This Day in Booze: The Double Whammy

I was going to call today's article "This Day in Booze: The Bitch is Dead", but today actually happens to mark two great days in booze history, so I had to change it.

What bitch? Whose a bitch? You'ze a bitch? Where the fuck are my pants?... ...Exactly.

Today marks the death of one Frances Elizabeth Caroline I'm a Bitch Willard.

She was a 19th Century educator and woman's Suffragist, but was most notably known for her role in temperance reform and the WTCU, or as I like to call it Women with Thorny Cunts United.

But she was a suffragist? That's a good thing. To what extent was here role in the Women's Christain Temperance Union (WTCU) that you feel such a need to vilify her so?

Well, as one of the originators of the satanic organization (at least that's what I'm told) known as the WTCU in 1874, she was elected the first corresponding secretary. In 1879 she was elected the President of the Women's National Council of the United States (another cult, I am told), and held onto her position there until she finally kicked the bucket. Kind of like a dictator, but with a vagina. She was the originator of the Formed Worldwide WCTU in 1883, but surprisingly was NOT the President of that organization. Well, not until 1888 at least.

During her time with the temperance movement, she set about traveling the Country, speaking to groups, to churches, to schools, to communities all about the evils of booze. So much of her time and effort was dedicated to this cause that from 1874 to 1884 she averaged over 30,000 mile of travel and 400 lectures PER YEAR! One of her biggest arguments against booze was its effect on the home life. Let's just forget about the effect of not being at home for nearly 10 years. That kind of screws up the home life as well. Oh wait, I guess you need a home life first, before you can screw it up. She never married (I wonder why), and it's clear that her real issue wasn't with booze, but with the "Evil Penis." ...hehe, penis.

Now don't get me wrong. I fully support any effort towards women's rights and praise great women like Julia Child and Martha Stewart who have taught today's women how to be creative, more independent, and how to bake a better pie.


Today is extra special because it also marks the signing of the Blaine Act by the United States Senate. Oh I'm sorry, the Blain Act doesn't really ring a bell with most of you. How about I call it by it's other name, the 21st Amendment.

The Blain Act, written by Wisconsin senator John J. Blaine, was the 21st Amendment to the Constitution before it was the 21st Amendment. On February 17th, 1933, the United States Senate Accepted the Act, but it wouldn't become an Amendment until it was ratified by the individual States. A process which the law grants seven years. Fortunately it took less than one, and on December 5th, 1933 it became the 21st Amendment to our Constitution.

So have two drinks today. One for the 21st Amendment and one for Pie.

This Day in Booze: Judgement Day

No, this is not a prediction into the future. The World will not end on this day in the year 2000-and-who-gives-a-rat's-ass. Nor am I the Governor of California running naked through the streets punching holes in peoples chests.

I'm writing to you because this day was probably the darkest day in the history of the American Alcoholic. Today began the days of Prohibition.



It was on January 16th 1919 the U.S. Congress Ratified the 18th Ammendment. The bill was to take effect exactly one year later on this same day, 1920. What would follow was 13 years of sobriety, bootlegging, organized crime, smuggling, rum running, speakeasies, moonshining, violence... ...actually that sounds kind of fun. Well, everything except fo the sobriety part. Because gunning down treasury agents just isn't the same without a flask of bathtub gin to enjoy while doing it.



And that is about all I have. I've nearly exhausted the subject on prohibition in many past posts, which you can check out.

Willis-Campbell Act

Brew Year's Eve

Cullen-Harris Act

The 21st Amendment

I know it's kind of a let down as this should be the big one. But I'm not feeling up to it. The truth is, if you read yesterday's post, I kind of went out for that one last drink last night. And that last drink led to another drink, which led to another drink, whiche led to another, which led to homoerotic flirtation with B James and McPaddy, which led to a busted lip and me washing the urine off the side of my car this morning.

This Day in Booze: One Last Drink

January 15th 1920. Last day for a legal drink in the United States before nearly 13 years of sobriety. Raise a glass to those poor souls who had to endure it.

