Sex Work in Early Spokane

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This building once housed one of the many popular brothels in the city of Spokane. One young prostitute, by the name of Abbie Widner, worked in this location that was then known as The Colonial Hotel.

The Colonial was a three-story brick building with the first floor occupied by hairdressers and the next two by a popular brothel. Between drug use and the visits from her "clients," Widner spent her remaining time writing to her boyfriend in Seattle. She wrote of how she missed him and how she despised the way that she was living. Sometimes she would brag about a large amount of money she had been making, but this was immediately followed by her saying that every time a man touched her she "wants to stab him in the heart."

Spokane's incredible early growth (which dwarfed other west coast cities) was due to the abundance of natural resources in the area, which brought miners, businessmen, railroad workers, loggers, and farmers to the city. This influx of population was largely young working men looking to spend their hard-earned money in the city. This polarization of males and females created a large market for prostitution. When these men were not spending their money in brothels and saloons, they frequented hotels, clothing stores, and restaurants. For this reason, prostitution was vital in the initial boost of Spokane's population and economy.

The city profited directly from sex work as well. Spokane levied fines up to ninety dollars on working women, in addition to a heavy tax on prostitution.

In recent decades, historians have changed the narrative around sex work in western cities. "Prostitutes of the American West were far from fallen women—many were savvy entrepreneurs," writes historian Erin Blakemore. "Often, sex workers saw the West as a place of opportunity, one where they could work their way out of the profession entirely due to high demand and high revenues." Historian Paula Petrik's study of Helena sex workers called them “Capitalists with Rooms." Many sex workers left the profession, married, and settled into respectable lives. Others used the capital they raised to start small businesses or to buy real estate.

Certainly, that was Widner's plan. "Kid, I am tired of this life I am living," she told her boyfriend in one letter. "I won't always be a sport, so help me God I won't, if I have to wash for a living... Sweetheart, some day we are going to be happy." Did she achieve her goal?

In 1906 an Abbie Widner was married in Spokane, to W. A. Wyer. She was 26 and he was 40. When Abbie Wyer died in 1964 at the age of 84, her occupation was listed as "housewife." Abbie's story has a happy ending.

The fine system ended in 1910 after the business community finally stopped pushing for its resumption. This made it possible for the prostitutes to be prosecuted instead of simply fined and it eventually brought an end to an era of open prostitution in Spokane.