August 27, 2010 Oasis Bordello Museum

Today we did a few more geocaches, we visited the memorial to the Sunshine Mine disaster. In May 1972, the Sunshine Mine of Kellogg was the site of one of the worst U.S. mining accidents, resulting in the deaths of 91 miners; as a result, every miner in the U.S. now carries a "self-rescuer" breathing apparatus, which gives the miner a chance to avoid death due to carbon monoxide poisoning. Eight days after the fire started, two men emerged from the mine. They were found on the 4800 ft (1463 m) level of the mine near a fresh air source. All others trapped in the mine had died.

We also found a second hand store in Kellogg where we found some kids books and a very cute teddy bear book shelf and then got directions to a new second hand book store that was located in the back of fish and tackle store in Osborne. After buying a few books we decided to drop the dog off and then head back to Wallace to go on a tour of the Oasis Bordello Museum.

The Oasis Bordello was a cat house that was open in Wallace, Idaho until 1988, yes that’s right 1988 not 1888, while Nancy Reagan was telling America "Just say no," the ladies of the Oasis were saying "Yes" to any man in Wallace with twenty bucks.

The Oasis operated quite openly in Wallace for many years, every so often they would get a heads up from local law enforcement that they should leave town for a couple of days because the Feds were coming. However in 1988 the FBI came to town and instead of staying only for a couple of days they were there for over two years. Seems that they were actually in town to investigate the local sheriff for corruption but the Bordello permanently closed. The current owners have preserved it exactly as it was on that night -- so the museum is also a time machine, providing a view of the late 1980s through the unique prism of prostitutes in Wallace, Idaho, right down to the J.C. Penney catalogs on the coffee table and the video store rental list taped to the kitchen wall.

Visitors enter the brothel the way that its clients did, up a creaking set of stairs and through a triple-deadbolt door. The first room on the tour is the Madame’s bedroom; there is shag carpet on the floor a feather hat/wig that she always wore and a school band uniform, the only thing that is not original in the place. The story goes that the Madame used to buy the local school band new uniforms each year and this was their way of saying thank you. Nearby, the brothel price list is taped to a wall for easy reference, written on a sheet of yellow tablet paper, broken down by sex act and timed to the minute. "Eight minutes, fifteen dollars, straight, no frills,” there was also an exchange rate for Canadians, it seems that the Canadian dollar was only trading at 70 cents on the dollar.

Next of the tour was the waiting room where the men would wait their turn. The green shag carpet was great. We then got to look at each girl’s room. They were all colour coded, there was the red, green, brown, blue and green rooms. Each room was decorated in those colours and they were filled with items that the girls had left behind, seems that when they used to leave they would only pack enough for a couple days because they would come back, but since they didn’t the rooms had a number of personal items in it, including underwear, books, perfume, hairspray ect.

In the bordello’s bathroom, there was a tub and a toilet but no shower or curtain and this was for all the women in the house. There were seven different medicine cabinets -- one for each girl, labeled in the colour of her room.

The kitchen at the Oasis was also its nerve center. There was a cash box for each room and a wind-up kitchen timers, one for each sex room. "When the bell rang, the maid knocked on the door and said, 'Time's up!'" Michelle explained. Then Michelle pulled open a drawer extra timers. "They were so busy they went through a lot of timers."

According to Michelle, a woman at the Oasis could make as much as $2,000 a week. That was after the Madame was paid her share and room and board.

In the broom closet, along with bottles of Scope and cans of Lysol and carpet cleaner were several dozen red light bulbs, still in their corrugated paper packages. Most of the bulbs in the brothel were red, Michelle said. "The red light gives you a nice glow." There was also a complete bar which the maids would sell the customers waiting at $8 a glass for a highball, which was almost as much as the sex was.

The bordello used to employ four or five local women, at least three a day to be the maids of the place. They were in charge of cleaning, making supper and coordinating the customers each night. It was known as being a prime job in town.

To show you how fast the women left, there was a bag of groceries left on the kitchen counter, peeling with age, revealed its contents: Minute Rice, egg noodles, and Campbell’s soup. The kitchen itself looked about half the size that you would find on a train. There didn’t seem to be much eating that went on as there was only one small table in the break room, not really big enough for everyone to eat at.

This was a very interesting tour and definitely gives you a realistic view of what life was like back in the late eighties.

After touring the museum we walked around town for a bit and then decided to go for supper at the local barbecue restaurant. Out on the street they have a smoker that is cooking all day long. We started off with an appetizer sampler which had pork ribs, chicken and beef brisket. It was amazing. Len had a rib platter with macaroni/cheese and coleslaw sides and I had the beef brisket with red beans and rice and macaroni and cheese. The food was fantastic; I would definitely recommend this to anyone who goes to Wallace.

After supper we headed back to the motor home to give Lindy her supper and relax.