E.B. Farnum
E.B. Farnum was born around 1828 in Massachusetts. Before coming to Deadwood, he and his wife Mary lived in Wisconsin with their three children.

E.B. Farnum, who opened a retail store, was one of the earliest businessmen to arrive in Deadwood Gulch. Realizing the value of commercial property in Deadwood, he secured claims on several Main Street lots beside his business property and his residence on Lower Main. To ensure that solid supply lines were open to Deadwood, Farnum and seven others started the Deadwood to Centennial Toll Road project, which was completed in the first week of August 1876. Farnum also was a member of the group of businessmen who established the initial value of gold dust as an instrument of commerce at $16 an ounce. He invested in several Deadwood area mining ventures such as the Laura Mine and the Prince Oscar Load.

Deadwood chose to install a provisional government since, as in most mining camps, no official government claimed jurisdiction over the people or the land. E.B. Farnum was chosen as chairman of the first Citizens Committee, and in an election for town commissioners in August 1876, he was elected mayor. The committee provided for the construction of a pest house (to isolate people with communicable diseases) and the cleaning of the streets and alleys. As mayor, Farnum worked to obtain official recognition by the Dakota Territorial government and some measure of protection by the army. He drafted a letter to General Crook thanking him for bringing troops to the Black Hills. Enclosed with the letter was a petition signed by Deadwood citizens requesting that the army build a fort near the Black Hills to protect Deadwood from “the murdering bands of Indians that surround us.” The letter prompted Gen. Crook to visit the town in late September 1876. In October, Farnum and the town commissioners drew up the first city charter, which established the town limits, defined the town offices, and set the mayor’s salary at $100 per year, the marshal’s at $150 per month, and the city clerk’s at $75 per month. All of the costs were to be defrayed through licenses issued to town businesses.

Farnum was the head of the school board that established the first school in Deadwood. He served as Justice of the Peace and performed Deadwood’s first “semi-legal” marriage joining Fannie Garrettson and Daniel Brown in civil matrimony in November 1876. Farnum acted as judge in numerous trials for people captured by vigilantes. Because his courtroom was not recognized by the Territorial government, detainees could not be sentenced to any prison time. Farnum only gave out two sentences; freedom or hanging. Horse thieves and cattle rustlers were hanged. Freedom was not necessarily a blessing, especially if the local vigilantes thought the sentence unjust.

The 1880 Federal Census did not list Farnum as a resident of Deadwood, and his ultimate fate is unknown.