This Day in Booze: The 21st Amendment

Do I really need to say anything about this day. It's the freak'n end of prohibition. The Eighteenth Amendment was repealed upon the ratification of the Twenty-first Amendment on December 5, 1933 at 3:32 pm. The United States of America had been dry for 13 years, 10 months, 19 days, 17 hours, 32.5 minutes....well, sort of.

The Noble Experiment Failed, but at this time of rejoicing we should look back on those 13 years and what long term effects they have on the shaping of today.

Yes, for the people that lived it, Prohibition was Hell. Regardless of the original game plan, there were unintended consequences. Some of the worst things to come out of prohibition, besides no booze, were bad booze (poison), organized crime, sobriety, lost jobs when the breweries shut down, the common man turned criminal just for trying to make a living, and a flat out disrespect for the law.

But if you really take some time to look at Prohibition, you notice that not all the unintended consequences were for the worse. I never though I'd say this, but prohibition in a lot of ways was good for society. Now before you decide to string me up by the balls for heresy (I like my balls) hear me out.

Prohibition was responsible for introducing American's to a vast wealth of foreign spirits. Since what was being produced locally at the time was little better than paint thinner with a touch of caramel and formaldehyde, the importation of liquor from abroad helped to diversify America's pallet. Whiskey from Canada was much smoother than American rye or bourbon, and is still extremely popular today. Tequila was all but unknown to anybody who didn't live in the South West or California, but as soon as booze was made illegal, the entire country was ¡Hurra por la bebida! Shiploads of rum, which had fallen out of favor after the revolution due to cost, were park just 3 miles off the coast of Florida. There were also scotches from the U.K., cordials from France, schnapps from Europe, and the list goes on.

Speakeasies. So long sausage fest! Hello all you can eat Tacos! OK, I admit that was a little much, but women in bars?! Astounding!


Finally it was acceptable for men and women to socialize in the same place. You can also find links to the suffrage movement and the beginning of women's social independence. Not only did the quality of the company improve, but so did people's view the bar scene. It was no longer a place to just hang out with the guys and talk about how much life sucked. Now it was an opportunity to mingle and entertain oneself on a Wednesday night. During this time the bartender was able to hone his craft, even if it was simply to mask the awful taste of the poison they were serving. But that didn't stop people form frequenting such establishments, and thanks to Prohibition the "cocktail hour" was born.

The dawn of the tourism industry owes it's roots to Prohibitions. Prior to the 1920s, traveling abroad just for the fun of it was a concept your average American never really thought about. But without good booze to be had locally, the industry took off with a fury. The Caribbean and Havana were especially popular places, and it was on these trips that American's were introduced to even more unique spirits and cocktails. As the industry grew, you have the birth of Pan Am and other major airlines and cities like Miami grew exponentially. All of this meant jobs and growth for the community as well.


Those are just the biggies. Some of the other benefits to arise from Prohibition include the government issue of industrial alcohol licenses, which meant more research into yeasts (nice for us homebrewers). In 1919, the Scientific American Publishing Company published "Home Made Beverages: The Manufacture of Non-Alcoholic and Alcoholic Drinks in the Household" in which vendors sold small barrels, simple stills, guides for distilling techniques. Don't ask me how a book on making non-alcoholic beverages is able to sell stills during Prohibition. I just report the facts. The rum industry was making some of the best quality rum ever, until WWII and things went to shit.

Now even though all these good things came out of prohibition, is any of this going to stop me from celebrating it's demise this evening in grand fashion? Nope. But just remember that even good things can come from bad situations. Except for Fuzzy Blueberry Fail. Nothing good comes of that.


Update: Anybody else have more good unintended consequences that came out of Prohibition? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

This Day in Booze: Willis-Campbell Act

OK, I postponed this till a little later in the day so as not to step on the feet of King Cool. ...Who am I kidding. I was too busy yesterday getting drunk and too busy this morning nursing my headache to write anything even semi-coherent.


