The Dollop with Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds - 498 - Madame Dumont

Episode Date: September 14, 2021

Comedians Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds the Wild West's Madame Dumont.SourcesTour DatesRedbubble Merch

You're listening and watching the dollop on the All Things Comedy Network. This is a bilingual American History podcast for each week. I, Dave Anthony, read a story from American history to my co-worker. Gareth Reynolds, who has no idea what the topic is going to be about. You want to scoot in? Just kind of... No, I got the frame right. Well, let's...

We're doing this... We're recording this one for Patreon and Dave's home. That's a... And the video. And it's... Let's get closer. Yeah, but we don't know what the deal is. Oh, wait, let me see if I flip this fucker around if that helps me.

Oh, yeah, you can... This is the first time. Well, I've never done it like this. Oh, this is perfect. Oh, perfect. You like you? I love me. I love me.

You like what you are? I love me. And called it, quote, his jam-pap. Jam-pap? I'm the fucking hippo guy. Dave, okay. My name's Gary. I'm the fucking hippo guy.

Dave, okay. My name's Gary. I'm the fucking hippo guy. Dave, okay. My name's Gary. My name's Gary. Wait. Is it for fun?

And this is not going to come to Tick-A-Lay podcast. Okay. This is like an arty. And a five-part coefficient. My room's a place. Now hit him with a puppy. You both present sick arguments. No sleep, no hip-hop.

That's like no hip-hop. Action, partner. Hi, Gary. No. Is he dead, my friend? No. No. Roder.

Roder in the car. Roder in the car. 1829. Year of our Lord. Jesus Christ. I like that your wife's at home for it this time. I think it's super weird. You're shouting 1829.

Simone Jules was born somewhere. We don't know. You've really done your research on this one. No. You've outdone yourself again. Nobody knows. I know. Where?

Bridgeport. No. Somewhere in Louisiana. Probably a Creole Frenchy situation. Sure. Probably from New Orleans is what people think. Okay. Not much known about our first 20 years.

She kept that very secret. Okay. Let's just go in 1849. She's 20 years old. She heads out. And she just starts calling herself Madame Dumont. Hmm. Or Dumont.

Probably Dumont. Dumont. Yeah. That's like Alexander Dumas. And everyone's like, give me a dumb ass. And he's like, oh my God. That's also a commercial. What is?

The dumb ass joke. Is it? Yeah. As a guy says now he's interviewing and he keeps calling him dumb ass. They allowed that in a commercial? That's interesting. Okay. So people gossip that she was fleeing some sort of scandal or she was biracial and trying

to get out of the South. I like that those are like unequal. Look, if she did something horrible or she's not pure white, either way, a crime has been committed. Yeah. So they thought, they're people like, she's trying to pass as white. Why else would someone come here? So other people thought she was hiding in the US.

This skin lottery is just, it really is just fucking, I don't know. It just keeps getting harder to fathom. Episode by episode. It's never ending. It's just like. That's the great thing. It creeps into anything. This idea that you're like, we get all the rights.

And it's like, I'm going to pretend to be that. You can also, there'll be no pretending to be as either. Your skin was a different color. That's it. That's life. You got the draw. Sorry. Now go get my shoes.

Other people thought she was hiding in the US and she was an heiress from Europe, which I don't, that's the one I don't go. Don't tell anyone. I'm secretly awesome. And then the queen and the princess go on a fox hunt for her. Over here. We found something, Mamzy. There she is.

Shoot her. It's an heiress. That's it. Get her into a luxury bath and a cape made of jewels as soon as possible. She shan't leave this prison again. I'm escaping from all the wealth. You will live a life of decadence. I want no wealth.

Have some cake frosting. Quick, fill her with frosting. I'm running. Give her champagne. I'm running to San Francisco. Give it to champagne. People will call me half black. You will do no such thing.

Oh my God, she's gone. I don't know where she's vanished. San Francisco. If only I had an idea, like someone would have said something. No. So, she didn't challenge any of these rumors. She was just like, whatever, have at it with your rumors and calls herself Madame, right? Madame Eleanor Dumont.

She's very young. She's very good looking. She is a hot hottie. Okay. She has such an olive complexion, Latin charm. She spoke French as well as English and she knew French manners and customs very well. So, the racism is sort of hard to pin down because people are like, how dare she pretend to be white. Awesome.

And yet they're also like, wow, she is gorgeous. I'll tell you what, for someone that's not as good as me, she's fantastic. Yeah, so that's okay. So, author Jan McKell Collins. Quote, writers enjoy describing her gorgeous features in great detail. Oh, God. Boy, she's got some pretty eyes and she's got some real pretty teeth. This is where they do, yeah, they do that thing where they're like, Madame Dumont, who has an olive complexion and knows that you could just die for.

It looks like it came off a diamond chipper, ears that you just want to lay earrings upon, and neck that has veins like a cascading river through the mountains upon it. And all her lovely rosy, rosy cheeks. She's got air to cleave or cleave it, you could lose your keys down. Oh, that's what I was wondering about. Yeah. Anyway, do we have something to say about her? I forget what she did, but man. She's having a potluck.

That's it. Hot babe potluck. So they would describe her gorgeous features in great detail using phrases like abundant purple, black hair, a complexion of the clearest olive, you know, the clearest olive. Latin charm. Oh, I already did that. Beautiful scarlet lips parted slightly to show two rows of pearly teeth. I mean, okay, look, I mean, those are lips. They're just like literally like, she's got lips.

No, no, these lips, you can, if you moved to a pot, you would see the teeth. She's got these lips that when she could somehow split them apart and just get, you see these white, you never seen anything like it. And piercing eyes of the deepest green. Okay. Yeah. All right. So a revolution broke out in France in 1848 and workers, including women, started organizing. And the government ordered a bunch of women to cancel a meeting.

They were like, no, you can't, women, you can't, in groups. So you're really playing to your camera today. Yeah. You know, we filmed these always and you, but today you're like doing a broadcast. Hi. I don't know. It's weirder with, I guess I don't notice the cameras. Well, normally there's like stuff.

Yeah, I agree. This is different. Yeah. And also there's no microphone. So I'm just standing here. Yeah, it might be because there's no microphone. I'm knitting for this episode. Yeah.

