MARTIN GROSETTA

 

Adam S. Eterovich

 

Martin Grosetta from Dubrovnik, Dalmatia was proprietor of the Virginia Saloon in Virginia City in 1860.  This was one of the first of approximately fifty business in Virginia City at the time.  The Virginia Saloon was included in a prominent panorama of Virginia City. (1)

Martin had been in Mobile, Alabama in 1849 and had voted in that city prior to coming to the Pacific Coast to seek his fortune.  He was one of many who had been established in the South prior to coming West.

 

PICTURE VIRGINIA SALOON

 

In 1859 Martin had a coffee stand in San Francisco at the corner of Sacramento and East Streets.  He was in many business ventures during his lifetime in Virginia City and San Francisco.  A few of his ventures were:

          1860           Virginia City         19 B. St.                         Virginia Saloon

          1861           Virginia City         19 B. St.                         Virginia Saloon

          1862           Virginia City         19 B. St.                         Virginia Saloon

          1863           Virginia City         19 B. St.                         Virginia Saloon

          1864           Virginia City         19 B. St.                         Virginia Saloon

          1868           San Francisco       535 Sacramento St.       Wines-Liquors

          1872           San Francisco       803 Union St.                Saloon

          1878           San Francisco       527 Commercial St.       Oyster Saloon

          1883           San Francisco       1610 Hyde St.                Restaurant

          1884           San Francisco       1203 Polk St.                 Oyster Saloon

          1889           San Francisco       515 Clay St.                   Oyster Saloon

Martin was a citizen in 1849 at Mobile, Alabama and had voted in 1870 in San Francisco.  He was Godfather to a child of Vulicevich in 1876 at St. Mary’s Church in San Francisco.  He was also a member of the Slavonic Illyric Society of San Francisco. (2)

ADVERTISEMENT VIRGINIA SALOON

 

Martin appeared on the Census in 1880 in San Francisco with a wife named Maria, also from Dalmatia.  It is not known whether he had a family.

Martin was typical of the hardy Dalmatian pioneers who ventured into the gold and silver mining boom towns as saloonkeepers or merchants.

Martin had other brothers or relatives in San Francisco at the time because a John Grosetta with a large family in the early 1860’s and later a prominent commission merchant had a business on Kearny Street in 1858.

Another A. Grosetta had a fruit store at 311 Dupont Street in San Francisco in 1859.  This A. Grosetta became a very prominent citizen of Arizona.

 

1.  George D. Lyman, Saga of the Comstock Lode, 1934.

2.  St. Mary’s birth records for 1876, San Francisco.