This is a map of Tombstone and its mines around the year 1881. I got this map from my second novel, Tombstone's Treasure: Silver Mines and Golden Saloons by Sherry Monahan. Though I am currently behind in my reading and posting on said reading, I believe this map shows a glimpse of life in a boomtown. The city itself only has 10 streets, but those streets held saloons, a hotel, a meat market, supply shops, a school, 2 newspapers, and 2 stagecoach companies had stops there.
For those who don't know, Tombstone is locate around 70 miles southeast of Tucson, 50 miles north of Mexico, and around 50 miles west of the Arizona/New Mexico border. Even today it is pretty isolated from other cities. Back then boomtowns were like their own little worlds, with their own laws, traditions, and lifestyles.
The city of Tombstone only covers 4 and a half square miles. Life in a boomtown must have been like life in a small town with a big city's pride. When it was in its prime, the Tucson's Arizona Daily Star said Tombstone was "probably one of the most cosmopolitan camps this coast affords. Creed, color, and condition are not considered.", and the Arizona Quarterly Illustrated magazine said, "If the town grows as it has in the past, and the prospects are fair that Tombstone will become an important point, as the mines attract population and capital to develop the wealth that lies waiting the porspector." I imagine this made the people of Tombstone very proud of their town, but I imagine word spread very fast in the city, and nothing was really kept secret.
Life in 4.5 square mile Tombstone must have been hard. Working in the mines was dangerous and entailed long, hard hours, lawlessness ran rampant, and someone who was an outcast wouldn't be able to stay in town easily.
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