Next, he wound up in San Gabriel, California, where his brother Joshua owned a saloon called the Headquarters Saloon. When Joshua was killed in November, 1852, Bean inherited the saloon. 

While there, Bean killed a Mexican official during an argument over a woman. Friends of the official soon hauled Bean off, lynched him and left him to die. However, he was saved by the young woman who had been the cause of the dispute. For the rest of his life, he sported a permanent rope burn on his neck, which constantly felt stiff.

Before long, he was back in New Mexico, where he again lived with his brother Sam who had become the sheriff in Mesilla.

During the Civil War, the Texas army invaded New Mexico and Bean soon joined them, hauling supplies for the Confederates and living in San Antonio. On October 28, 1866, he married eighteen-year-old Virginia Chavez, but the couple were not happy together. Just a year into the marriage, Bean was arrested for aggravated assault on his wife. However, despite their differences, the couple would eventually have four children. For the next decade, the family lived in a Mexican slum area on South Flores Street that soon earned the name of Beanville. During these years, he worked at a number of professions including teamster, saloon operator, a dairy business, and other entrepreneurial enterprises that were obviously not very successful as he became known for circumventing creditors, business rivals, and the law.

By the early 1880s, Bean and his wife were separated and he sold all his possessions and left San Antonio, wandering about the railroad camps before finally settling down in west Texas near the Pecos River. Opening up a small saloon, a tent city grew up around it, which he called Vinegaroon and on August 2, 1882 he was appointed the Justice of the Peace for the new precinct in Pecos County. When the town grew large enough to establish a post office, he renamed the town Langtry after the actress of his dreams, Lillie Langtry and also changed the name of his saloon to the Jersey Lilly.