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Pauline: The Madam on Clay Street

April 11, 2024|Sam Terry's Kentucky Blog


Pauline Martin Tabor Webster


April 11, 1905 - the birthday of Pauline Martin Tabor Webster of Bowling Green. During the Great Depression, Pauline found herself a divorcee with two young boys to rear and lackluster results from selling cosmetics door-to-door. Once a Sunday School teacher, Pauline visited a house of prostitution in Tennessee to learn about the management of such an establishment. After some early efforts in other towns, Pauline returned to her hometown and set up business at 627 Clay Street, where her business attracted military leaders, businessmen, political figures, farmers, and more than a few college students. Pauline prided herself on offering complete discretion to her clientele.

Pauline’s clientele understood that if the milk can was on the front porch, the house was open for business while the milk can in the driveway invited you to return at another time as the house was closed. Known for her shrewdness, political knowledge, and business savvy Pauline presided over one of the three longest-running brothels in the United States. She didn’t hire common hookers, but lookers and saw that they were stylishly dressed, tested regularly for STDs, and were paid well and fairly. In 1972, she told the New York Times that her business helped a lot of people, specifically preventing young men from forcing themselves on their girlfriends, saved old men from getting involved with their secretaries or their children’s babysitters, and saved everybody from getting V.D. The success of the business allowed Pauline to reputedly deposit $5,000 in her bank account each week.




In 1971, Pauline published her memoirs, PAULINE’S: MEMOIRS OF A MADAM, which brought international attention. Maintaining complete discretion, Pauline skillfully changed names, personalities, and the chronology of her years as a madam as she wrote her book. She became a popular subject of interviews around the country and was a guest on the Dick Cavett Show promoting her book. Hundreds of thousands of readers purchased the standard hardbound edition but for $25, one could purchase the red velvet cover edition which included a lock and key.




While her profession was frowned upon, Pauline was widely known for her generosity to the needy. Long before modern charities held coat drives, Pauline anonymously bought coats for children in need and provided food for needy families. Through the years, Pauline became an avid collector of fine antiques including early Kentucky furniture, Tiffany lamps, and fine glassware.


A brick from the dismantled Clay Street house.


After 38 years in business, Pauline’s fell victim to urban renewal and the business was closed. The brick house at 627 Clay Street was dismantled and every brick was sold, each now a coveted possession. Pauline retired to her farm where she became one of Kentucky’s first organic farmers, went fishing every morning, raised orchids and peacocks, visited the sick, became a guest lecturer at colleges, and found religion. Pauline Martin Tabor Webster died June 11, 1992.

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