apparently the myth is widespread. In Urban Legends Reference Page: College, Snopes.com explains the history of the myth, but suggests that no proof has ever been produced that a law exists anywhere which prohibits more than four or six unrelated females from living together under a “brothel law.” “We routinely hear from students who are convinced their particular university lacks a sorority because of this non-existent law. Their vehemence aside, none have yet produce a copy of the statute they so firmly believe in, an act that would earn their city and institution of higher learning a measure of fame in the world of contemporary lore.” The Massachusetts lodging house law is Mass. General Laws, Chapter 140, Section 22, and the brothel law is Chapter 140, Section 26, “Permitting immoral conduct; defense; evidence”.

Tidbits

My journey into the dark places of cyber space to find information or information leading to my subject of my blog. I have found out interesting tidbits along the way that I found interesting. So just look under the tab “Tidbit”. Also I am currently watching the series on PBS, God in America. It begins exploring religion from the 1600 to present.

 
here is the link:

God in American

North Street

Here are some old photos of North Street also known as the Combat Zone also the place where the Old Red Light District was.

It was first named in 1852, and consists of segments of streets formerly named Ann, Fish, Ship, Drawbridge, and Conduit Streets. Ann Street, also known as the “Black Sea”, was an infamous neighborhood in the 19th century. The main street and its side alleys formed a red-light district where brothels, inns, “jilt shops”, and tavern could be segregated from the rest of the city.Over half of Boston’s brothels were located there. The establishments in the area relied heavily on custom from sailors, who had weighed anchor at Dock Square nearby, and working men, who used the taverns as meeting places in the winter. The area was one of the few places in Boston where African Americans and whites intermingled.

The first photo below is a detail of 1814 map of Boston, showing Ann St. and vicinity.

The second photo is North Street, looking up from North Square, ca.1894.

The third photo is North Street, Boston, 1949.

The fourth photo is Ann Street, Boston, 1881.