Sacramento’s Gold Rush Saloons: El Dorado in a Shot Glass

As early as 1839, Sacramento, California, was home to one ofthe most enduring symbols of the American West: the saloon. From theportability of the Stinking Tent to the Gold Rush favorite El Dorado GamblingSaloon to the venerable Suttera s Fort, Sacramento saloons offered not simply anip of whiskey and a round of monte but also operated as polling place, museum,political hothouse, vigilante court and site of some of the nineteenthcenturya s worst violence. From librarian James Scott and the SpecialCollections of the Sacramento Public Library comes a fascinating history of Sacramentosaloons featuring the advent of all types of gaming, the rise of local alcoholproduction and the color and guile of some of the regiona s most compellingpersonalities.