So 1848, like I said, they tell these women not to organize. And because they're French, they just started writing. Right. French. Oh, we should do that. Oh, they're so good at it. King Louis Philippe was off. McDonald's is charging for ketchup.

They're like Tuesday Stricts. Fire bombs. Drive a truck down through the capitale. I'm going to punch a cop. We want fruit ketchup. So two days later, the king was off the throne. Wow. In the US people are very sympathetic to the revolution.

The Camden Journal quote, the tumor, talking about King Philip, the tumor of the three glorious days has turned his back upon France. But it is said he goes to America tomorrow. Be it so, only take care of him when you get him. So they're like, hey guys, this asshole is leaving tomorrow. We should probably kill him soon. He's going to leave. Yeah.

So French peeps start heading to the US to get away from all the violence that's happening. Many go to California because the gold rush is happening. Sure. And Wessners are fascinated by French women. Okay. And they really enjoyed French sex workers. Okay. Interesting.

Okay. Sure. Many had worked on the streets in France, but here they were in brothels that required men to bathe and clean up before their appointments. Oh, wow. And here I thought we had a low bar. Oh, God. I mean, I don't want to, like, when I was in Paris with my brother once, we were like,

it was some of the strongest BO ever in the subway down there. Oh yeah. So time traveling through their BO history. Yeah. I mean. But I think back then people were, BO was just like normal. I guess. It wasn't until a recent thing that BO became a bad thing.

I might be wrong. But there's still like levels of BO. Like there's a BO where you can enjoy your BO and then there's a BO where you're like, I cannot be around humans again. I'm a monster. I belong in a zoo. I need to be hurt. I should be hurt.

I need to be trained. Yeah. Yeah. I could imagine there being a great ripening in France. The great ripening is a book. We'll talk about that later. So yes, they're making men wash. That makes the men feel like, oh, these are special ladies because they actually want

me to clean up. She makes me wash my bows. She's special. She's not from here like the others. She made me go ahead and just wash the whole area down there. And let me tell you, honestly, it's a good thing I did so much. It looked like I was just knocking dirt off it. It's like striking a catcher's mitt against my legs.

Yeah, I don't. I feel like I don't know you well enough. I'm just saying it was like, honestly, it was like watching a cave collapse with all the dust and debris that dropped. It fell hard. Can I have my own room? Yeah, of course you can. I'll build you one out of all the debris that dropped out.

You gotta go and throw up. Look, I built a little log cabin. I'm building a throw up pile. So, a journalist at the time, quote, if the poor fellows knew what these women had been in Paris, how one could pick them up on the boulevards for almost nothing, they might have been as free with their offers of five or six hundred dollars a night. What? Now they would have.

They're offering, at that time, they're offering that amount of money? Or is that? No, it's the crazy gold rush thing where there's just guys trying to get rich. Five, six hundred dollars. I mean, yeah, it's a lot. It's a lot to me now, for anything. Yeah, for anything. Let alone an evening.

An evening. Or an hour. I mean, what are you talking about? Let's be honest. 45 seconds. The way I do it. Wow, 10 minutes for $700? Okay.

Four minutes. Yeah, no, I think. I just want to talk. I think guys would have. I'd pull that one. Whether or not they were, they were just French ladies and the dudes were like, yeah, it's whatever. So I would open a dialect coaching business.

I know you would. Go ahead. I would too. But either way, there's like a French fetish going on. Okay. And it's a perfect time for Madame Dumont. Okay. So women also hang out in gambling houses during the day to lure in male customers.

Okay. And the ladies got a daily fee for doing that. Okay, great. So Madame Dumont began honing her persona in San Francisco as a decoration lady, as they were called. Meaning? She's decoration. She is like arm candy?

Yeah. She's a hangout lady. Right. Okay. Right. Rent a friend. Rent a lady. Rent a pal.

Sure. She worked at the Bella Union, a theater and gambling house. She specialized in the game of 21, which. Blackjack. Yeah. How you know? 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17. Okay.

So that means 21 in French, as Gareth just said. And it was the precursor to America Blackjack. So she's the first female gambler in San Francisco. Okay. A dealer and probably gambler. I mean, no one allowed ladies to do this. I can tell that gambling in America was strictly male. Sure.

Yeah. And rightfully so. Yes. Come on. What would happen? Men have better hands for cards. That's right. White men were built to perfection.

Yeah. And if you look around, the model exists still. No. Women don't. They can only, their hands can only do this. Too oily. Yeah. That's true.

That's right. Writer Michael Lapoint. Well, women who played games of chance were said to be dissipating their fertility. What? And not, not medically. Like, right? He doesn't mean like medically. I think he means that they're, they're, they're looking less unattractive to society.

Yeah. And wasting their time playing cards when they could be making a baby. Of course. Yes. Seriously. That's your job. And even when. We're trying to figure out how women can have litters.

We're in the lab daily. It would just be so much more efficient for us. And even when they were allowed to play, the amount they could wager was strictly curtailed. So. Right. So they were on a limit. They were on a pitch count. I think you've had enough.

Yes. Not the right for you. I don't know why they're French. No. So Dumont stayed cool at the card table when gambling and she made a small fortune. So when she was gambling, she made a fortune and she worked as a dealer at the same time. Okay. By then no one knows why she left town.

Okay. So she just leaves San Francisco. There's rumors, of course. People thought she'd been accused of cheating and she'd been kicked out. Either way, she goes to Nevada City. Mm-hmm. Which is in California. Oh, sure.

No. You knew that. Absolutely. Yeah. Makes sense to do that too. Mm-hmm. It's not confusing. When she first goes into town, people thought she was a sex worker.

Okay. Well, number one, she's French. Right. She's hot. Right. So this one, the men are cartoons and their eyes are bugging. They're biting their palms and stuff. Right. Well, not all the men because she's glamorous and hot and she's wandering around

the town for a few days just looking in stores and she's just getting a feel of the place. Lay of the land. And they're like, how is this lady walking around alone? That's the third day she's been walking. What a whore! What's she doing? A miner's wife, quote, there's got to be some bad in a girl with all her charms who seems to have nothing to do but strut up and down Main Street.