Ahh, Prohibition. When you’re having a rough day, you can always count on it to brighten things up knowing that people had it a lot tougher 80-90 years ago. At least in this day and age, you can go down to any corner bar and drink your troubles away.

Alcohol during the early years of prohibition was treated very similarly to how California handles marijuana today. Alcohol was illegal, but there was a work around. It was called the doctor’s office. Booze was only legal if you had a doctor's prescription, and it didn't take long before doctors were writing scripts for everything from back pain to a paper cut. Just like pot today, alcohol was the cure for everything.


Of course we all know the truth. Everybody knows that for every 100 prescriptions that some California wack job writes for pot only maybe one is for something legitimate, like glaucoma. Personally I think the Government should just legalize it already and then tax the shit out of it. But that's a another subject for another realm of the blogosphere.


But it does relate back to prohibition and this day. With all the prescriptions for liquor, and the booze industry actually making more money than they did prior to prohibition, it didn't take long for President Harding to realize that his mother-in-law's weekly drunken nude stumble through the Rose Garden had little to do with easing the pain of her bunions.

So on November 23rd, 1921, President Harding signed the Willis-Campbell Act (also known as the anti-beer bill), which forbade doctors from prescribing beer and liquor for medicinal purposes. So no more booze for Grandma and here sore hip. No more booze for Aunt May and her chronic depression. No more booze for Uncle Jack and his addiction to ...booze. No more fun for anybody.


According to Wikipedia, the most reliable source for anything on the interwebs, "The Act kept in force all anti-liquor tax laws that had been in place prior to the passage of the Volstead Act in 1919, giving authorities to right to choose whether or not to prosecute offenders under prohibition laws or revenue laws, but at the same time guaranteeing bootleggers that they would not be prosecuted in both ways." I guess I could take some time to explain what that all means, but really that's too much work for my brain on a Monday. You should be lucky I'm writing this at all, given my current condition.

This Day in Booze: Homebrew Legalized

What is the greatest day in booze history? And you can't say the invention of alcohol. That's a cop-out for unimaginative plebeians who bicker about how Poke-mon is so much better than Yu-Gi-Oh, and argue for three hours on how the two are nothing alike. You're better than that. Many would say the obvious answer; the day that Prohibition was repealed. But for all its obvious downfalls, Prohibition actually did a lot to fuel growth and innovation in the booze industry and promote new social ideals. There were these hip little places called speakeasies. Let’s just say you aren't going to find any tacos at a sausage fest.


Another possible answer would be the invention of the cocktail. Yes, those candy sweet concoctions, which since their inception have been primarily used for the purpose of removing clothing from women. They are quite tasty and are very good at doing what we all hope. But they are rooted deeply in having the original purpose of masking all that was bad about alcohol of old, like rat feces. Also we here at JABB would like to start a petition to get the word -tini stricken from the English language. Nuff Said. There are probably even a small few readers out, who are on this site looking for fodder to fuel your immeasurable contempt and hatred of all things fun, who might say the day Prohibition was enacted. I hear they also kill puppies.


For me, my answer would have to be the day they legalized homebrew beer, which I shall defend as best I can in my current inebriated state. But first the details.

When prohibition ended, everybody and their grandmother wanted to make beer. It was a guaranteed money maker after nearly 13 years of sobriety. The problem was everybody wanted to cash in, and quick. Combine this fact with the limited availability of resources due to the war, and you wind up with the wonderfully bland and unexciting light golden lager we all grew up with. Over time, as some businesses succeeded and others flopped, the world of American beer was soon dominated by the big breweries. As long as these corporate giants were making money, they didn't care about the quality of their product, so long as it sold. Any new upstarts that tried to get a hand in on things were either forced out or bought up. Thanks to this consolidation, there were only 42 breweries operating in the United States in 1978, and most sucked donkey balls.


On October 14, 1978 that all changed when President Jimmy Carter signed a bill that removed the restrictions on Homebrewers and allowed your average citizen to brew (tax free) beer in small quantities for their own consumption.

