The Bucket of Blood Saloon in Holbrook, Arizona got its name from a card game that left two men dead on the floor. The stone building where it happened still stands downtown.
It opened in 1888 as the Cottage Saloon. The new name stuck so well that the street out front carries it today.
We live and work in Holbrook, so we pulled together everything we could verify. That means the shooting, the people involved, the dates that don’t agree, what became of the building and how to see it on your trip.
Along the way we’ll separate the documented history from the stories that grew around it. The real version holds up just fine on its own.
How the Bucket of Blood Saloon Got Its Name
The short answer is that two men were shot to death during a card game inside. Afterward, people said there was enough blood on the floor to fill a bucket.
The longer answer comes from Albert E. Potter, whose account the Navajo County Historical Society kept in its files.
The card game at the Cottage
According to Potter, a cowboy named Joe Crawford rode into a cattle camp just west of Holbrook with a gambler named George Bell. A herd was being held there for shipment, and Crawford was badly shot up.
Bell explained what happened.
The two of them had been playing cards at the Cottage with Ramon Lopez and his partner. Then a disagreement broke out over the game.
Lopez hit Crawford over the head with his gun. Crawford drew his own six-shooter and killed Lopez, and after several more shots he had killed Lopez’s partner too.
Where the dead men had lain, enough blood stained the floor to have filled a bucket. It was renamed the “Bucket of Blood” soon after.
Vada Carlson’s 1973 history, Highlight of Early Holbrook, tells it more simply. In her version, two men died in their own blood on the saloon floor.
The place was dubbed the Bucket of Blood on the spot. She added that the name seemed to suit the time and place, and it’s hard to argue with her.
Was the shooter really Grat Dalton?
You’ll hear this one in videos and on a few travel sites. The claim is that “Joe Crawford” was an alias for Grat Dalton of the Dalton Gang.
Potter himself came to believe it. It makes a great story, since the Daltons were among the most famous outlaws in the West.
Here’s what is certain.
Grat Dalton died on October 5, 1892, when the gang tried to rob two banks at once in Coffeyville, Kansas.
What isn’t certain is whether he was ever in Holbrook. We found no court record or newspaper from the time that puts him at the Cottage.
So we treat it as a legend worth telling, not as a fact.
Did it happen in 1886 or 1891?
Most websites and travel guides put the shooting in 1886.
However, the building’s 1997 nomination to the National Register of Historic Places gives a different year. It says the saloon was known informally as the Bucket of Blood “after an 1891 double murder.”
The 1886 date has another problem. That same nomination says Byron Terrill didn’t build the stone saloon until 1888.
So either the Cottage did business somewhere else before 1888, or the 1886 date is simply wrong. We couldn’t find a newspaper account of the night itself, which is why the question is still open.
Not the Bucket of Blood Saloon in Virginia City
Found reviews of a working bar when you searched? Then you probably landed on the Bucket of Blood in Virginia City, Nevada.
That saloon’s building went up in 1876 after a big fire, and it still pours drinks today. The name was popular in the Old West, so more than one town ended up with a Bucket of Blood.
Holbrook’s is the Arizona one, on Route 66. Nobody has served a drink here in over a century, but it’s the one with a documented killing behind the name.
What Holbrook Was Like in the 1880s
The saloon makes more sense once you know what kind of town it opened in. In short, Holbrook was young, loud and full of cattle money.
A railroad town built almost overnight
Holbrook exists because of the railroad.
The Atlantic and Pacific tracks reached this spot on September 24, 1881. The town took the name of the railroad’s chief engineer, Henry Randolph Holbrook.
Before that, travelers forded the river at Horsehead Crossing, just east of here. Juan Padilla and Berrado Freyde ran a store and saloon there from about 1872.
In other words, the first business in the area was a saloon too.
On June 26, 1888, a warehouse full of wool caught fire and took most of the wooden town with it. People rebuilt in brick, stone and adobe, and the stone Cottage Saloon dates to that same year.
When the cowboys came to town
In 1884 the Aztec Land and Cattle Company brought about 40,000 head of Texas cattle into northern Arizona. Its range ran from the New Mexico line to Flagstaff, and its headquarters sat just west of Holbrook.
Payday meant a ride into town.
Old-timers remembered cowboys galloping down the street, firing their guns and shooting out the lights at dances.
Hide out kids, the cowboys are in town!
A historical society volunteer told KJZZ in 2019 that some of those cowboys were “pretty wild.” That’s putting it gently.
According to the historical society’s own history, twenty-six shooting victims died here within a single year. That’s the world the Cottage Saloon opened into.
The cattle company pulled out in 1901, and the town’s shooting days mostly left with it.
Fittingly, the last famous shooting that October was an attempt on Deputy Sheriff John Blevins. Years earlier, he had survived Sheriff Commodore Perry Owens’ 1887 gunfight at the Blevins house.
The 1896 killing in front of the drugstore
The saloon’s reputation didn’t rest on one night. In January 1896, newspapers as far away as Phoenix reported another card game killing in Holbrook.
