The steamship Senator was hired for $2,000 to tow Arkansas to the tidal flats in Yerba Buena Cove where she was left along the Pacific Street Wharf at what would later become the northeast corner of Pacific Avenue and Battery Street. Being no longer seaworthy due to damage, Arkansas' masts were cut off and she was converted to a storeship. An entrepreneur named Joe Anthony opened a saloon inside Arkansas called "The Old Ship Alehouse" and cut a hole in the bow to act as the door which customers accessed using a gang plank leading up from the wharf. A sign above the door reportedly read, "Gude, Bad, an Indif'rent Spirits Sold Here! At 25¢ each". The first bartender was 19 year old James "Jimmy" Laflin who had worked aboard the Arkansas as a cabin boy on her final voyage. Laflin would later become one of San Francisco's most prolific shanghaiers, continuing to use the Old Ship as a venue to kidnap patrons and press them into service on seafaring ships.