Able to brew beer at home, craft brewers were allowed to develop their beer without the influence and meddling of the big conglomerates. The legalization of homebrew finally allowed creativity and originality to be explored freely. And if you don't think that that is important, in 2006 congress passed a resolution commemorating American Craft Brewers for supporting American Agriculture, providing jobs, and improving the balance of trade. The resolution also supported the establishment of an "American Craft Beer Week". By 2008, forty years after the legalization of homebrew, there were 1493 breweries reported to be operating in the United States, 1420 of which were considered craft brewers (smaller, independent, traditional brewers) by the Brewers Association. Take that, Budweiser.

Cranberry Nut Crunch Fuck'n Ale!


OK, it's true that with the microbrew and craft beer movement there have been some bad ideas. There have been some flops and some jokes and I think the term "yuppie" got thrown around quite a bit. But that is all part of the experimentation process that makes average citizens like us get together on a Saturday afternoon with a box of ingredients, a tub of no-rinse, and a handle of Vladimir. We are free to create something original, even if it's just a new strain of blue fuzzy goodness that later is found to be the cure for male pattern baldness.


And look at the industry now. All the big name brewers are struggling to keep up with the Great Lakes and Magic Hats of the beer world, especially the King of Beers. In recent years we've seen Anheuser-Busch try to market such beers as their Budweiser American Ale and Bud Light Golden Wheat. And then there is the Michelob seasonal line including their Bavarian Wheat, Märzen, Porter, and Pale Ale. The little guys have taken the lead, and the big guys can only follow. Any time the large breweries try something new on their own we wind up with such wonderful concoctions as Michelob ULTRA Tuscan Orange Grapefruit and Pomegranate Raspberry....really?!?

But in the end, we the consumers are the winners. The gates have been opened and great beer is pouring out like the Johnstown Flood.


Just about anywhere I go, I have to opportunity to taste something I've never tasted before, to enjoy something new, and to throw up a new color of the rainbow I never knew existed. Woohoo!

This Day in Booze: Black Tot Day

Today is indeed a sad day. It is a dark and dismal, black day. A day that ended a tradition dating back almost 300 years. On July 31st, 1970, the British Royal Navy stopped issuing daily rum rations to it's sailors.

Rum and the Navy go back over 350 years to the mid 1600s. Rum was a harsh, foul, disgusting beverage that only the poorest of man or slaves would drink. But as settlements began to take hold in the Caribbean and the Colonies, sugar production was on the rise. Alcohol on sailing vessels was a necessity. It helped the sailors stay hydrated and provided much needed nutrients. Most importantly, it was sterile. Beer was the seaman's best friend for many years. However, rum was much cheaper than beer, and by 1731 it was officially adopted by the British Navy. It was as common on their ships as beer and brandy. Half a pint of rum was treated as equivalent to the sailor's daily ration of 1 gallon of beer (beer was pretty week back then). Unfortunately, as rum grew in popularity with the Navy, so did drunkenness, disorderly conduct, and good old fashion tom-foolery.


One particular sailor, Admiral Edward Vernon (the same Edward Vernon that Mount Vernon is named after), saw the benefits of rum, but realized it needed taming. In 1740 he issued an order to his sailors that the daily rum rations should be diluted with water. The mixture was "the proportion of a quart of water to every half pint of rum", and it served two purposes. It diluted the rum so that the sailors could take it in at a slower pace and not get plastered. It also helped to disinfect the ship's water supply and make it taste and smell much better. Rations were doled out twice a day, however the sailors could trade up one of their rations for limes and sugar to make what they had more palatable (explains the term 'Limeys' given to British Sailors). His men called the new drink "grog" supposedly after the Admiral's nickname "Old Grog", attributed to the grogram coat he would always wear.

Due to the daily dose of vitamin C, Admiral Edward Vernon's sailors were healthier than the rest of the fleet, something that would not be fully understood until 1747, when James Lind proved that citrus fruit supplemented into the sailors diet could treat and prevent scurvy. The rest of the Royal Navy followed suit, and by 1756 Navy Rum was codified into the Admiralty's naval code.

