Our History

In 1971, Dee Schafer bought the building and became the first-or-second woman to receive a non-restricted gaming license in the state of Nevada. The Mark Twain Saloon of the 40s and 50s was no longer there; instead, the Brown family of fortune tellers rented the premises. Dee Schafer had just recently purchased Nevada’s first newspaper, the Territorial Enterprise. Samuel Clemens took his non-de-plume while working there as a reporter from 1862-64. It was because of this association that she decided to name the saloon the Mark Twain. It was much to her chagrin that on her opening celebration old-timers brought in various souvenirs from decades before. So, Mark Twain Saloon & Casino was meant to be and has been in continuous operation under the Schafer family for over 50 years.

Today the Mark Twain is Virginia City’s preferred stop for 24 hour gambling. It features an exceptionally convivial staff as a player’s club with many promotions to benefit the gambler.

THE FASCINATING HISTORY

OF THE MARK TWAIN SALOON

The Mark Twain Saloon & Casino was built in 1863 and is one of less than 10 percent of buildings that survived the “Great Conflagration” (fire) of 1875. It has almost always been a saloon, but not named the Mark Twain until the mid-1950s when operated by Ed Colletti and Don Magiurk—an Italian and an Irishman—two ethnic groups out of many more than made up Virginia City’s population in its heyday almost a century previous.

The Face

UPON THE BAR ROOM FLOOR

THE FACE UPON THE BARROOM FLOOR is mentioned quite a few times in American folklore, but we may have the face that started it all! Ours may not be the one that later ended up in popular songs and poems, but the face painted on the floor of the Mark Twain Saloon & Casino might just have the most famous subject: beloved courtesan Julia Bulette. The artist was rumored to be none other than the man that they say eventually took her life — a French drifter named John Millian.

JULIA BULETTE

BELOVED QUEEN OF THE COMSTOCK

JULIETTE “JULIA” BULETTE as one of Virginia City’s more colorful, and beloved, figures. Comstock tradition holds that Bulette was a native of England, but recent historical research has discovered that Bulette was born in Mississippi. She found herself in New Orleans by the late 1830s and eventually made her way to California. In the late-1850s she had arrived in Virginia City, following the Comstock silver strike that turned the area into a boomtown. Jule, or Julia as she became known, was a favorite “accommodating woman” among the mostly single male populace. Described as a beautiful, tall, and slim brunette with dark eyes, she was said to be refined in manner with a humorous, witty personality. She was a friend to the miners who adored her – one having described her as having “caressed Sun Mountain with a gentle touch of splendor”. In 1861, the firefighters made her an honorary member of Virginia Engine Number 1 and elected her Queen of the Independence Day Parade. Since the firefighters of Company 1 were mostly the elite of Virginia City, in spite of her status as a woman of the town, she had achieved a considerable degree of respectability. On January 19, 1867, Julia Bulette dressed and went to see a performance at Piper’s Opera House. Despite her popularity, “polite” society still made sure she knew her place. As the story goes, when Ms. Bulette refused to sit in the curtained section reserved for women of the red light district, she was escorted out of the theater. The following morning, a neighbor alerted citizens that she had found Julia cruelly murdered in her home on North D Street. The town was shocked by the violent act, and the citizenry demanded a prompt search for the killer.

THE FUNERAL

OF JULIA

JULIA BULETTE’S FUNERAL was held at No. 1’s Engine House the morning of Jan. 21, 1867 with Pastor William Martin giving her eulogy. Her ornate casket was borne from there to her grave that afternoon – but, again, “polite” society kept her at a distance even in death. Julia was buried in a lonely grave a half-mile east of town at Flowery Hill, just beyond St. Mary’s hospital, where she remains in a location lost to time. A simple wooden board with the name “Julia” was left to mark the final resting place of Virginia City’s “Queen of the Red Lights”. Saloons throughout the city were closed as a sign of respect.

JOHN MILLIAN

CHARGED WITH MURDER

A crowd of some 10,000 people turned out to watch the “stupendous hanging” of Millian – just over a year after Julia’s tragic murder. Among the observers was Mark Twain, who had been a reporter for Virginia City’s Territorial Enterprise from 1861 to 1864 and was back in town as a lecturer at Piper’s Opera House. Twain related the grisly story of the first public hanging in Nevada in a dispatch to the Chicago paper, the Chicago Republican. The noted humorist’s humor was notably absent in this particular tale.

GUILT

OR INNOCENCE?

There have been questions over whether Millian did the dirty deed, over what may have been his motive, and whether his command of English was such that he even understood the courtroom procedures. He was a veteran of the Crimean War and war can do things to a man. Millian himself maintained his innocence to his dying day, vacillating between admitting to being a lookout and saying he was framed. It is always possible that he was in the wrong place at the wrong time and had an unrequited love for the Soiled Dove.

It is not hard to believe that a broken and lovesick man whiled away his evenings painting an image in tribute to his murdered lady-love, never knowing that he would be the one to pay the ultimate price for her demise. Or, just maybe, his passions ran away from him. Perhaps it was lust or greed; but guilt, ultimately, may have driven the Frenchman to immortalize Julia on the saloon floor. Whatever, the case, some time in those early Spring months of 1867, it seems a legend was frozen in time and became the “Face Upon the Barroom Floor”.