A frustrated but well-connected wife, Emilie Kampmann stood before a Bexar County, Texas court in July of demanding a divorce from her deviant spouse Gustav Kampmann who frequented houses of prostitution regularly. The humiliating revelations illuminate a period of tension in San Antonio history in which prostitution and proper society clashed and people disputed whether the trade was a necessary evil aspect of urban life or whether it debased urban life and society. The documentation of prostitution existed in San Antonio de Bexar as early as [3].
However, the first house of prostitution to appear in what was later designated as the red-light district was noted in , and in twenty years, grew to well over one hundred brothels.
Yet exactly how much autonomy bawdy houses possessed, and how rigorously the city of San Antonio tried to control and regulate them, remains unclear. Previous scholarship on the history of prostitution in San Antonio tends to rely solely on the blue book as irrefutable evidence and ignores other municipal documentation, such as city council minutes, city ordinances and newspaper accounts. The history and autonomy of bawdy houses in San Antonio from its legal status from to and quasi-legal status from to the beginning of World War II.
The study of prostitutes and sexuality is not uncharted ground for scholars. Between the s and mids, a plethora of books and articles devoted their content specifically to this topic. Although Bowser does utilize Sanborn Fire Insurance maps and lists the San Antonio Light newspaper in his bibliography, his lack of citations make it hard to ascertain the accuracy of his accounts.
Selcer utilizes sources such as city council minutes, court documents and newspaper accounts. In the introduction of his monograph, Selcer voiced concern over the lack of verifiable historical information regarding prostitution in Fort Worth. He claimed:. The problem with getting into the historical roots is that the historical viewpoint languishes while mythology is self-perpetuating. Over the years, a succession of journalists and amateur historians and local characters have contributed to the mythology.
