Nevada History Lecture – To Control or To Ignore: The Virginia City Police Department, Journalists, and Smoking-Opium, 1875-1900
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December 7 @ 1:00 pm - 2:30 pm
$6.00
Nevada History Lecture
December 7, 2024
1:00 to 2:30pm
To Control or To Ignore: The Virginia City Police Department, Journalists, and Smoking-Opium, 1875-1900
Dr. Diana Ahmad
Curators’ Distinguished Teaching Professor Emerita of American history at Missouri University Science & Technology
NHS Q Book Review Editor
The Opium Debate Book
Summary of Talk
Interior VC Courthouse Jail, 1899. NHS ST-000908.
During the 1870s and 1880s, Virginia City regulated and often licensed entertainment facilities, such as saloons, cock and dog pits, and houses of ill-fame, while at the same time, it prohibited opium dens. Things changed in September 1876, when the community passed the nation’s first ordinance abolishing opium resorts. Violators could receive a fine of at least fifty dollars and/or ten days in jail. Journalists demanded that the local police force uphold the new ordinance and arrest the violators, as well as close the dens. Despite the demands, the Virginia City Chief of Police and his deputies decided to take a “night watchman” approach to law enforcement regarding the opium dens. They chose selective enforcement to keep Virginia City safe for its residents over the following the letter of the law. The journalists pushed the police to enforce the ordinance. How the police went about their tasks and what impact the journalists on the actions of the police are the subject of this talk.
Speaker Bio
Dr. Diana Ahmad is a Curators’ Distinguished Teaching Professor Emerita of American history at Missouri University of Science and Technology. She specializes in the history of the American West, with areas of interest in vice (smoking opium and prostitution), as well as animals on the overland trails. In addition, Ahmad researches the expansion of the United States into the Pacific. Ahmad is also the Book Review Editor for the Nevada Historical Society Quarterly. Currently, she is retired and working on a book about American tourists in the Pacific from 1880-1914. Ahmad received her Ph.D. from the University of Missouri in 1997 and her B.A. (1974) and M.A. (1979) from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
Dr. Diana Ahmad, historian
We will have Dr. Ahmad’s books available in our museum store for purchase.
Make sure to arrive early as we have limited seating available in our Event Space. Don’t forget, we provide free, temporary parking permits to make it easier to visit NHS!
