Dora DuFran
1868-1934. Brothel owner and Calamity Jane's biographer
Dora DuFran was born Amy Helen Dorothy Bolshaw on November 16, 1868, in Liverpool, England. Records give the spelling of her middle name variously. Her father was a butcher, and the family emigrated soon after her birth, settling first in Bloomfield, New Jersey, and by 1880 in Lincoln, Nebraska.
To Deadwood
Claims about her teenage years are hard to pin down. The Liverpool Footprint local-history site says she chose prostitution as a career at thirteen, and Wikipedia marks the same claim as unsupported. She arrived in Deadwood at about fifteen, around 1883 or 1884, and went into the brothel trade. Her main rival in town is named as Mollie Johnson.
The business
She married Joseph DuFran, a gambler who became her business partner. They built up several houses in South Dakota and Montana, including at Lead, Miles City, Sturgis and Deadwood. The best known was “Diddlin’ Dora’s” in Belle Fourche. She also owned the Green Front Hotel. After Joseph died in 1909, she moved her business to Rapid City.
One popular tale credits her with coining the word “cathouse.” The evidence suggests the word was in use before her career, so this is one to drop.
Calamity Jane
Her lasting importance to history is her connection with Martha Canary. DuFran employed her at various times, and when Canary returned to the Hills in poor health late in 1902, DuFran took her in to work at the Belle Fourche house. Canary died that August.
In 1932, under the pseudonym “d’Dee,” DuFran published a twelve-page booklet, Low Down on Calamity Jane. An expanded edition, edited by Helen Rezatto, came out in 1981. It comes from someone who knew her, and it should be read as one person’s memoir.
Afterward
She died of heart failure on August 5, 1934, at about 65, and was buried at Mount Moriah Cemetery beside her husband. Her pet parrot, Fred, is reported to be buried with them. She appears in Larry McMurtry’s novel Buffalo Girls, and the character Joanie Stubbs in HBO’s Deadwood is loosely based on her.