Over the next 200 years, the world changed, and so did the rum rations. Thanks to the global Temperance Movement, the daily grog allotment was cut in half in 1823, and in half once more in 1850. By 1950 only about one-third of Royal Navy's sailors opted for their daily rations of grog. As the computer age dawned, new technology began being incorporated into everyone's daily lives. One such piece of technology spelled the end for Navy Rum. The British Navy did a study and subjected the sailors to random breathalyzer tests. When the results came back they realized that, at any given moment, half their naval force was legally drunk.


So in 1970, aboard the HMS Fife at 11:00AM, July 31st, the last "tot" of rum rations was doled out to the men, putting an end to a tradition older than the country we call home.


But fret not my children. Wipe away those tears of sorry and replace them with tears of joy, for Navy Rum is back. In 1979, one Charles Tobias obtained the rights to the recipe and began producing Navy Rum once more. The product is called Pusser's Navy Rum, and you can find in on the shelf of any liquor store that's worth it's salt. I picked up a bottle about 4-5 months ago and you can read all about its history and what it tastes like in some of my past posts. I will tell you that the Royal Navy never actually distilled their own rum. The recipe is actually the blending of 5 different West Indian rums (three lighter rums and two dark rums). I definitely recommend trying it. It tastes like no other rum I've ever had, and I've had A LOT of rums. Plus part of the proceeds go to the Royal Navy Sailor's Fund. I for one will be taking a tot of Pusser's this evening to honor one of the greatest miltary traditions of all times.

UPSPIRITS!!!

This Day in Booze: The Beer Bottle

You've just come home from a long hard day at work. you're tired and exhausted, and you just want to relax for a couple of minutes. You grab a nice cold bottle of beer out of the fridge and the condensation on the bottle feels great in your hand. You pop the top, kick off your shoes, flop down on the couch, and enjoy. Ahh, that hits the spot.
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Sounds great doesn't it, but that wasn't always a luxury that every man could enjoy....or was it. I thought it used to be that if you wanted a beer in the old days, you had little choice but to head on down to the local tavern or inn, where the barman would poor you a nice "warm one" from the huge wooden cask behind the bar.

I was surprised to find out recently that bottled beer goes back a lot farther than I originally thought. Then I thought about it a little and it made perfect sense. Of course bottled beer had to exist in the old days. How else would you tailgate with your buddies outside the Coliseum. Nothing like a cold one to get you in the mood for gladiators fighting or the lions getting their noon snack.



So how far back does the beer bottle go?

It was a pleasant July day in 1568. Alexander Nowell, the Dean of St Paul's Cathedral, in London, decided he wanted to do some fishing down by the river. He packed up all his fishing gear and tackle, the wife packed him a ham and cheese sandwich, and he grabbed his night crawlers and the new fishing lure he bought off of the Outdoor Channel. He was all set to go when he realized, what would go great with fishing? A beer! Because fishing without beer is like driving without beer. It's just no fun. So he stopped by the corner pub on his way to the river and had them fill a glass bottle up with beer for him. He made sure they sealed it up good and tight with a cork so his horse wouldn't get pulled over for an open container.

When done fishing, he accidentally left the still half full bottle on the river bank. Several days later (July 13th) he returned to do some more fishing, because he needed an excuse to get away from the wife for a while. He saw his old beer on the ground and thought "man, I could really go for some for that right now." When he went to drink it, the cork opened with a loud bang (the beer had fermented further over the past few days). He found it to be extra fizzy and quite delicious.

I guess he must have told his buddies, because by the 17th century bottled beer was quite commonplace. It was usually only drunk, however, by the wealthier middle and upper classes who really didn't want to mingle with normal folk down at the inn, or those people who just weren't that into Friday's lute and karaoke night.

Another one for those masochists out there.

This Day in Booze: 10 Cent Beer Night

On June 4th 1975, in an effort to boost ticket sales, the Cleveland Indians held a 10 cent beer night. The promotion allowed fans to purchase as many 8oz cups of Stroh's Beer as they could hold down for just 10 cents a piece. As you could probably guess, what followed was a massive case of Fail.