Yeah, for sure. In other words, hey, there's a fucking hot lady walking around and everyone's checking her out. That's a problem. That's a problem. So after she's got up to town, looking in at the stores and stuff, Dumont had a hand like pretty woman. Well, I've never seen it.

Oh, this is, well, just so you know, this is the part where she goes into the store and the woman won't help her because she doesn't like to look at her. Yeah. So don't worry, Dave, she's going to have a full makeover later in your story that you've written up. She's going to come back to the store and after she's spent a ton of money on other clothes and she's going to come in and she's going to have these bags of clothes. You don't need to take a sip right now.

You can interact with me. And she's got these bags of clothes and she'll go in there and she's just going to go, excuse me, you as a woman who worked here the other day when I came in and needed help and she'll go, yes. And she goes, you work on commission, right? And she'll go, yeah. And she'll go, big mistake, big, huge. Fuck you.

And then she'll walk out and she'll have a lovely hat on. Oh, I like it. Okay, that's not the story. So what she does is she puts up handbills, print it up, advertising her, quote, finally furnished, and carpeted gambling saloon for only well-behaved and well-groomed gentlemen. Okay. Great. So people start getting invitations to the opening?

Like doggy day care. People start getting invitations to the opening that says it's going to be free champagne. She is hand-inviting the well-groomed? Well, she's just putting up signs around saying you come well-groomed or you don't get in, basically. Oh, I love that there's a grooming bouncer. Yeah. This man will sniff your balls on you pits.

I don't want to work here anymore. We're having trouble filling the bowl, sniffing shit. So it's going to be free champagne. She has gas chandeliers. It's a fancy joint. Sure. Even though she was a Lady Blackjack dealer, she only allowed men to play. Right.

And cursing was very discouraged. Okay. No swearing. Everyone dressed nice. This swearing thing is very strange. She said it was... That's so weird. Well, you'll see.

She says it's the best gambling establishment in Northern California. So it stands out because she's running it with this lady-like grace. It's never been seen in the mining world. They're like, what the fuck is this? She's witty. She's charming. She's animated. She's chatting up the dudes.

Now, in Nevada City, demographics are different than in San Francisco. 1854, men made up the vast majority of the population in Nevada City. Author Ralph Mann, quote, the men were young. Over 60% were the ages of 20 to 30. And an additional 30% between 30 and 40. And about three men out of 100 had their families with them. Oh, wow. So this is like...

So it's a lot of single... It's Alaska. It's a lot of single bros. Wow. Yeah. Okay. Dicey. Okay.

So... It's quite a market. So, being unattached to good-looking, all these dudes are like, holy shit. They're in love. Yeah. So that's how she's getting guys in. And then, to get in there, they want to impress her. So they all act and dress the best.

Right. Oh, man. She quickly got a lot... She's like a bachelorette. She quickly got a lot of marriage proposals. Yeah. And she passed on all of them. I don't think he's here for you.

Hey. Okay. Hey. Yes. Hello. Hey. Hello there. Yes.

Excuse me. Do I need to go to... Hey. Hi. Hello. Thank you for coming tonight to 21. Hey. All right.

Okay. Excuse. Hey. Hi there. Okay. All right. I should... Okay.

I'm done. Okay. Oh, my God. Oh, fuck. Oh, horrible. That's the nicest place you got here. Oh, my God. No.

We'll be back tomorrow. Oh, for fuck's sake. She managed to not insult any of them while she turned on the marriage proposals. Author Duncan Aikman. Quote, she stayed in her hotel dressed in a slightly flamboyant manner and locking her bedroom door each night like a lady. So she's not... She's not...

She's not fucking around. Right. She's not like out... Right. ...what he's saying. She's not enjoying herself. Right. She's going home alone.

Some of our historians think she was in love with the editor of the Nevada Journal. And it sounds like he came to her at night for booty calls. Okay. And then after a while, he crushed her when he married a more socially acceptable lady. Hmm. Because she still runs a gambling joint. Right. And besides vent and un, there was poker and chakaluk.

Chakaluk? Chakaluk is dice game. It's chocolate. It's chocolate dice. It's... Chakaluk. Chakaluk is a dice game and there's a cage and you crank the cage and the dice are thrown around and then whatever...

Whatever they land on... So it's like cage craps. Yeah. Okay. Whatever they land... No. Whatever you land on, you had to guess them perfectly. The three.

Wait. You had to guess the dice? Yeah. Then we're going to fall. That's horrible. That's a terrible game. It's even possible to be right. No, it sounds like the worst game ever.

Dumont preferred Pharaoh, which is a game from France. Now, unlike most gambling joints, Dumont was very against violence and debauchery. Okay. Because other gambling joints were like, yeah, no kill and punch and... Swear. Debouch. Right. She was always emphasizing how refined she was and that her place didn't rip you off.

Okay. She banked heavily on customers being reluctant to act up in front of her because she's hot and... Right. A nice lady. I wonder if, like, if you were one of the few married people, if you had any shot of going there. Because your wife would be like...

Because your wife would be like, it's... You probably would have to go to another gambling joint. Yeah, you'd have to go to the place where you could, like, you know... I mean, it would just be a hard sell. Because there's dudes, like, there's got...you go there and you wait to gamble at her table. Oh, wow. That's ridiculous. You're just sitting there waiting and telling her to gamble at her table.

I would go to the place where you could stink and swear. But then you're next to the hot lady and there's no ladies around. Yeah, but it's the... Yeah, but it's the... I mean, but it's like... Yeah. It's one of those situations where it's like, I'm... Listen, I'm just gonna...

I'll go somewhere else. I'm 100% with you. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, I wonder, like...yeah, it's just...I don't know. I'm curious. What was the deal with... If you were married, would you...

I mean, would dudes just cheat it on their wives a lot, right? Or was that not... Or were they more... I don't know. Is it like today where it's just standard? I would imagine it's the same. Okay. Interesting.

Uh, so around this time, so crowds are packed. Her place is packed. Sure. So around this time... Are they socially distancing? No, no one. Really? No, we're still...

