At the time of the Earps' arrival, Nome was two blocks wide and five miles long. The best accommodations Wyatt and Sadie could find was a wooden shack a few minutes from the main street, only slightly better than a tent. The river was an open sewer. Typhoid, dysentery and pneumonia were common. In September, Earp and partner Charles E. Hoxie built the Dexter Saloon in Nome, the city's first two-story wooden building and its largest and most luxurious saloon. The second floor had 12 "clubrooms" decorated with fine mirrors, thick carpets, draperies, and sideboards. Trading on Earp's name, the Dexter was a success. It was used for a variety of purposes because it was so large: with ceilings. Earp used the club rooms upstairs as a brothel, another fact that Sadie worked hard to see was omitted from stories about him. Sadie justified the services upstairs because the Dexter was a "better class" saloon and served an "important civic purpose".