Donald L. Hardesty, Ph.D., Chair, University of Nevada, Reno
Sue Fawn Chung, Ph.D., University of Nevada, Las Vegas
Kenneth H. Fliess, Ph.D., University of Nevada, Reno
Eugene M. Hattori, Ph.D., Nevada State Museum
Ronald M. James, Nevada State Historic Preservation Officer
David B. Landon, Ph.D., Michigan Technological University
Patrick E. Martin, Ph.D., Michigan Technological University
Susan R. Martin, Ph.D., Michigan Technological University
Ronald L. Reno, Ph.D., Archaeological Resource Services; Comstock Historic
      District Commission
Kelly J. Dixon, Administrator

J. Clark Guild, Esq., President	I. R. Ashleman, Esq., Treasurer
Sue Clark	Donald Hardesty, Ph.D.
Sherry Colquitt	Marydean Martin
John Copoulos	Robert Ostrovsky
Diane Deming	Janice Pine
Renee Diamond	Kevin Rafferty, Ph.D.
Thalia Dondero	Robert Stoldal
Fritzi Ericson	Karen Wells
Sandra Halley
Beverly Carlino-Banta, Executive Director

Michael S. Coray, Ph.D., Chair, University of Nevada, Reno
Lucy W. Bouldin, Director, Storey County Library
Kenny Dalton, NAACP
Elmer R. Rusco, Ph.D., University of Nevada, Reno
Theresa A. Singleton, Ph.D., Syracuse University

Cover Illustration: A gilded porcelain fragment from a tureen discovered under an ash layer is a clear indication that things of beauty await the excavation of a remarkable remnant of African-American heritage.

Virginia City’s African American Community: Discovering Traces of an Ethnic Past in the Wild West was written by Ronald M. James and Kelly J. Dixon. Formatting donated by Susan A. James.

Introduction

Virginia City during its heyday in the 1870s was a cosmopolitan, urbanized industrial community. People came there from throughout the world.

Archaeologists and historians have recently discovered the site of the Boston Saloon, an African American business that once thrived in the world-famous 19th century mining town of Virginia City, Nevada. Because this resource is so rare, and because it promises to write a highly significant chapter on the role of African Americans in the West, the Boston Saloon site is a landmark of national significance. The archaeological excavation of this site provides an exciting opportunity to explore the diverse past of the nation. The Comstock Archaeology Center and the Museums, Library and Arts Foundation are seeking $279,650 in grants and major contributions to make this happen.

History

The Comstock Mining District, founded in 1859, gave birth to Virginia City and grabbed international fame as one of the richest gold and silver discoveries in history. African Americans came to Virginia City together with thousands of others from throughout the world, seeking an opportunity to capitalize on the immense wealth produced by local mines. They served as laborers, business owners, cooks, waitresses, teamsters, professionals and business owners. Unfortunately, most people, regardless of background, moved quickly in the transient mining West, and so it is difficult to find archaeological sites that can be linked over time with any single group. Opened in 1864 and operating for roughly ten years, the Boston Saloon was an important center of commerce, recreation, and society for the local African American community.

Significance of Boston Saloon Site

The discovery of the Boston Saloon location in 1997, together with a subsequent test excavation, demonstrates that the site is rich with artifacts and has national importance. This business stayed at a single location through most of its existence, making it an anomaly at the outset. Defying the odds, remnants of the saloon survive in the archaeological record, escaping 125 years of development and bottle collecting. An asphalt parking lot currently caps the property, which the Comstock Archaeology Center plans to excavate from June to September 2000. The Center will complete analysis and cataloguing over the course of the following nine months. Pending funding, one or more exhibits will open at various locations in the summer of 2001.

Today, the Virginia City National Landmark is one of the nation’s largest historic districts, soaring to more recent prominence in the 1960s as the subject of NBC’s Bonanza series. It includes over five hundred buildings dating to the time of the great bonanzas, from 1859 to 1880. Thirty-five minutes from Reno and forty-five minutes from Lake Tahoe, Virginia City provides a unique opportunity for public education with nearly a million visitors a year.

The Comstock Archaeology Center is a private non-profit corporation mandated to encourage the professional excavation and management of the district’s archaeological resources. Visitors to Virginia City learn about the growth of the West and its place in the history of mining. The story of minority groups is often left out of the picture, an oversight the Center seeks to correct. Archaeology is in an excellent position to fill a gap left by the largely Euroamerican written record. The Boston Saloon excavation will provide a remarkable chance to bring life to the African American contribution to Virginia City and the American West.