It's one of those places. Uh, around this time, she got a nickname. It wasn't one that anyone would say to her face. Oh, that's always good. She had a noticeable little bit of hair on her upper lip. Oh, no. Did I give her a hair? No.

And some guy one day called her Madame Mustache. That's shitty. And it stuck. Uh-huh. Now no one's gonna say it to her face. They said it behind her back. Right. She doesn't embrace the stache.

Sure. She like lightens it or whatever. Right. Um, so she... She should have embraced it. She should have. Lean in. So she, uh, she expands, builds up the place, uh, brings in professional men to help out

in the, in the joint. Sure. She brought in gamblers who she paid to play with customers who were waiting to play with her. Right. That's smart. So get money while they're sitting around. Yeah, right, right, yeah.

That's a win-win. So for them, David Tobin worked his way up and became her second in command. Okay. Now they lived upstairs in rooms right next to each other. Okay. And some people thought they were a couple. Okay. Cause he's good looking too.

Sure. And as time goes by, Tobin kept asking for and getting larger and larger share of the business. Okay. So you think, so the insinuation is that he's giving the business and then she's giving the business. Yeah, they're both getting the business. But he finally asked for too much.

Okay. And she was like, Fuck off. Quote, in a heated discussion one evening, she informed him that she didn't need a man. She had gotten along fine prior to his assistance. They were fucking. And would do so again, the partners went their separate ways. They were fucking.

They were fucking. Had to be. So they split up and Tobin wanted to take over the business and just have her as a figurehead making a lot less money than him. That's how it seems. So she was like, no, I don't actually need it at all. He was like the Trump brand. Hey, what if now that you've done this business thing, I just come in and take it over because

I'm a bro. You know, you did pretty good as a lady, but I'll be totally honest with you. I think it's time for me to tell you, you take it as far as you can. Let me fuck this up for a little while. Let me get my inexperienced hands all over your precious budget. How are you going to ruin your business? Seems like you're on a good track. Just do some dumb shit.

So at the time there was an economic downturn happening, so gambling was going down. And then after this happened with Tobin, she just bailed. She's done. So Dumont leaves and starts hitting up different mining camps. What is that, man? Okay, so things started going downhill in Nevada City because the mines drying up and then this guy is coming in on the business and she sees the writing on the wall, which is this mine is going to start to end.

So there's mining camps popping up. Like, oh, there's a mine here. A town will start to build around it. Okay, so she's okay. And so it's a mining camp, meaning like a lot of it's not buildings. They've just got like the restaurants a tent and the stores a tent. Right. So that's what she starts going to.

She starts going to different mining camps and she put on a full show, but she finds out that miners think that's annoying. Okay. And it put her in danger. So she realizes and she finds like a middle ground. Now mining camps are rough. Sure. Very fucking rough.

People constantly on the move. They attracted aggressive men looking for tons of cash. Sure. The best kind of men. Right, yeah. And they didn't worry about their accommodations. Historian Ralph Estes quote frame shanties pitched together as if by accident. Tents of canvas of blankets of brush of potato sacks and old shirts with empty whiskey barrels

for chimneys. What, what the fuck? Who's making a chimney? What? What's cold? You gotta have a fire. I mean, I just would imagine you'd make a fire. I don't imagine you'd turn a barrel into a chimney.

No. If you're sleeping in a potato sack, chimney should not be on your priority list. Well, you put potato sacks. Well, let's see. I'll use this shirt as a pillow. Now for the interior heating of the area. How will we get that filtration? You stitch together a bunch of potato sacks so you have like a drape and then you put a,

you put a whiskey barrel in the middle for your fire. Well, then I think we're not being fair to real chimneys. I doubt there are any fire, fires at the camps. No, probably not. No. You think this sack will catch on fire if I make a whiskey chimney? Okay. There's more.

Smoky hovels of mud and stone. Coyote holes in the mountainside forcibly seized and held by men. Wait, I'm sorry. I'm going to need you to, much like a coyote, dig a little deeper. Dudes would find, they would find a coyote fucking hole that could coyotes dug a den. And the dudes would take it from the coyotes. What a time. And that was their living place.

And I can't believe they couldn't get a woman. I can't imagine like having the balls to take over a coyotes home. I mean, and then just being like, so that's my house. Where do you live? I live where up one of the coyotes was. Oh. You should come back there. I can't see your house.

It's not a house. Do you see that barrel that's on fire? Yes. Near all those shirts? Yeah. That's home. It's a coyote. I share it with two coyotes.

What? You should come up there. Do you mean like that? See my penis. Like what? You should come to my home and check out my penis and my coyote area. Oh, thank you. I have a bunch of shirts.

Let me ask you this. Do you like whiskey? I do. Well, I don't have any, but I have a barrel that used to have it in there that I used for fire. It'd be great to get you up there. You can see my penis. I don't know.

Come on up there. We'll go up there near where the coyotes are. I'm uncomfortable. Do you have any whiskey? No. We should get some. I don't want any. Then we'll go up there and lay around.

I can play out a bunch of shirts for you. Yeah, drink the whiskey and later on you can check out my penis. I think that'd be great. Okay. Yeah. You talked me into it. Great. It sounds good at first.

So it's a two-day hike to get there and it is not easy to be fair to you. Okay. Also, my leg ain't working great. So if you could maybe carry me for some of it, then we'll get up there and then we'll clean up when we're up there. Not too much. Just a little. I'll start off my penis so you can see it.

Wow. There's other men here. Yeah. A lot of good ones too. There's that guy over there. She drinks his own piss. There's a bunch of winters. Oh man.

There's so many good ones. Well, you don't want to come. That's all right. But I'm going to go up there and have my penis with me. You never want to see it. If I have coyotes up there, you'll find me. Goodbye. Yeah.

You smell me when I'm up there basically too. Yeah, but there's a musk that carries. That's how come I'm able to live with animals. Okay. I have to go. I have to go too. I got to go all the way up there and get my penis undusted. Okay.

Yeah. All right. She's a lady. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. There's more. No.

Pits and shafts with smoke issue. Pits and shafts is my favorite board game. Smoke issue from every crevice. What? Pits and... Pits and shafts with smoke issuing from every crevice. Ugh. This is like living on a battlefield.

