Subject: Re: Hangtown Fry

From: [email-masked] (Mark Shanks)
Date: 1 Mar 1995 03:21:23 GMT

[email-masked] (Bruce R. Fortnum) wrote:

>Some of the lucky and smart immigrants made fortunes and became 
respectable. 
>They built mansions on Nob Hill and formed the San Francisco Vigilance
>Committee to rid the city of its worst criminals and to put a lid on 
the
>soaring crime rate.  They became known at 'the Vigilantes' and were not
>loved.  The Barbary Coast was their favoured hunting ground.

Huh?  The Committee of Vigilence not loved?  By whom?  "The Sidney Ducks,
" confidence artists, crimps, pimps and other "street pirates?"  The 
corrupt federal judges and city government?  Or the Federal troops who 
found themselves called on to protect the judges?  (Including a young Lt. 
W.T. Sherman... <G>)  In fact, the Committee ("Fiat Justitia : Ruat 
Coelum") which at its height numbered more than 1000 of the upper and 
middle class of SF was a MOST popular organization....and compitition was 
fierce to gain membership, as it implied that one was a solid citizen and 
member of the community.  

>The Vigilantes were effective, though.  So much so that San Francisco 
became
>known as Hang Town.

Could you cite some primary period source of this cannard?  As the 
Committee's favorite punishment was exile (sometimes after being ridden 
out of town on a rail), not hanging....and they strictly followed the 
rule of law appointing council and a jury for any accused (which OFTEN 
voted to aquit!), this seems a great streach.....and much more likely a 
story composed much after the fact.

>Thus Hang Town fry was invented in Peter parker's saloon.  Story goes 
that a
>miner who struck it rich ordered the most expensive items in Parker's 
saloon
>to be fried up in celebration - eggs, oysters and champagne.

Another problem....  While eggs and champagne were darn near worth their 
weight in gold, oysters were not exactly in short supply.  There was a 
booming oyster fishery in SF bay (primarily centered around the Oakland 
mudflats), which leads me to suspect that if there is a grain of truth to 
this story, it happened at some far INLAND location.....not beside SF bay.

Sorry, while I love a good Hangtown Fry, I think your story has some 
major holes in it as the origin of the name....

-
  MARK SHANKS  [email-masked]
  
 Sure, I'm living in the past...  I'm a historian!

---

From: [email-masked] (Suzanne Houghton)
Date: Wed, 01 Mar 95 19:58:48 GMT

According to the recipe for Hangtown Fry in my Sunset Cookbook,
Hangtown was a nickname for Placerville, California, in the Gold Rush
days.

TPK