The 1875 Bird’s Eye View of Virginia City is the only known image, though minute, of the Boston Saloon. An enormous fire burned the structure together with hundreds of others, shortly after the publication of this drawing.

The 1890 Sanborn-Perris Fire Insurance Map shows the location of the Boston Saloon at 4 South D Street after the area was destroyed in 1875. The walls of the saloon are in bold outline

African Americans in the West

The study of western and American history increasingly includes the diversity of its people. At the same time, it is important to use imaginative means to reconstruct the stories less likely to find a place in the written record. Since the 1970s, historians such as Rudolph M. Lapp demonstrated that African Americans made a significant contribution to the mining West. Other scholars followed including Elmer R. Rusco, who wrote a groundbreaking overview of African Americans in Nevada. Still, research will need to grow beyond the written record to fully understand how African Americans fit into places like Virginia City. Expanding an appreciation for African Americans in the West is important to interpreting our nation’s history.

In spite of increasing academic research regarding African Americans in the West, understanding still lags for the broader public audience. The African American story has often been popularly regarded as belonging to the South or at most to the eastern half of the nation. Recently, treatments of the "buffalo soldiers" and the black cowboy have introduced the West’s role in African American history. Little has been done, however, to provide the public with the full spectrum of the African American contribution to the mining West.

The 1883 graduating class photograph from Virginia City's Fourth Ward School features Clarence Sands, far left in the back row, the first African American born in the community. The Sands family was highly respected on the Comstock, where public schools were integrated after 1872.

The Comstock Experience

Research in the written record demonstrates that African Americans came to the Comstock Mining District and that many exploited the economic flush times by becoming prosperous business entrepreneurs in Virginia City. Unfortunately, from an archaeological point of view, these businesses often moved after a brief time, leaving few traces of their presence. Furthermore, there was no established black neighborhood, as integration was the rule of the day in Virginia City. This residential scattering allows even slimmer traces of African Americans in the archaeological record. Racist laws and 19th-century society restricted African Americans on the Comstock. Virginia City’s fiercely pro-Union stance and its cosmopolitan nature may have eased conditions more than elsewhere. The Comstock was, after all, an international meeting place with a degree of diversity only some larger cities of the world could exceed, but there were still many obstacles that confronted African Americans.

Within this environment African Americans found employment and chances to build businesses while pursuing advancement. As a group, they provide an excellent example of how success on the Comstock was a possibility, not just for the famous silver barons, but also for thousands of people, including those who faced legal and social restrictions. Among these, ex-slaves and freeborn African Americans prospered. The Sands family, for example, ran businesses in Virginia City and had a child graduate in 1883 from the integrated public school.

William A. G. Brown and the Boston Saloon

An 1866 article from the famed Territorial Enterprise discusses an incident at the Boston Saloon.

William A. G. Brown had founded the Boston Saloon by 1864 on North B Street. He arrived in Virginia City about a year earlier, working at first as a bootblack or street shoe polisher. Still, Brown clearly had no intention of ignoring the opportunities of the great Comstock Lode, and he went into business for himself as a barkeeper. His saloon prospered, and within two years, he moved it to the corner of D and Union, in the heart of the entertainment district at a prestigious intersection.

Grafton T. Brown, a noted African American artist of the West, visited Virginia City in the early 1860s. He drew this picture of the community for publication and sale.

Brown was a free-born native of Massachusetts who named his saloon after the city he certainly knew well. He went on to operate other saloons that catered to an African American clientele, but he maintained an interest in the Boston Saloon until it closed about 1875. Brown apparently left Virginia City around 1880. Storey County records suggest, however, that he continued to maintain real estate holdings in the area. Brown was an American success story, and his saloon represents a unique opportunity to gain insight into his life.

The Boston Saloon was an important meeting place for African Americans of the Comstock. The few brief newspaper articles that report on the establishment attest to its popularity. They fail, however, to provide much insight regarding the nature of the business or its customers. Was it affluent or working class? Did it cater to women and children as well as men, as many saloons did at the time? Did it offer a menu of food and drinks different from that of other saloons? With archaeological investigation, the answers to these and other questions will cast the African American of the West into new light.

Today, the Boston Saloon offers a unique opportunity to augment the Comstock African American story with objects, information, and insights retrieved through the methods of archaeology. This site holds immense potential to complete the telling of an important national epic. Investigations at the Boston Saloon will fill gaps in the written record as scholars attempt to understand the role African Americans played in the expansion and development of the West.