It's just like any hole. Excuse me. That's my hole. Oh, sorry. That's not that. Two things. I need a hole and I got to start a fire. All right.

Listen, everybody. A lot of us have been shitting in holes that people's living and thinking they're shitting holes. Shitting holes is clearly marked by shit. Piles of goods and rubbish on cracky points in the hollows on the rocks. Scatter any rubbish or stuff, put it on cracky points. In the mud, in the snow, everywhere. Scattered, broadcast, and tell milk infusion.

Now, when I read this, I just think of a Native American just wagging upon this and going, what the fuck? This is the plan? Who brought the awful fucking things? This is their... I mean, it is like they are like, wow, white people for the chosen race really don't know how to do shit. This is not going to work for them.

We made a home out of shirts and dirt. I brought a smallpox collective. And so now there's a fancy lady amongst all this. Oh, what an honor. Miners really enjoy gambling and the camps allowed her to start. I mean, they're gambling with existence, so clearly they like it. So the camps basically allowed her to start like a successful road business, like she can move around and set up shop.

Sure, she should be moving around, I'd say. She passed through places like Helena, Montana, Silver City, Idaho, Eureka, and Virginia City, Nevada. And then when the gold dried up, she would follow miners to the next camp. Okay. So Jumon made shirts. But what is she doing? Just this little show thing?

She's doing gambling. So it's gambling show? Yeah, it's gambling mostly. It's gambling. And where is she gambling? Just then like a shirt? She made a little shirt tent? She had a tent.

She would set up a tent. Great. They were like, wow, this place really opens up. You ain't even got no coyotes in here. No, we decided not to do a hole. Oh, very interesting. Yeah. That's a great decision because I live with the coyotes way up there.

Yeah. And I keep trying to get someone to come up there to see my penis. No one's going to do that. Yeah, you seem more like you're living the life of like a worm. Yeah, very much wormy. Bad. It's bad. Very wormy.

Yeah, we're humans. Especially because I'm breathing through my skin mainly. Gotta go. Yeah. I have my penis skin. Bouncer skin. Can I put a flyer up here inviting anyone, man or woman to come and check my penis out? No, you cannot.

Okay. So, do you mind making sure things did not get in the way of making money? When she was in Fort Benton, a steamboat full of smallpox victims wanted to dock. Just as buckers up. Hey, so a bunch of people carried smallpox wanting to get off for a little while in Rome. Is that cool to do that in this area? No. They really want to stretch their legs and a lot of them really, they're not doing well.

Some of them said it could be their last walk. We're pretty good with no. That's like a death. Do you have a dance hall? No, we don't allow smallpox people to dance or really walk around. It's a deadly disease. Yeah, believe me, I know. I have it.

So, it's horrible. Could you step back a little bit? Like a dance? No, just like get away from me. So, her customers are, you know, there are a lot of guys who drink a lot and smoke a lot and so they're susceptible to smallpox. Some would argue it would be great for them to have. Might be a better existence.

So, DuMont grabbed her gun and went to talk to the captain and the captain broke down what happened. Quote, you get the hell out of here with that boat, she said, and you do it pronto. I ain't going to let no smallpox spoil my business. And so, he steamed off. I like the steaming off too. That sounds like a boat gun, I agree. Yeah, well, that's great and probably right. I mean, he was probably having a lot of trouble docking.

He was probably going to every dock just sort of like, great, cool. I'm trying to think if I left anything out. So, it's like 60 passengers, they're highly motivated gamblers. Yeah, gender split pretty much. Yeah, I'm trying to think of something else. Do you have food and everything here? You got food, yeah. Yeah, they're starving.

Yeah, everyone has smallpox and a lot of them pack for a longer trip. So, if we can do some, we're shorter trip, honestly. So, if we can wash some clothes, potentially. You said before the longer trip thing, you said they have legs they need to stretch. They're highly motivated, highly motivated. Smallpox. Small is not even, they're tiny. Tinypox.

Babypox. Go ahead and just take the ship down there. Well, I mean, I just... Down there. Okay, great. Sure. Yeah. They said no too, gay.

I don't know what's going on. Seems like this is going to suck. The Pioche Weekly record wrote about her when she passed through, quote, Time seems to make no change in this little old French lady and she looked as pleasant and smiling as when we... She dealt their game four years ago. She's old now? No.

They're just like... But the more difficult surroundings started to take a toll on her looks. Okay. So, she's... The quality of her looks is part of her charm to the gentleman of the era. Yeah, but, you know, mining camps and her lifestyle, it's taken... Right. You know, it's getting to her finances.

Sure, sure. Well, she's... Yes. And her finances. She's living with coyote people. That's right. She was traveled alone. She didn't let her flirting at gambling tables

and temporary good times lead to, like, any serious relationship. She's not getting in any relationship. Sure. Writer, Jen McElcolan. She, quote, found men cumbersome as a whole and preferred to keep her profits for herself. Yeah, I like that. Yeah.

I'm on her side on this one. Yeah. My mother's... That's what my mother said. Fuck it, I'm done. Even though she was worn down a bit, her charm still worked. Mm-hmm. So she still had that.

Sure. The miners still flocked to her. Collins, quote, every miner in the camp bowed before her shrine in humble and respectful adoration. This is dumb. That is creepy. That is what... I mean, you know...

If you get there, men are so susceptible to doing shit like that where they were like, we won't like that. That's another system that, like, makes sense to men. Like, to be like, she's a queen. It's like, can you just find the fucking balance and, like, just be human? You know what? She no longer works for us.

We work for her. We work for her. It's like, dude, bro, bro, bro. Yeah. Men are good. It's just a chill. She doesn't like it when we're mean, so she's in charge of all of us and we all love her.

But none of us fuck... She's Smurfat. She is Smurfat. We have found Smurfat. Uh, so, yeah, every miner in the camp bowed before her shrine in humble and respectful adoration and lost his gold and ecstasy at her table for the chance of one personal fleeting glance

from her eyes or one word from her lips. That's just crazy. She's...it's this simple. She's fucking hot. Yes, and they're just, like, in the middle of fucking... Are there any other women there? No, there's almost no women in the camp still. Okay, so she's an attractive woman in this camp

full of, like, men starved for attention and since there's been, like, this hierarchy created there... I mean, she's a celebrity. She's like... Yeah. Yes. It's like, you know, if Uma Thurman was in the room right now, you know, it would change the vibe.

