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I don’t want to sound disrespectful but back during Prohibition the United States of America was governed by a bunch of goobers. Just sniveling little paper pushing, play by the rules dorks with no vision.
You can wax poetic all you want about Woodrow Wilson’s accomplishments in government but on that Wikipedia page on the right hand side where it lists his various titles – 28th President of the U.S., 34th Governor of New Jersey (trash state), and 13th President of Princeton University (couldn’t get into Harvard, huh?) – we should also be listing the most important position ever held; narc. President Wilson was the O.G. narc.
Wilson will forever be known as the President who clamped down on the sale of alcohol nationwide. He is the man who ended fun for all American’s and forced hard working folks looking for a reprieve from factory work and whatever the hell else people did in the 20’s for money into illegal activity.
Prohibition in America has never made sense to me. What did lawmakers in D.C. really think was going to happen when they passed legislation saying everyday American’s couldn’t toss back a few frosty suds? That people would just lay down and submit? Drink fucking root beer? I highly doubt that, playboy.
Of course not. The people rebelled. They created a black market for booze and business boomed. Speakeasies became the place to be in cities all over the country. It was a place where you could grab a drink with relatively low risk of getting busted by the cops. For THIRTEEN YEARS, organized crime bootlegged booze and ran speakeasies to the delight of many. Thirteen fucking years we went in this country with a ban on alcohol. All I have to say is thank God for FDR and the New Deal, but that’s a civics lesson for another day.
The point is that speakeasies were the only place you could get a drink unless you knew someone that made moonshine in the woods behind their house. These speakeasies were extremely profitable and they were often hidden in basements or side rooms, a storefront or barber shop set up to act as a front to any Prohibition agents who might become wise to the whole deal.
Nowadays America knows where it’s bread is buttered. Alcohol sales are a cash cow in this country and the speakeasy is no longer a necessity. Yet every week it feels like I hear about another person I know visiting what they refer as a “speakeasy” simply because there’s a trap door inside of a barber shop or a convenience store that leads down to a bar. There are speakeasies popping up all over my city because we just cannot help ourselves. The speakeasy a fresh form of nostalgia that millennials just could not resist exploiting. They’re a fad like the slinky or the artisan cocktail. They’re just so…stupid I can’t believe that people want to spend money at these places.
A bar should not be considered a speakeasy just because you have to walk through a storefront to get to it. Just because you can order a “moonshine” from the mustachioed bartender doesn’t mean you should. It’s not actually moonshine anymore. It wasn’t bought from a guy in the boonies in Kentucky or Tennessee, it was made at a factory right next to the Smirnoff vodka or Jack Daniel’s whiskey. The speakeasy is not a secret if I can look it up on Yelp or Google and look at customer reviews from people who call it “an authentic experience.”
First of all, no one alive right now would know what it feels like to drink inside of an authentic speakeasy. Secondly, there is no need for the speakeasy. I understand that this is a gimmick. People like the idea of the hidden bar. But you’re not breaking any laws. You’re drinking legally. The hidden bar was created to hide the fact that you were drinking. There’s no need to hide that fact anymore. We don’t live in the Prohibition-era anymore, folks! Does it make you feel like Jay Gatsby walking down a flight of stairs and then opening a door up to see a bar with a mustachioed man behind the counter?
There are plenty of fools out there who think that this is a cool idea. But how cool is something when you can walk down the street to a bar openly advertising for alcoholic beverages and drink the same thing you would at the “speakeasy” for half of the price? It feels sort of like the “pop up” bar trend that is popular amongst people my age.
Does a trap door leading down to a bar in the basement of a storefront really make it any better than the hole in the wall that sells beers for 3 bucks a can? No. But people will go to the speakeasy because it’s a little bit different. It’s a new spot to get an Instagram picture off. And most importantly, the drinks are thirteen or fourteen bucks a piece and who doesn’t love paying for that?.
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jduda@grandex.co
Speakeasy bars popping up are not real Speakeasys. They’re just dimly lights bars that employee whiskey snobs and charge double for drinks. However, there is one real, hidden, secret speakeasy I know of in Houston that took me and a buddy almost a year to find and it’s cool
Spill the beans
Where??
Guys, if I tell you it defeats the purpose and then I run the risk of walking into an overcrowded bar rather than a quiet happy place.
I will give you a hint: the phone never rings backwards
There’s an awesome speakeasy in San Francisco called Wilson & Wilson. It’s located inside a building that housed a real speakeasy in the 1920’s. Getting in is easy enough – you can just make a reservation online and they’ll email you a code to tell the bouncer at the door. But inside is super cool: it’s darkly lit, not packed at all since you can only get in if you have a reservation and they don’t allow you to use your phones so you actually have to talk to your friends/significant other when you’re there, like some kind of animal from the 20th century. And their cocktails are really fucking good. Highly recommended.
There’s a speakeasy in Raleigh called The Green Light that is similar. It is hidden behind a bookcase inside of another bar and you need a reservation to get in there on the weekends. But during the week the main bar will be closed but the front door is unlocked and you can still open the bookcase and someone will be there to serve you. Great cocktails, great ambiance. I’ve taken many dates there.
Yeah I like the “speakeasy” vibe that these types of bars are selling, they obviously for the most part are not really hidden bars (outside of a bit of novelty). Again Duda just bitching about something because it’s be becoming popular. Those “speakeasy” vibe spots are top tier date spots.
Can confirm, great date spot.
I’m a bartender, and speakeasy’s are popping up all over the city I live in. They are not at all authentic and half of them turn into clubs on Fridays and Saturdays, which is the complete opposite of what they should be.
10/10 absolute trash.
This is generally a great take, Duda.
However, I’ve been to an Irish bar in NYC that stays open until 8AM (bars here close at 4) where everyone smokes cigarettes indoors because they don’t want you to go outside. All the windows are blacked out so you can’t see daylight, and everyone arrives around 4:15am. Highly recommend.
Prohibition was passed because of the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution, not because of Woodrow Wilson. He even vetoed the Volstead Act before the amendment was ratified.
If you’re ever in Baltimore, the “Owl Bar” is a great spot and is 100% authentic- it was a bar prior to prohibition, speakeasy during prohibition, and now bar again.
My wedding reception was at the Belvedere, after party at the owl bar. Great spot.
username checks out
Prohibition was a result of Suffrage. Never let your girlfriends forget how much drunkards had to go through for women’s rights
Not all speakeasy’s have this vibe. Have you been to Halligan in Chicago? Of course, you have and that was a speakeasy owned by a mobster in the prohibition era. Now it’s got a bunch of windows and reasonably priced drinks.
These wannabe “speakeasy” bars are just dimly lit back rooms or basements filled with cornballs who post pictures of their drink on Instagram and get a really good bargain from their weed dealer at $50 a g.
“New Jersey: It’s not that bad”
I stopped reading at NJ trash state. Johnny I’m going to need you to take a big step back and literally fuck your own face. Then come to the Garden State and check it out. It’s not that bad.