Excavation as Public Archaeology

Comstock archaeologists have nearly a decade of experience working with the public. In 1997, after refining an approach to visitors and the media, the principal participants in the program formed the Comstock Archaeology Center, in conjunction with the Nevada State Historic Preservation Office, the University of Nevada System, and the Michigan Technological University. The Center grew from a program within the Virginia City National Landmark District to encourage the preservation of archaeological resources in the Landmark and to promote the retrieval, analysis, and interpretation of information from sites within the district. One of its principal goals is to return that information to the community through exhibits and public education. The Center is a private non-profit corporation working with the Museums, Library and Arts Foundation to raise funds for this project. Grants and contributions to the Foundation, a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation, are tax deductible.

Project Phases

The project will consist of three phases, each with a public education component featured prominently. The first phase will include the excavation of the Boston Saloon site in a parking lot of the Bucket of Blood Saloon, currently operating in Virginia City. The property owner has consented to participate in this project by allowing the use of the site.

Phase I: Excavation/Cleaning, Sorting and Preliminary Analysis of Artifacts

The first phase of the project consists of the excavation, but it will include work at a field laboratory for initial cleaning, sorting, and preliminary analysis of artifacts. Much of this work can be accomplished with minimal funding through the use of volunteers and archaeological field school students.

Interpretation during the first phase will include signs and brochures on the site, interpreters and tour guides at both the excavation and the lab, and frequent press releases designed to inform the public and to attract more visitors. Students and volunteers will rotate in the role of site interpreters and tour guides, giving them experience in communicating the value and nature of public archaeology. This phase will last from June through September, 2000.

In 1997 and 1998, the Comstock Archaeology Center excavated a nineteenth century site in the basement of the world-famous Piper’s Opera House. Located two blocks from the Boston Saloon, the Opera House provided an excellent opportunity to combine volunteerism with public education. Dozens of people participated in the excavation and thousands of visitors left with a better understanding of the past and the process of unlocking its secrets. The Boston Saloon site has perhaps a greater potential to attract public attention and participation.

Phase II: Cataloguing, Identification and Preliminary Interpretation

The second phase will focus on cataloguing, identification, and preliminary interpretation of artifacts in a lab. Whenever possible, volunteers will be included in the process, and the lab will host publicized visitor days when the public will be encouraged to see the “behind the scenes” process. Experience has shown that the media responds favorably to press releases on archaeological discoveries whether from the field or the lab. The second phase will last from October 2000 to May 2001.

Phase III: Traveling Exhibit

The third phase of the project will begin in May 2001 and will consist of the opening of a traveling exhibit at Virginia City’s Fourth Ward School and other regional locations. It will also produce an African American walking tour brochure on Comstock minority heritage. Phase III will end in September 2001. The exhibit will continue to travel as long as there is interest in the project.

Thousands of visitors of all ages have learned from visiting historical sites excavated by the Comstock Archaeology Center. These participants at Piper's Opera House enjoyed screening for artifacts under the supervision of a professional archaeologist.

Public Education

In the past, the Comstock Archaeology Center has found that a four-tier approach to public education works best. First, professional archaeologists work with volunteers to educate them on excavation and lab analysis methods. Second, these professionals and volunteers work directly with visitors to the site, offering an interpretation of the past and an introduction to archaeology. Third, the organizers of the excavation issue press releases and coordinate with the media to educate a broader audience. Fourth, following the completion of the excavation and analysis, the project supports a series of exhibits and lectures.

The Center believes archaeology is most effective from an engaging educational standpoint when the public is involved during all phases of work, from the initial discovery of buried materials, to the essential laboratory process, to the final exhibition and interpretation of those materials.

Also during the summer of 2000, the Comstock Archaeology Center will coordinate with Julie Shablitsky, a Ph.D. candidate with Portland State University, to excavate sites in Virginia City associated with the 19th century Chinatown and its outskirts. Since African American families were known to live near the Chinese, this project may yield insights useful to the Boston Saloon excavation. The Center may use some materials and services principally associated with the Boston Saloon excavation on this second project, and volunteers and other labor may be shared as specific needs arise.

As the story of the Boston Saloon unfolds, hundreds of thousands of visitors to the Comstock will have the opportunity to see the archaeological process in action, and they will learn about a group of people who are rarely included in the telling of western mining history. Through subsequent lectures, exhibits, and media contacts, this story will reach an even broader audience throughout the nation. An announcement in 1999 of the discovery of the site yielded newspaper articles from Boston to Portland, Oregon and from San Diego to Denver. Material unearthed during excavation and reconstructed in the lab will certainly yield equal or greater attention.