So there were many stories of her breaking up fights and solving arguments in the town. She stopped it. While in Boise City, all the gambling joints were robbed by a gang of card cheats. So these guys came through all at once and just... Sure. And that's another mining camp, basically?

Yeah. I would imagine it's pretty easy to break into that vault. Just to open the lid on the barrel. DuMont raised $1,000, which is $32,000 today. Okay. In 24 hours to get her business up and going again as her competitors are still trying to recover. Because, of course, she's the hot lady

and she's like, hey, fellas, can I get... She did a telethon. She's the smartest businesswoman rolling right now because she gets like, oh, I get how dudes work. Yes. Simply. Yeah. They're really dumb.

Yeah. One night she was walking home when two drunks tried to rob her. They told her they would take her purse. They go, we're going to take your purse. Good robbers, by the way. I always feel that good robbers give you the instructions. Here's how she's going to work. I'm going to point this at you.

It's very much how the bad guy to bond would be like, you understand Mr. Bond? It's going to go like this, one by one by one. They're like, first you're going to take your purse, then we're going to go through it, and then if you give us any shit, we're going to hit you. So I need you. Where did she go, dude?

She's gone. She calmly told them, quote, no, you'll not. Can we have one second, please? Yeah, go ahead. Hey, so what the fuck? Why did she just say no to us? Do not understand. She's a lady.

She's pushing guys. She's not, legally, she's not allowed to do that. That's right. That's right. What's her deal? She's fucking crazy. So I'm just so... Yeah, I've never had this before.

So... How did she even know? Here's what we'll do. Here's what we'll do. When we go back, I'll go back to her. Well, she's right behind us. I know. And when we turn around, I will say to her,

yes, you will. I think that's a pretty... Yeah, then she'll get it. Then she'll get it. She'll know that she made a mistake. And if she pushes back again, I'll ask for another minute to have a conversation, and we'll go through it.

And I'm going to say, hey, look, we're dudes. Yeah, that's good. You're not. I'll say that's great. I'll go, yes, you are. And then you go, we're dudes. And you're not dudes. Yeah.

Well, I think... Keep it short. Just the line I think is, we're dudes. We're dudes. Good. Great. I got that. Great.

Right before that. Yes, you will. We're dudes. Okay, turn around. Fuck. Hey. She's hot. Line.

So one of the guys had a gun and said, give up the purse or else. Okay. And Dumont then reached under her skirt, but instead of pulling out the purse, pulled out her derringer, and she killed one, and the other ran away.

Oh, my God. That's... Now it's over. Yeah. Now it's over. Now nobody can ever do anything to fuck with her again, because she's a shooter.

Yeah. By the way, the one guy was like, well, I want to see where this is going. No! Shit! You shot Teddy! Teddy! Uh, she's not big on taking shit.

No. He was working at Rocky Thomas' Dance Hall in Virginia City, Montana. Great spot. I'm actually there in, I think, January. Oh, yeah. That's a good gig.

Yeah, I know where you come in. Yeah. A customer got a little bit too familiar. Mm-hmm. Collins, quote, when a hapless bandit laid his hand upon the beautiful, naked shoulder disclosed by her low-cut bodice.

Mm-hmm. Modice? Mm-hmm. Sure. Madam stabbed him in the throat with a long stiletto rose and pointing disdainfully at the thing upon the floor,

said to an attendant, remove that carcass. Wait. Sorry. I mean, it's a lot. So she stabs the guy in the neck with what? Not with a heel? Yeah, a heel.

She takes a fucking heel and puts it through a dude's neck? Uh-huh. And then he's like, get that body out of here. That guy's like, yep, ma'am, we get that out.

You better cheer. Well, get him out, right? Right fine. Wow. I would say it's over. I would hope that the guys would be like, yeah, don't listen to what she says and wants. Well, now, around this time,

she's getting older, right? Okay. And she starts leaning into the moustache a little bit. You alluded to this earlier, leaning into the moustache, something I've done before. In SF in Nevada City, she had done,

she'd been diminishing it, right? Sure. But now on the road after a while, she starts letting it just grow into its full glory. I'm just like, I'm gonna have a, only when I have one,

I'll have the busiest one of the group. Men are like, respect her moustache. And it's not like she's letting herself go. She's still dressing great, wearing frilly frocks, but it's just this moustache situation. She has a moustache now.

She's traveling luxury. She's always been traveling in luxury. She carts around or ships her fancy gear to her next place for future setups. Sometimes she would go through this all and then

expense it, pay for it, and then find out the new location doesn't have customers to cover the cost of going there. Right. And she likes to gamble, so sometimes she'd lose all of her money.

So she's starting, her fortune's starting to fade. And as, As the moustache stops fading, the fortune begins. That's right. It's,

as she passed from mining camp to mining camp, she starts drinking more as would be expected. Sure. Back when she was in about a city, she only drank champagne or wine. Okay. Because the miners are all drinking whiskey

and then she's a step ahead. Great. That's why I drink it too. Yes. But her new hard life leads to her drinking the hard stuff. Oh boy. Which made her make mistakes

and she was gambling. Yeah, sloppy. Her manners got worse. Yeah, she's probably still letto-ing a lot of people now. Still letto-ing like five guys a night. So that's not helping the business. Sure.

But she can still bring it when she needed to. Okay. In Virginia City, Nevada, she went and set up shop. And one night she beat a famous prospector at poker. Okay. Quote,

Several of the prospector's friends intent on getting the miners' money back that had, that he had lost started after. She slowly backed up against one of the walls in the hall and started kidding the rowdy crowd. Kidding?

Yeah. Oh. But, you know, joking around. Okay, sure. Other patrons who had known L&R for years were witness to the ruckus-told Virginia City newspaper reporters that her wit again sparked

and there was a flash in her eyes. Okay. I love that someone. I seen her eye spark. I saw that old raccoon come out. So her eye sparked and then there was a flash.

