Madame Mustache Eleanor Dumont

A colorful character that once resided in Fort Benton, Montana is Madame Mustache Eleanor Dumont. I had never heard of her before but she sounds like a pistol. Don't know how the women of the town liked her, but the men did respect her gaming skills.




Eleanore Dumont, better known as Madame Mustache, was one of the first known professional blackjack players in American history and, for over three decades, made her name famous across the mining camps of the American West.
She was thought to have been born in New Orleans, Louisiana in about 1829 but, for whatever reasons, made her way west during the California Gold Rush. Known as Simone Jules, a petite and pretty French woman in her early twenties, she arrived in San Francisco in about 1849, where she soon established herself as a gambler, favoring the game of Vingt-et-un, which means “21,” the precursor of American Blackjack.



At times, Eleanore could be a tough, shrewd businesswoman, but she also possessed a good heart, often providing free meals and a place to stay for miners who needed it. While at Fort Benton, Montana, she was perpetuating her reputation working in what was known as “the bloodiest block in the West.” Here, on Front Street, the block contained more than a dozen saloons, dance halls, and brothels, where Eleanor had set up her table in a gambling den called “The Jungle.” In June, 1867, as she sat at her table dealing cards, she spied an incoming steamboat called the Walter B. Dance coming into to dock. Having heard a report that the boat was carrying smallpox aboard, she jumped up from her table, ran down the stairs and across the street to the levee, where she brandished two pistols, warning the captain not to stop.

When the rush was on in Deadwood, South Dakota, she was also present. While there, some say that she was friends with Calamity Jane and tried to teach her the finer points of poker. However, if this is true, her attempts failed, as Jane was always known to be a poor gambler. In 1877, a Deadwood reporter would say of her: “A character who attracts the attention of all strangers is ‘Mme. Mustache,’ a plump little French lady, perhaps forty years of age, but splendidly preserved.

She derives her name, which is the only one she is known by, from a dainty strip of black hair upon her upper lip. She deals her own game, and is quite popular with the boys, who treat her with marked respect. She has bright black eyes and a musical voice, and there is something attractive about her as she looks up with a little smile and says, ‘You will play, M’sieur?’” He continued by saying, “No one knows her history. She is said to be very rich.”