On January 26, 1910, temperance crusader Carry Nation brought her hatchet-era reputation to Butte. At sixty-three, she pushed into the Irish World, a notorious house in the red-light district, determined to smash the erotic paintings on its walls.

She did not get far. Madam Maloy met her at the door and physically threw the famous reformer out—local papers delighted in the well-placed kick that ended the raid. Butte’s open vice and copper wealth made it a ripe target for Nation’s national campaign, and an equally hard place to reform.

The clash lasted only minutes, but it captured the city’s character: rough, defiant, and unimpressed by outsiders who tried to tidy it up.