And I can tell she's thinking shit. And I stood up on a chair and I go, She's back. Yeah. Yeah. That's Our lady's back.

She sometimes chised. A new cylinder just started faring. So it was like when, when cornered the old smart. Right. Madame Dubal. I don't want to say con man, con man type,

but it's not that. It's like. Her muscle memory kicked in. Yeah, whatever she had, she had a lot of things. Yeah. And in 1964, she's had up shop

in Bannock Montana, Montana. I would love it if you would call it Montana. Montana. Thank you. Ikebin quote, she had descended so much that Madame Dumont

of Nevada City days would have scorned with dignified blushes. Okay. So she's what she used to talk shit about. Right. She was now running brothels too.

She had sex workers in the rooms or gambling hall this way. If someone won, she could still get money. I mean, okay. That makes sense. It does make sense. Makes dollars too.

After a summer in Nevada, traveling to camps of workers building the Union Pacific Railroad. So, so she's not. She's partially responsible for the railroad. So,

but she's like she's, it's gone down from. Rolling into a place where they're digging gold out of the ground and giving it to her. To now she's just like, to workers who are,

I mean, these guys don't have a lot of money. They're fucking workers on a railroad. Right. So she's, she's trying to get squeeze money out of guys

who have no money. Right. And just going. It's less, it's less like of a long-term strategy. It's day to day. Yeah, it's day to day.

Yeah. Becoming methie. That rumor started that she had bought a farm. And then it was learned she had a new husband, Jack McKnight. Jack McKnight said he was

a cattle buyer. She was very taken by him. Who wouldn't be? He turned out to be a conman. It's a conman on farmers only, it sounds like. Yeah. He turned out to be,

he turned out to be a conman. Yeah, he turned out to be a conman. He had been swindling for years and he took her, he sold her land and left. Ah, wow. Damn it.

That's a rough one. That's tough. Because that was the retirement plan. Yeah, yeah. Some historians say she confessed to killing him later in life,

but there's no record of that. I love, I do love the later in life confession. Yeah. I would, it would be, I mean, it's gotta be crazy your whole life to be like,

I did kill that person, but then eventually just be like, by the way, I did it. Every, every person before they die, should have to write out a confession

of all the shit they did. Oh, that's very true. And she should just be unsealed. Yeah. And then you die and then everyone gets and just goes, oh. Oh my God.

Grandpa was a fucking murderer. What the fuck? Why not? I've made life so much more. Yeah. And you're not there anymore? Yeah. Yeah, I agree.

I'm also, I'm just thinking of all the fun stuff to make up. There's treasure. I would send people on a treasure hunt. No questions asked. I'd be like, you've got to find it

before the Clarksons do. That's a family I've been competing with my whole life. Find this treasure. Um, look, there's no record that she killed him,

but she did publicly vow to kill her ex if she found him. So, whatever. She confessed to it. Um, she fell into a relationship

after this with a guy named McHarnie. McHarnie. Mm-hmm. Uh, they ran a gambling house together in Montana. Uh,

sorry, Montana. Montana. Now, another guy in McFarland wanted to take McHarnie's place.

Okay. Sure. The old McSwitch. The McSwitch, a Mac in the Mick. Yeah. One night, McFarland got really drunk

and shot McHarnie. Okay. And killed him. Okay. Well, there we go. Now,

even though McHarnie had been a good business partner and her boyfriend. Mm-hmm. She didn't protest. Mm-hmm. She was like, yeah,

all right, this is business. All right. Well, you won. Well done. Well, you fired him.

There we are. Yeah. Uh, she just removed his body and then she bailed McFarland out. Oh, my God. And let him take over

the gambling joints. Christ. You're the alpha. Normally, somebody gets punished. He's like, that went really well. She saw it.

She's like, oh, this is like Silverback apes. Yeah, right, man. Uh, and then, but then she left.

She's like, fuck all that. I mean, she was probably just like, he can have it. Fuck this shit. Man. And she,

I think she leaves it like, he ended up just running into the ground. Great. Um, and there's nothing she could do about it at that point. She probably felt like

I can't do anything about this anyway, because he just killed my business partner. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so she's not,

that's a tone. She's not slowing down as he ages. She opened a two-story place in Eureka, Nevada. There she was known for being gracious,

wearing a giant gold brooch and sporting a mustache. Okay. So it's, she's found the look. Yeah. What are you going to do?

Leave it in. You got to fuck a mustache. What are you going to do? Fuck it. Fuck it. I love it. If you're, if you're a woman

and you don't want a mustache, if you shave it, it just comes back like a, it comes in more and more. Yeah. It comes in more and more. You shave it. Back then,

back then you didn't really have it. You can dye it, but who knows? I mean, I think that's what she was doing before. There's a waxing. I don't know if they did that.

Maybe they did. Oh yeah. Back then, I like my mustache. You like me. Yeah. Yeah. Um,

so, she moves to Deadwood. Oh, Jesus Christ. Well, here we are. It's 1878. She's hoping to make some money

off of the miners and stuff. And now she has a real drinking problem. She's really drinking hard. Sure. I would say that it seems like the mustache and the drinking problem have gone hand in hand. A little bit.

As an owner of a mustache, I'm not going to lie. It doesn't help. Well, it seems like all this deterioration is a little associated with the drinking issue. Um,

so her gambling skills are noticeably deteriorating. She's out of money. Seems like they've deteriorated quite a bit. And her looks have faded a bit as she's aged. Sure.

She's filled out a bit, as people do when they get older. Uh-huh. Um, the mustache is clearly darkened. Uh-huh. But she tries to keep up with her parents as best she could,

but it's a hard life, and it's showing. Okay. Collins quote, as time went on and her wealth dissipated, she began making up her face and wore only cheap tinsel jewelry. And as her beauty went-

Tinsel. I'm New Year's the person. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. And as her beauty went, it was harder to charm the crassness out of the miners. Now they started cursing around her, and they would keep their hats on,

and they'd tell dirty jokes in front of her. So as, as she is physically changing, and it's such a, it's such a- Yeah. It's such a fucked up,

like they were super well behaved when she was a hot lady. Right. And now that I- And now, as she's noticeably going downhill, they're like- Yeah,

what about the guy who fucks the tree? She's like, excuse me, I don't know what's going on. Shut up. What do you know? You're basically one of us. You're pretty close to us now.