Summary of Products

The Comstock Archaeology Center plans to produce several traveling exhibits (the exact number pending available level of funds). These exhibits will travel to appropriate museum facilities, particularly, but not exclusively to those that specialize in African American history. Pending funding, the Center will host a symposium on ethnic archaeology and its implications for American studies and public involvement and education. The project will also generate articles for popular and academic journals, and it will provide the basis for a book-length manuscript on African American archaeology and the importance of this group to the growth of the West. In addition, the Center will develop a walking tour brochure celebrating African American contributions to this world-class mining district.

The masonry walls of the Bucket of Blood Saloon predate the great fire of 1875. Shadows of doorways recall a time when enclosed stairs led down to the Boston Saloon. The Bucket of Blood has long served as a local landmark in the center of Virginia City. Until recently no one realized that the Boston Saloon lay under an asphalt cap to the rear of the building.

Budget

The 1997 test excavation demonstrated that a dense deposit of artifacts lie beneath the 1875 burn level, likely debris from the Boston Saloon itself. Dozens of artifacts from this layer include the gilded porcelain fragment featured on the cover as well as the button, bottle fragment, and crystal stem illustrated above.

Phase 1 (4 months):

Phase 2 (8 months)

Phase 3 (6 months – 4 overlapping with Phase 2)

To obtain supporting documentation for the budget, please contact the Comstock Archaeology Center at P. O. Box 128, Virginia City, NV, 89440, or call (775) 684-3440.

Comstock Archaeology Center Mission Statement

The Center encourages the preservation of archaeological resources of the Virginia City National Landmark District, in order to promote the identification, excavation, analysis, and interpretation of sites within the district, and to return information and insight to the community through exhibits and public education.

Museums, Library and Arts Foundation Mission Statement

The Foundation secures public and private funding in support of and in cooperation with the Nevada Department of Museums, Library and Arts. Organized in 1990 and governed by a Board of Trustees, the Foundation is a 501(c)(3) institutionally related foundation operated exclusively to accept and manage gifted funds.

Boston Saloon Project Goals

The Boston Saloon Project will provide a better understanding of the African American contribution to the American West. It will increase public awareness of the role of minorities in history by working with volunteers, visitors, and the media, to reach a still wider audience. By working with school groups and regional museums, the project will become involved with education. Whenever possible, it will promote tourism and economic development by encouraging people to visit the dig site, the exhibit, and various special programs as the project unfolds.

Project Principals

Michael S. Coray, Ph.D., associate professor of history, is the special assistant to the president for diversity at the University of Nevada, Reno. He is the author of numerous articles on African Americans in Nevada. He will provide technical assistance for the project.

Kelly J. Dixon serves as the administrator of the Comstock Archaeology Center and will direct the Boston Saloon Project. She served as Inspector/Clerk of the Comstock Historic District Commission, during which time she directed the Piper’s Opera House Excavation. Dixon is currently enrolled in the Ph.D. program in the Anthropology Department at the University of Nevada, Reno.

Donald L. Hardesty, Ph.D., professor of anthropology at the University of Nevada, Reno has been the president of the Society of Historical Archaeology and is president of the Mining History Association. He is the author of The Archaeology of Mining and Miners: A View from the Silver State and The Archaeology of the Donner Party. He will serve as instructor of a summer archaeological field school featuring the Boston Saloon, and he will provide technical assistance for each phase of the project.

Ronald M. James is the state historic preservation officer. He is the author of The Roar and the Silence: A History of Virginia City and the Comstock Lode and an editor of Comstock Women: The Making of a Mining Community. He served as project historian for the Old Corner Bar excavation and will serve in a similar capacity for the Boston Saloon.

Elmer R. Rusco, Ph.D., emeritus professor of political science, University of Nevada Reno, is the author of Good Times Coming? Black Nevadans in the Nineteenth Century, regarded as one of the best western African American state histories. He will provide technical assistance for the project.

Theresa A. Singleton, Ph.D., is an associate professor of anthropology at Syracuse University. Her topical specialty is African American archaeology, and her related publications include The Archaeology of Slavery and Plantation Life: Facing the Challenges of Public African American Archaeology, The Archaeology of the African American Diaspora in the Americas, and I, Too, Am America: Archaeological Studies of African American Life as well as numerous articles on African American archaeology. She will provide technical assistance for the project.

Virginia City is in the Reno-Tahoe area. It attracts nearly one million visitors a year. This map is from Wells Drury, An Editor on the Comstock Lode (1936).