A Celebrated Accommodation

The name sounds like this business must have been a saloon—and one that tolerated fairly loose moral standards, at that—but the truth is even more interesting. What Cheer House was a hotel with high standards that catered to male clientele only.  Women, even the wives or daughters of the registered guests, were not allowed to enter; and the sale of liquor on the premises was strictly prohibited.  

Built by its owner Robert Bline Woodward, the three-story hotel opened July 4, 1852, at the south-west corner of Sacramento and Leidesdorff Streets, not far from the wharves that jutted out into San Francisco Bay. Rates were reasonable for the topsy-turvy, inflationary times: one dollar a day for a private room, 50 cents and up for a shared room; and for another dollar per day, guests could dine in the hotel’s restaurant. Beds featured the best of curled hair mattresses.

Other amenities included a sitting room, a barber’s room, and—a luxury not found just anywhere in a gradually gentrifying, but still rough gold rush town—special rooms where registered guests could enjoy a free bath. Non-guests (male-only, of course) paid 25 cents for the privilege, unless they wanted a bath on a Sunday morning, in which case it cost 50 cents. 

Woodward had strict rules for conduct at What Cheer House. First, he never extended credit for rooms or food; guests paid cash, period. (Even so, word got out that Woodward had a soft heart. Often, he gave men who were broke--and asked for a bed or a meal on credit--fifty cents so the fellow could go to another inn.) Second, no alcohol would be sold on the premises; and the third rule prohibited the entrance of women in the hotel under any circumstances, which applied equally to hotel employees and staff. 

But, ... things happen. Rules get broken. Only three years after its opening, two incidents belied the mandate that prohibited females on the premises.

On August 1, 1855, a shocking affair involving an unfaithful wife occurred inside What Cheer House. Days earlier, in another town some 130 miles distant, Mrs. Mary Cuberly had deserted her husband and, taking $400 of the couples’ cash with her, ran away with her new love, Scott Farrish. The newspapers said Mr. Cuberly diligently searched for his missing wife and money with no success, until friends told him where she was. (The mystery: Just exactly how Mary Cuberly was able to not only get past hotel security but into a private room at What Cheer House, is unknown.)

Taking a riverboat to San Francisco and locating the hotel with no trouble, Mr. Cuberly went directly to the room occupied by the illicit lovers, where, by chance, Mary was alone. Right off, he began upbraiding her for her conduct, and was still in the midst of his tirade half an hour later, when Scott Farrish entered the room. Instantly, Mr. Cuberly pivoted and fired at Farrish twice, striking him above the hip bone--though, as it turned out, Farrish was not seriously wounded. The police came, and took both Mary Cuberly’s lawful husband, and her paramour, into custody. It was reported that she screamed loudly all the while the police were present.

Nearly two months later, in much happier circumstances; but, nevertheless still a violation of the rules, Mr. John Farrell of Tuolumne County and Miss Margaret Marsh of Kentucky were married in What Cheer House on October 26, 1855, in a ceremony officiated by Reverend Lawrence Ryan. It was never made public who allowed this second, blatant disregard of the rules; but we might believe that these two incidents were the only times women were inside What Cheer House while Robert Woodward was alive.

Popular from the very start, What Cheer House became even more so after Woodward established a couple of novelties on the premises, free to his paying guests: In 1856, a library; and in 1860 a museum that showcased the oddities sailors brought Woodward from all over the globe, combined with items from his own travels. Toward the end of the decade, newspaper advertisements for an in-house laundry appeared regularly:

BE CHEERFUL

And send your washing to the

WHAT CHEER LAUNDRY

WHAT CHEER HOUSE

The only reliable institution of the kind

That delivers laundry on short notice

Gents’ shirts and collars neatly polished,

And all buttons sewed on

What Cheer Laundry served hotel guests and the general public alike. In keeping with hotel policy, all advertisements carried this last line: No credit given.

In 1862, the hotel expanded with the addition of a five-story building right next door, designed in the same style as the original, three-story structure.

Robert Woodward, later more famous for his spectacular, entertaining, and curiosity-filled “Woodward Gardens” than for What Cheer House, died in August 1879, although ownership of the hotel remained in the family. By the late 1890s, however, What Cheer House only occupied its 1862 five-story addition, because the hotel’s original three-story building had been replaced with a four-story structure, and a new owner. What Cheer House, along with a third of San Francisco, was destroyed in the massive 1906 earthquake and fires.

The former location of What Cheer House was officially recognized as an important historical site with the placement of a plaque at the southwest corner of Sacramento and Leidesdorff Streets in 1959— now the city’s financial district—identifying it as California Historical Landmark No. 650.