A Business Doing Pleasure

A Business Doing Pleasure

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The Author: Dr. Heather Branstetter 

A Silver Valley native, Heather Branstetter graduated summa cum laude with a BA in English and philosophy from the University of Idaho before completing a PhD in rhetoric, writing and cultural studies at the University of North Carolina. She taught at the University of Idaho, the University of North Carolina and Wake Forest University and was assistant professor of rhetoric and writing at the Virginia Military Institute. Dr. Branstetter now lives in Wallace, Idaho, where she is executive director of the Historic Wallace Preservation Society.

Heather’s Bio

Project Description

This site explores the history of Wallace, Idaho, a town with a remarkable past. My research uncovers Wallace’s transition from a major silver mining hub to a town known for its unique underground economy of gambling and brothels. My work discusses how these aspects shaped the town’s identity and values, surviving societal changes and economic challenges. This site presents a journey through Wallace’s history, highlighting how the community’s collective identity was influenced by its mining town heritage as it transitioned from selling sex to selling the past.

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Selling Sex in the Silver Valley

A Business Doing Pleasure

Book Cover: Selling Sex in the Silver Valley A Business Doing Pleasure

Once the largest silver producer in the world, Wallace became notorious for labor uprisings, hard drinking, gambling and prostitution. As late as 1991, illegal brothels openly flourished because locals believed that sex work prevented rape and bolstered the economy, so long as it was regulated and confined to a particular area of town.

The madams enjoyed unprecedented status as influential businesswomen, community leaders and philanthropists, while elsewhere a growing aversion to the sex trade drove red-light districts underground. Dr. Heather Branstetter’s research features previously unpublished archival materials and oral histories as she relates the intimate details of this unlikely story.

  • interviews and event dates

    June 2, 2017

    KXLY TV (channel 4) news came over from Spokane to chat with me about the project. The show will broadcast tonight between 6:00-7:00 pm… Here’s the teaser: I’ll post the online version of that interview when it goes up, too. You can also watch KXLY’s Facebook video preview here: Below is an interview I did with […]

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  • buy my book!

    buy my book!

    May 18, 2017

    The publisher ran out of my book before it even came out. That means that the book sold around 1,000 copies before its official release day even arrived. This is a good thing, I keep reminding myself as I’m pushing the prepaid preorders out the door. Get your own personalized, signed copy! As of May […]

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  • reading and signing events in wallace

    April 23, 2017

    I just wanted to spread the word on a few local reading and signing events coming up. My first event will be in the Wallace Brewing Company‘s tasting room on Bank Street, Friday, May 19 at 7 pm. Please join us for a reading, question and answer session, and signing/meet-and-greet. Plus, there will be delicious […]

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  • *buy my book here!*

    *buy my book here!*

    March 30, 2017

    It’s finally here! My book, Selling Sex in the Silver Valley: A Business Doing Pleasure, is now available! Order a personalized, signed copy for $25.00. Thank you for supporting my work!

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  • i wish i could have met dolores

    i wish i could have met dolores

    January 24, 2016

    Dolores’s story, like her identity, an invented persona she assumed for forty years is a mix of fact and fiction that became its own reality.

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  • reading at the wallace brewery—7:00 pm on jan 13, 2016

    January 6, 2016

    A week from today, I’ll be reading an excerpt from my work on the history of sex work in the Silver Valley! Please come join us at the Wallace Brewery (610 Bank St., Wallace, Idaho) on Wednesday, January 13, beginning at 7:00 pm. I’m actually the opening act for the Idaho-raised author, Keith Lee Morris, […]

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  • a business doing pleasure

    a business doing pleasure

    October 24, 2015

    It’s about the size of a book or iPad, understated for a woman who was the most famous and beloved madam in Wallace’s history.

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  • a reminder, on the 24th anniversary of the fbi raid

    a reminder, on the 24th anniversary of the fbi raid

    June 23, 2015

    …what you really ought to do is get up there and get to know these folks. Get to know why they do what they do. Get to know the history of the community. Get to know why they have to have poker machines in their bars to survive. You know I said, ‘It’s a different world up there, and maybe that will help you understand this, and maybe we can get this case dismissed.’

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  • updates and progressive era reform tidbits

    updates and progressive era reform tidbits

    June 19, 2015

    And in Wallace, the economic symbiosis of the brothels and local government would ultimately increase as a result of this propaganda campaign.

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A Business Doing Pleasure

A Business Doing Pleasure

Selling Sex in the Silver Valley, 1884-1991


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