The Municipal Stadium was packed with over 25,000 fans, compared to the previous season's average of only 8,000 per game. The Indians were up against the Texas Rangers, who not but a week earlier had gotten into a bench clearing brawl with the Indians during a "cheap beer night" game at Arlington Stadium, which ended with the crowd storming the field. So naturally, the most sensible thing to do is to one-up the Rangers and host an even more idiotic promotion of their own only one week later.

As the game progressed, the fans got drunker an drunker. Players were getting pelted with hot dogs, and one of the Rangers was almost struck with a one gallon jug of Thunderbird (don't ask me why someone would sneak a gallon jug of Thunderbird into a baseball game, or how. But he sounds like a guy I wanna party with).


When the Indians managed to rally in the 9th to tie the game at 5-5, the crowded was past gone and had reached its boiling point. A fan ran onto the field and attempted to steal an outfielders cap. In attempting to confront the fan, the player tripped, leading the Ranger's manager to think that his player had been attacked. The manager and the entire Ranger's bench stormed onto the field, some wielding bats. The fans in turn also charged to field armed with everything from knives, chains, broken bottles, and even parts of the stadium seats they had torn apart. The Indians, fearful of the rioting fans, actually picked up bats of there own and went out to DEFEND the opposing team.


Realizing that nothing could be done to restore order, the umpire called the game and forfeited the win to the Rangers.

And if you think that Cleveland learned their lesson, you'd be wrong. No, Cleveland decided to hold 3 more such events throughout the season. They changed the promotion so that a fan was limited to a max of four 10 cent beers, but still. Cleveland's got to be denser than a brick.

In modern times, such occurrences are practically nil, thanks to such ingenious ideas as not allowing fans to bring any outside food or drinks, except for enough peanuts and water to make a dixie cup look like a generous portion, and requiring fans to take out a second mortgage if they want to have more than two beers.


...Cleveland Sucks

This Day in Booze: We Want Beer!!!

The year was 1932. The sun was setting on the days of prohibition. America was a hornet's nest, and prohibition was the little kid jamming the stick up in it. Public outcry against prohibition was rampant. Organizations such as the Association Against the Prohibition Amendment (AAPA) and the Women's Organization for National Prohibition Reform (WONPR) fought fervently to end prohibition. WONPR particularly hurt the prohibitionists and their cause. Throughout the years, there was always an assumption that they could count on the support of women almost unanimously (Take that! Women's Christian Temperance Union).

I know I used the one picture before in another post, but it's just such a damn good picture.

The great depression had hit hard, and people were more concerned with unemployment than keeping alcohol out of peoples hands, and opening up the breweries meant jobs. Presidential nominee, Franklin D. Roosevelt, practically built his platform on fighting dry laws and ending prohibition. Even some of the most outspoken prohibition supporters had flipped sides, and were now touting the benefits of repeal.

Now that I have set the stage, the date is May 14th, 1932. New York City Mayor, Jimmy Walker, organized a day-long Beer rally known as the "We Want Beer Parade." Nearly 100,000 people showed up in support of repeal and the legalization of beer. On the very same day the city of Detroit held a similar even of there own, in which some 40,000 people attended. They marched and the chanted "Who want's a bottle of beer?"

"We Do!"

This Day in Booze: Brew Year's Eve

Today is a very special day in history. No, it's not 50 cent wings at your favorite BBQ place. Nor is it your anniversary, which you unceasingly seem to forget. Today is a special day because it marks the end of Prohibition.

"Wait a minute?!? Didn't Prohibition ended of December 5th?" you ask. Well, not exactly. December 5th marks the the appeal of the 18th Amendment, with the ratification of the 21st. A great Amendment. My personal favorite. But how is it that Prohibition ended nearly 8 months earlier. It's all thanks to the Cullen-Harrison Act. The Cullen-Harrison Act was drafted by congress and signed by President Roosevelt in early 1933. This federal act modified the definition of "intoxicating liquids", and allowed the manufacture and sale of beer with less than 3.2% alcohol content by weight and certain light wines. On April 7th 1933, two weeks after signing the Act, the very first “legal” beer in 13 years was delivered to the White House, to commemorate the special day. Beer was finally able to be sold legally in 19 of the 48 states and the District of Columbia. Over 1.5 million barrels of beer were consumed within the first 24 hours.

