BUTTE, Mont. (AP) - Ruby Garrett ran the last brothel standing in this mining town's once-lively red-light district with a reputation for kindness toward her girls, but the grandmotherly figure was also a husband-shooting, tax-evading madam who once said prostitution should be considered a commodity.
The first time Garrett went to prison, it was for shooting her husband five times in the middle of a card game in 1959. She killed him, she said, because he had abused her repeatedly.
She went to prison again in 1982 for failing to report her earnings. While she was investigated, the sheriff padlocked the doors of the Dumas Hotel in late 1981, marking the end of the brothel that had catered to the miners in the Montana boomtown since 1890.
Butte's last madam died Saturday at Crest Nursing Home at the age of 94, the Duggan-Dolan Mortuary confirmed Tuesday. The cause of her death was not immediately known.
Former Sheriff Bob Butorovich, who shut down the brothel, said prostitution became a fact of life in Butte with so many young, single miners. He said Garrett never held a grudge against him for closing down her establishment.
"She was a wonderful old gal," he said. "Part of Butte history is gone."