By: Stan Jordan
From its founding, Dodge City had a reputation for corruption and was often labeled the wickedest city in America.
The Dodge City Gang dominated the law enforcement and monopolized the whiskey trade, but in 1879 the anti-gang supporters won on election for Ford County defeating a popular member, Bat Masterson. They called themselves reformers, but that was name only. They only wanted the take from the whiskey trade.
Mayor Algonzo Webster owned two of the saloons himself. He also fired Bat’s brother, Jim, a city marshall, and that caused trouble with the mayor and the Mastersons.
In 1883 a friend, Luke Short, bought half interest in the Long Branch Saloon.
The mayor passes a law making prostitution illegal in Dodge City and arrested several girls from Short’s saloon and Short was banished from town as an undesirable.
Short and Masterson called in some favors from some old friends. The eight men, later called ‘The Peace Commission’ walked up Front Street into Short’s saloon. The mayor was scared by that show of force and negotiated peace. Short returned to the Long Branch Saloon in exchange for a promise that there would be no violence. Later that year Short went to Fort Worth.
The Peace Commission’s presence was enough. They were all gun slingers.
See ya!