Over the years, her establishments were more and more second rate. Okay. She's no longer an exciting novelty because more and more women are coming into the mining camp. Right. So she's,

but she's the OG though. So she like set the foundation. But she's losing her value. Yeah, right. As far as like- Yeah. Supply and demand. Yeah, yeah, right.

That basic thing of like, hot lady in the camp. Is now a thing. Yeah. Yeah. It's sad. She only lasted in deadwood a few months. And then she moved to the mining town

of Bodie, California. Okay. Inmate. Now, Bodie, California is, I think people generally say the worst Western city in America ever. Awesome.

It's- Is that what the sign says when you're driving? Well, there- Should we go here? There's like a famous saying- We're in Bodie soon, aren't we? I think we should. Yeah, we're doing a show there.

It's kind of near Mono Lake. It's- Yeah, now it's just a ghost town. But you can go there and check it out. But there was a thing of like, a family had to move there. And the kid was like, I'm in Bodie.

I'd rather be in hell. Like a six-year-old wrote that. Oh my God. It's like the shining though. Yeah, I know. I got the quote wrong. Edobe. Edobe.

Edobe. Edobe. He's riding Bodie. So it might have been the craziest town in the whole while. It was. And it's a refuge for the worst of the worst. Okay. I get it.

Our listenership at Bodie's dropped dramatically. Eggman described it in the late 1870s. Townspeople quote, still strong enough in muscle, wits, and drinking capacity to raise hell. They raised it with the fervor of old graduates with the snorting pride of finished competence, the self-conscious determination to make the most

of a last license indulgence until the announcement, I'm a bad man from Bodie became the stock witticism of Main Street rakes and professional parlor cut-ups. So if you say you're a fucking asshole from Bodie, people are like, okay, that's the guys. That's the. Right. Yeah.

You look at your. Hell's angel in a mongrel. Right. Right. So she takes the Bodie right off the bat. Sure. Right in Collins quote, she flourished at the Magnolia Saloon for over a year

throughout the summer of 1879. It's time for a dolly stash, I think. But then after a year, things started to take a turn and Bodie became too hard even for Dumont. Personally and financially, she drank way too much. Okay. She made bad bets. She lost another fortune.

And then on September 8th, 1879, she bought $300 from a friend because she didn't have any more money for her pharaoh game and she lost it within a few hours. And then rose from the table and wandered outside. The next day, her body was found resting on a stone a mile outside of the next town, next to a bottle of Claret wine with morphine mixed into it. Oh, wow.

She had left a note that gave details about what to do with her remaining effects and that she was, quote, tired of life. She was 49 or 50 years old. Fuckin' A. That is not what I was picturing. Right? No.

I'm picturing 73. But yeah, but it's the hardest fucking line. Yeah. Also, morphine and wine sounds not only like a Good Stones album, also a great way to just go. Morphine and wine? Yeah. Yeah, nice, relaxed.

I would say that's a nice... Yeah, she too. Your last glass of rosé. Her death was real to suicide. The people of Bodie arranged and paid for her funeral. The Bridgeport Chronicle... That's pretty good for Bodie, I would say. Yeah, it is.

The Bridgeport Chronicle Union, quote, it is said that of the hundreds of funerals held in the mining camp, Vada Madame Moustache was the largest. Madame Moustache? The gamblers of the place buried her with all honors and carriages were brought from Carson City, Nevada, a distance of 120 miles, especially to be used in the funeral cortege.

Wow. She... Yeah, okay, so I want to thank Melanie Griffin for the research sources. Duncan Aikman, Six Madame Moustache, and some gaming ladies, Jan Michael Collins, Good Time,

Girls of California, a red light history of the Golden State. There's some other ones, Ralph Estes, Aces and Aites, Poker in the Old Wild West, Michael Appointe, Dice Roll, Madame Moustache, Madame Moustache in the Pioche Weekly, and then there's Ralph Mann,

Frontier Opportunity, and the new Social History. And there's other ones, go check them out. That's crazy. It's a... Yeah. It's such a crazy... It's interesting to see how a woman

could penetrate the male hierarchy. Really, not that it should be complicated, but you would just think that more people would be able to hack the brains of these fucking monkeys. You know? Well, but I also think because of the way society was and the way... Sure, there were sex workers out there,

but the society, you would have to be able to handle being frowned upon in that people would just be like, Jesus Christ, she's out there with the fucking miners. But she was like, no, this is the best way to make money and have a good time. Well, it's almost like she had a podcast audience.

She was like, she just had a demo, and she's like, yeah, fucking judge me or whatever, and it worked. And a lot of that, I bet you a lot of... Well, it was uncouth probably to be like that. There were probably a lot of people who were jealous, too, who were just like, oh, that's such an easy grift.

Easy. Yeah, just an easy way to like... And then she had the... And if she'd stayed sober, probably would have just, you know... She had the... What was I gonna fucking say? She had the gift of...

Oh, she had the French thing going on, so exotic, different, the flavor of the time sort of... Yeah, it really beat a lot of odds. It did. There would normally be a lot of X's on her, but she was able to just say, fuck it, and just was herself.

Yeah, she was smart. Smart as fuck. And then it's just so funny. Reminds me a lot of you. Reminds me a lot of you. Whatever happened to the guy who wanted to show everyone his penis, do you have an update on him at the end of the story? He became governor.

Oh, my God, that's awesome. We promise to get more jobs here, and everyone today will see my penis. It's a three-day hike. Like many of you, I started out in either a badger hole or a coyote hole. I don't even remember which animal I fought off. I think it was a coyote, because a badger will keep coming.

A honey badger don't give up. And I only had to fight for two nights. I fought off one species, and I had sex with the other. And I don't know which is which. Both give me that I look like a bandit. Anyway, I'm gonna be an amazing governor. Forgot about that for a minute, didn't I? Whoopsie-daisy.

Holes for everybody. Yeah. All right. All right, well. All right. I hope everybody's happy. I'm happy. Thank you.

Thank you for this.