A bartender named Harry Donnelly quarreled with a barber, J. C. Hiatt, over a game of cards.
Hiatt left the saloon and stood talking with friends in front of the store next door. Then Donnelly stepped out and shot him through the heart.
The Phoenix paper, the Arizona Republican, spelled the bartender’s name “Donleigh” and called it simply his saloon. You can read the original 1896 report in the Library of Congress newspaper archive.
Later accounts place the shooting at the Bucket of Blood.
The store next door was the drugstore of Frank J. Wattron, who went on to become Navajo County’s sheriff.
If you’d rather hear the legends told on camera, this video walks through them.
Holbrook’s Bucket of Blood Saloon, 1888 to Today
Once the shooting stopped, the building lived a long and much quieter life. Here’s what the records show, from the first stone to today.
From saloon to storage
Byron Terrill built the Cottage in 1888, and Charles O. Brown bought it the next year.
It stayed in the Brown family for decades.
Over that time the Browns leased it to a string of saloon keepers who used different official names. Even so, everybody in town called it the Bucket of Blood.
Arizona voters approved statewide prohibition in 1914, and it took effect on January 1, 1915. After that, the building sat mostly empty and was used for storage.
Lloyd C. Henning bought it in 1939, and by 1955 he owned all four buildings in the row.
Later, by 1977, Navajo Community College was using the old saloon as a warehouse.
In 1997 the row was listed on the National Register as part of the South Central Avenue Commercial Historic District. The National Register nomination is the best single record of the building’s history.
What the building looks like
It’s a one-story building about 25 feet wide and 60 feet deep, with a front of dressed sandstone. Built in 1888, it turns 138 years old in 2026.
The storefront has a central entry with glazed doors, a transom and big display windows.
Inside, the nomination records wood strip floors and a tongue-and-groove wood ceiling. There’s also a small cellar reached through a trap door near the middle of the room.
Walk around to the east side and you’ll see a row of steel posts leaning against the stone wall. They went in to brace it and were called temporary back in 1997, yet they’re still holding.
The neighbors have stories of their own.
Next door stands the old drugstore, then the Pioneer Saloon and the H. H. Scorse Mercantile, which Henry Scorse owned along with the Pioneer.
Who owns the Bucket of Blood Saloon today?
The City of Holbrook owns it. It isn’t open for business, and there’s no public access inside.
Part of the old adobe back wall gave way decades ago, so keeping the rest standing is ongoing work. In the meantime, the doors and windows stay boarded up.
Visiting the Bucket of Blood Saloon in Holbrook
Seeing it takes about fifteen minutes. It’s free, and you can stop by any time of day.
Where it is and how to get there
The Bucket of Blood Saloon sits on the south side of Bucket of Blood Street in downtown Holbrook. It’s just across the railroad tracks, east of Navajo Boulevard and a short walk from old Route 66.
From I-40, take the Highway 77 South exit and follow Navajo Boulevard south across the tracks.
Bucket of Blood Street is the first street past them. Turn left and look for the sandstone row on your right.
There’s room to park along the street. Then walk the whole block, because all four buildings are worth a look.
Can you go inside?
No, the building is closed and boarded, so you’ll see it from the sidewalk.
Please don’t climb on the braces or lean on the walls.
The stone is old and the back walls are fragile. Besides, a lot of people in town want to keep it standing.
Is it haunted?
Visitors ask us this a lot.
So far we haven’t found a documented ghost story tied to this building. All we’ve found is the feeling you get standing where a floor once ran red.
For Holbrook’s ghost stories, head to the Navajo County Historic Courthouse Museum. The historical society that kept Potter’s account is based there. So are the old jail and the story of the 1900 hanging invitations.
Photo tips
The front faces north, so it sits in soft, even light for most of the day.
That makes it easy to photograph at almost any hour.
A utility pole and its guy wires stand in front of the row. Step a little east or west along the sidewalk to frame around them.
The Bucket of Blood St street sign makes a fun second shot. Then stand across the street and get the whole row in one frame.
What else to see in Holbrook
Holbrook is best known for the Wigwam Motel and its stretch of Route 66.
It’s also the closest town to the south entrance of Petrified Forest National Park. Plenty of travelers make it their overnight stop for that reason.
To see the rest of downtown, use our self-guided historic walking tour. It maps 50 stops around Holbrook, and the Bucket of Blood Saloon is one of them.
After that, spend a night in a concrete teepee at the Wigwam Motel. In the morning, drive out and work through our list of things to do in Petrified Forest National Park.
Is the Bucket of Blood Saloon Worth a Stop?
Yes, especially if you like your history with a little grit. The Bucket of Blood Saloon is one of the easiest history stops in Holbrook, and few stories in town can match it. It’s a real 1888 saloon building on the spot where its story happened, not a replica built for tourists.
A visit takes a few minutes and costs nothing. It also pairs well with the courthouse museum and a walk through downtown.
Planning a Route 66 trip through northern Arizona? Tell us your dates and what you like, and our free trip planner will build you a Holbrook itinerary.
