Prostitution, Polygamy, and Power reveals insights into the complex history of prostitution in Salt Lake City. After the transcontinental railroad opened Utah to large-scale emigration and market capitalism, hundreds of women in Salt Lake City began to sell sex for a living, and a few earned small fortunes. Businessmen and politicians developed a financial stake in prostitution, which was regulated by both Mormon and gentile officials.

Jeffrey Nichols examines how prostitution became a focal point in the moral contest between Mormons and gentiles and aided in the construction of gender systems, moral standards, and the city's physical and economic landscapes. Gentiles likened polygamy to prostitution and accused polygamous Mormons of violating Christian norms of family structure and sexual behavior. Defending their church and its ideals, Mormons blamed gentiles for introducing the sinful business of prostitution into their honorable city. Nichols traces the interplay of prostitution and reform from the 1890s, when the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints began to move away from polygamy, to World War I, when Mormon and gentile moral codes converged at the expense of prostitutes. He also considers how the conflict over polygamy distinguished Salt Lake City from other cities struggling to abolish prostitution in the Progressive Era.

Jeffrey Nichols is an associate professor of history at Westminster College in Salt Lake City.

Preface   vii
Abbreviations   ix
Introduction   1
1. "Celestial Marriage" vs. "Polygamic Lascivious Cohabitation"   9
2. "Women of the Town"   45
3. "The System in Vogue"   83
4. "An Extremely Clever Woman"   135
5. "The Future Occupants of the Houses of Ill-Repute"   178
Conclusion   213
References   219
Index   239
Illustrations follow page 82