That, my friends, marks the true end of Prohibition. Of course, not all types of alcohol were permitted yet, but you could still walk into a bar and legally order a nice cold beer. Unfortunately, not everyone was able to share in the celebration. By the time National Prohibition was enacted in 1920, many States already had their own prohibition laws in effect. When the 21st Amendment was ratified, the right to govern alcohol use was turned back over to the States. Many of those States would take several more years to repeal their own individual prohibition laws. The State of Mississippi held out all the way to 1966 before repealing their prohibition. Kansas, one of the first states to enact its own prohibition in 1881, disallowed the sale of liquor "by the drink" until 1987. To this day, you'll still find many dry counties when traveling through some of our more southern States (the Bible Belt). Hell! I was in Franklin County Alabama last year and had to drive two counties north before I could find a drop of legal alcohol. Note, I said "legal".

That is why we celebrate April 7th as the end of Prohibition. Because on that day, across much of the United States, people flocked in mass to any place they could find a cold one. In fact, there is one local Pittsburgh man who can honestly say he's been there to provide the great libation every step of the way. Angelo Cammarata, of Cammarata's Cafe in West View, holds the Guinness world record for the longest serving bartender. Mr. Cammarata just turned 95, and has been serving beer ever since 12:01AM that special day, when he poured his first beer at his fathers grocery store soda fountain-turned-bar. Surprisingly, he doesn't drink beer. His dad once told him "Beer is not made to drink, it's made to sell." However, Angelo does have himself a bourbon and coke every day, so I think we can let him slide.

This is the Beer Drinkers Holiday, and it deserves to be celebrated. The Brewer's Association, a national trade organization, has officially designated April 7th as Brew Year's Eve, and first celebrated it last year on the 75th anniversary of the end of Prohibition. So I don't care who you are, what you're doing, where you live. I don't care if it's at home alone, out with friends, or at your corner dive bar. You make sure you toss back a cold one today. 13 years of sobriety demand it. I for one plan on heading down to Cammarata's Cafe to get a drink from the "Great Pourer." Let's ring in year 76 with a bang!

This Day In Booze: The Cullen-Harrison Act

The year was 1933. Prohibition had raged on for over 13 years. Between the effects of organized crime and an overall distain for the law by just about everybody, this great melting pot had finally reached it's boiling point. Alcohol was gaining increased social acceptance and public outcry over prohibition could no longer be ignored by the US Government.

Franklin D. Roosevelt was just getting his feet wet as the 32nd President of the United States. Early that year, during a dinner at the White House, he famously remarked, "I think this would be a good time for a beer." That very night he would go on the write a letter to Congress asking them to draft a bill allowing the sale of beer. What came out of it was an amendment to the Volstead Act known as the Cullen-Harrison act.

The Volstead Act, passed in late 1919, was one of the driving forces leading up to prohibition. The Act specified that "no person shall manufacture, sell, barter, transport, import, export, deliver, or furnish any intoxicating liquor except as authorized by this act". However, It did not specifically prohibit the use of intoxicating liquors. The 18th Amendment would take care of that and seal the deal on nearly 14 years of sobriety. The proposed act would allow the manufacture and sale of beer containing no more than 3.2% alcohol by weight, as well as light wines. On March 23, 1933, President Franklin Roosevelt signed into law the Cullen-Harrison act, officially making him one of the most kick-ass presidents in my book (despite his heavy socialist leanings). This was the first big blow to prohibition and would ultimately lead to the 21st Amendment later that year.

On April 7th, two weeks after the passing of the act, the first legal beer in over 13 years was opened in this country. And everybody got laid. The end.