Liquor stores and saloons were doing three times their normal business. And at the Police Gazette building a riot was under way. Better than a thousand “sporting men” having responded to publisher Richard Fox’s invitation, the place was packed to the rooftop. Already the “guests” had consumed several hundred bottles of champagne and whiskey, devoured a barbecued ox, and were busily smashing up the furniture for fun when the police arrived to clear the building.
