Prohibition in Dallas & Fort Worth: Blind Tigers, Bootleggers and Bathtub Gin
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Rita Cook
Rita Cook is a writer and editor with over 1000 articles to her credit in the past 10 years. She has also written four books.
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Prohibition in Dallas & Fort Worth - Rita Cook
Yarbrough
PROHIBITION IN DALLAS/FORT WORTH
Prohibition was coming, and a headline in the paper in Dallas on August 1, 1917, said as much, noting Senate Passes Pro Measure.
The article reported that a resolution to the states of a prohibition amendment to the federal constitution was adopted late today by the senate. The vote was 65 to 20, eight more than the necessary two-thirds. As adopted the resolution contains a provision that the states must be asked to ratify the amendment within six years. The house must act on the resolution.
In 1919, it was noted in Dallas that voters of that city and Dallas County approved prohibition and women’s suffrage amendments to the state constitution, and at the same time, the papers reported that the Dallas chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) persuaded the city to cancel a presentation of a stage version of Birth of a Nation, while the city also raised $7 million for the Liberty Loan Drive to help pay the nation’s debt for World War I.
When it was first decided that this book would be written, the idea was to find the best of the best bartenders (or mixologists) in the Dallas/Fort Worth area and let them speak about the big-time cool factor that has become the speakeasy culture of many bars these days. Besides, even today in parts of the Dallas/Fort Worth area, you can’t buy alcohol, so while prohibition is no longer alive and well, you wouldn’t know it looking just anywhere around here.
So, with that, I started asking around. Sure, I drink a good cocktail or two on a regular basis. And sure, coauthor Jeffrey Yarbrough had a list of bartenders who were must go to see
guys. But when all was said and done, and after I had scribbled down the names of the mixers and made my list (checking it twice), these names rose to the surface and kept coming up; they have become the root of this book about cocktails in Dallas/Fort Worth.
Bomber Grill and the longest bar in Texas. Thomas Kellam, Tarrant County College, Special Collections.
Cover of the 1906 March Purity journal, from Fort Worth, a Modern Sodom.
Dallas Historical Society.
Another good thing was that these five men and one woman, and the bars they own and tend, aren’t likely to go anywhere fast. So, with no further ado, while the history is fun in regard to the Prohibition era in Dallas/Fort Worth, what is more fun is talking with (in no particular order other than alphabetical) Curtis Cheney, Brad Hensarling, Jason Kosmas, Tyler Lott, Michael Martensen and Charlie Papaceno.
So let’s take a look at prohibition through the eyes of these bartenders extraordinaire and dive right in from there. As Jason Kosmas said to me during our interview, Sometimes it is fun to pass along the legends and the mythology of the cocktails because that is what makes it so powerful, and I think when you debunk it, that takes away the magic.
First of all, most drinkers these days (even if you only drink a little) take for granted the fact that it is not against the law to sidle up to a bar and order a drink. However, up until 1933, you couldn’t legally get a decent drink in the United States thanks to the Eighteenth Amendment, ratified on January 16, 1919:
Interior of Herman Schertz’s Saloon at Elm Street (now 2723 Elm Street, Daddy Jacks Bar). The man at the bar in front is Herman P. Scherz, 1900. Dallas Public Library.
Men drinking in a saloon. North Fort Worth Historical Society.
SECTION 1. After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.
SECTION 2. The Congress and the several states shall have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
SECTION 3. This article shall by be inoperative unless is shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of submission hereof to the States by the Congress.
With the amendment repealed on December 5, 1933, the government finally made it legal to drink in the United States again:
SECTION 1. The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.
SECTION 2. The transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use there in of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited.
SECTION 3. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by conventions in the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of submission hereof to the States by the Congress.
Indeed, while you might not have been able to get a good drink legally between 1919 and 1933 in the United States, you could definitely get a good drink illegally, and that’s where the word speakeasy
(a place for the illegal sale and consumption of alcoholic drinks, as during prohibition in the United States) actually comes from, as well the terms bathtub gin
(homemade gin) and blind tigers
(places where alcoholic beverages were sold illegally, also known as speakeasies and sometimes blind pigs
).
Keep in mind, too, that most of the savvy and cool bartenders of the Prohibition era packed their bags when prohibition became effective and headed across the pond or even to Havana, Cuba, where Americans could still go to drink. They found some great cocktail creations too.
It’s true that when we think of prohibition today, we most often think of flappers, gangsters with hats, well-known authors like F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway and the good old jazz age, but where exactly did Dallas and Fort Worth sit in regard to what was happening during this time?
Since alcohol was believed to be the cause of all the problems in the United States (crime, poverty and more), some folks felt that it only stood to reason that without alcohol, all these social problems would go away. Not so much, really, and we can thank President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who was elected in 1933, for overturning the big no drinking
law in this country and setting life straight again.
WHAT ABOUT MOONSHINING?
Everyone has heard the word moonshine,
and most folks know what it means (the unlicensed distillation of whiskey), but in Texas, moonshining dates back to when it was called white lightning,
and it was first introduced by the early folks who came to the state before prohibition. However, it was during the Prohibition era that the market for this illegal whiskey became popular.
Another fact about prohibition in Texas is that there were counties and communities in the state that had already prohibited liquor by local option laws in 1876 and 1891; these laws were successful in closing a good many of the legal saloons in Texas even before the end of World War I. However, with the closing of the saloons, it meant that moonshine got a boost, and this boost actually found its strongest legs during the period of national prohibition from 1919 to 1933.
Moonshiners in Texas were even said to have reached a sort of folk hero
status during the time. When the economy was bad, folks turned to moonshining to make money. As such, it is said that during the Great Depression, there were people who felt that moonshining was a good alternative to no money or food on the table. Regarding the law, it is known that many elected officials kept a don’t ask, don’t tell
policy because many otherwise well-respected citizens had to turn to moonshining as a means of money.
A recipe for moonshine at the time might include corn whiskey with about fifty pounds of sugar and the same amount of steel-cut corn chops. Then you would add thirty-five gallons of water and let it sit for seven days. When it stopped bubbling and turned a blue color, then it was distilled and was good for five or six runs—sometime with a bit of sugar, water and grain added for more. Even so, the mixture already made about sixty gallons.
Family photo during Texas prohibition. Jeffrey Yarbrough.
It has also been discovered that Dr. Pepper was also a good ingredient to add to the mix to get the process going faster. The moonshine could be cooked off faster, too. Most people have also heard that moonshine could kill you; this was due to the fact that to speed up the process, the ingredients might be put through an automobile radiator with battery acid added. While it cooked well, the lead from the old radiators could mean lead