The family first arrived in Basin City during Gold Rush, when a Roark ancestor brought with him a large number of foreign prostitutes. The prostitutes were quite popular, turning a small mining camp into a thriving city. The Roark family would eventually gain political power as a result, controlling the land via their methods of corruption. The prostitutes themselves eventually split from the family and formed their own district reserved specifically for prostitution; this section would later be known as Old Town.