Western saloon

A Western saloon is a kind of bar particular to the Old West. Saloons served customers such as fur trappers, cowboys, soldiers, lumberjacks, businessmen, lawmen, miners and gamblers. The first saloon was established at Brown's Hole, Wyoming, in 1822, to serve fur trappers. By the late 1850s the term saloon had begun to appear in directories and common usage as a term for an establishment that specialized in beer and liquor sales by the drink, with food and lodging as secondary concerns in some places. By 1880, the growth of saloons was in full swing. In Leavenworth, Kansas, there were "about 150 saloons and four wholesale liquor houses". Some saloons in the old west were little more than gambling houses, brothels and opium dens.

Saloons in America began to have a close association with breweries in the early 1880s. With a growing overcapacity, breweries began to adopt the British “tied-house” system of control where they owned saloons outright. Brewers purchased hundreds of storefronts, especially on the highly desired corner locations, which they rented to prospective saloon keepers, along with furnishings and recreational equipment such as billiard tables and bowling alleys. Schlitz Brewing Company and a few others built elaborate saloons to attract customers and advertise their beers.

Legislative factors also played a factor in the growth of brewery owned saloons. The Chicago City Council increased the saloon license from $50 to $500 between 1883 and 1885 to pay for an expanded police force made necessary by the barrooms. Relatively few independent proprietors could afford to pay such amounts.

Politicians also frequented local saloons because of the adaptable social nature of their business. In neighborhoods where literacy was low, the bar provided the principal place for the exchange of information about employment and housing. A savvy politician could turn his access to resources into votes. In factory districts, saloons became labor exchanges and union halls, as well as providing a place to cash paychecks.

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