Taverns.Breckinridge.HISTORY-OtherFrom: KyArchives [Archives@genrecords.org] Sent: Saturday, October 28, 2006 3:12 PM To: Ky-Footsteps Subject: Taverns.Breckinridge.HISTORY-Other Taverns Breckinridge County KyArchives History Other Book Title: A Glimpse Of The Past Plots against the tyranny of George III were made in several of our early taverns. "The Green Dragon" of Boston, which our history calls "the headquarters of the Revolution". As a gathering place for patriots it was a natural and reasonable choice, for the tavern of that time was vital to the people of its community. Brought to this country by the English, the tavern soon occupied a position of remarkable esteem in colonial life. Rome had founded it as a stopping place where travelers could find rest and sleep, wash off the dust and grime of the journet, obtain fresh horses, and take food and drink. To Rome the tavern was a highroad convenience. But in early America it wa the heart of every settlement, its strength, its unity, its fellowship, the center of its daily living and its struggle for survival. Since taverns were given the priviledge of selling alcoholic drinks, they had to be operated by honest and upright men. Men, women and children of all classes and all ages drank fermented beverages as casually and regularly as they would drink water. Since this was a way of life brought from the old country and one they expected to maintain, it was highly important that these beverages be sold and served in an orderly way and that they be prudently used under judicious supervision. It was therefore ruled by the General Court of Massachusetts in 1656 that each town should maintain a well-managed tavern, or be subject to a fine. There were a number of reasons for the widespread drinking of spirits, which existed in colonial days, the first being, of course, that it was customary. Spirituous liquor was considered necessary to health, hospitality, endurance, and nutrition, a cure for many ills and a preventive of many more. Also it was true that some settlements lacked good drinking water. And then there was the bitter cold of winter, which led the settlers to seek warmth and comfort in drinks made with beer, wine, brandy, or rum, especially rum. For these reasons there was little objection to the drinking of spirits, but to drink to excess was a grave offense. A tavern owner who allowed any person to "be made drunk in his house" was fined. Habitual offenders were put in prison, sentenced to periods of hard labor, and obliged to wear a humiliating patch of cloth, which confessed their weakness, a large red D on a white field. The tavern owner was usually a highly respected man, and his tavern a lightly respected establishment. As far back as 1672 his license could be revoked if his tavern was not managed in a proper and orderly way. It is evident that every tavern was closely watched, especially for condoning or excusing excessing drinking, which was a serious offense. In Massachusetts one tavern owner who permitted "tippling" to go too far was fined thirty shillings and two pence. Excessive drinking was defined as, when above half a pint of wine or once cup is allowed at one time to one person. Oddly enough to people of today, the church and tavern were closely related. No town was consdered complete without both, and the authorities ruled that they must be as close together as possible. The tavern was the center of the town's activities. It was an information center where news from the outside world could be had, a place where mail was deposited, collected, delivered and distributed. It was a courtroom, a recruiting office, an auction house, a social hall for community festivities, a refuge from Indian attacks and a meeting place for the patriots who plotted the rebellion against George III. During the Revolution the tavern, as in institution, became officers' quarters, barracks, a prison and a hospital for the wounded. It was also a place of assmebly for the military training given at least nine times a year as requied by law for all able men between sixteen and sixty. Each must come armed wiht guns, powder and flints, all in good order and ready for sudden occasion service. Most of the founding fathers of our country and some of its presidents were closely associated with colonial taverns. Nearly every tavern in the colonies had some significant part in the Revolution. Here soldiers were mustered in and mustered out. Here friends and families went to bid them goodbye when they left, and to welcome them home when they returned. Here the townspeople gathered for word of the Continential Army, its victories and its defeats. And when the war was ended, the patriouts who once had come here to plan a rebellion now came again, this time to plan ways to realize the dream shaped for them by Samuel Adams-- "that these American states may never cease to be free and independent". The new land was opening, broadening, widening, revealing deep flowing rivers, fertile valleys and wooded hills that called new settlers from foreign lands. The French had come with their rum. And now, the Scotch-Irish, brining the tenderly made spirit known as whiskey, which was to be to the new country, both a blessing and a curse. Colonial roads were not more, at first, than an Indian Trail, usually in poor condition and ill-marked. Travelers found passage from one place to another difficult and slow. The roads were terrible and travelers have left accounts of journeys, which were tedious and disagreeable. For the entire 17th and 18th centuries, water systems connected the young settlements with the world at large. A person did not have to be traveling a great distance tobe in need of a tavern. A trip beyond ten miles required spending the night. Taverns were also deliberately located on the outskirts of town where a pulic house could be serviceable to those who on long journeys were in want of necesary refreshment. Isolated taverns, which established themselves initially for travelers become the nucleus of settlements. The only landmars, other than natural ones, were taverns. The travelers measured thei journeys in the miles from one public house to another. Traelers knoew taverns would be located in the principal part of the town, along the highways, at point of road intersections and at the foot of ferry landings. The law required tavern owners to post obvious signs, for the directions of the strangers and they are the only artifacts from the 18th century tavern to survive in any numbers. Inn signs, a British tradition, were flat wooden boards decoratively painted with a symbolic representation of the name of the house. Entertainment was the catchword of tavern keepers. Today one equated the word with amusement, but entertainment's archaic meaning, in use in the 17th and 18th centuries, was maintenance or provision. The term covered eating, drinking and lodging. Travelers expected food and liquor on the road to be mediocre, choices limited and the prices haphazard. They were delighted when a public house's entertainment exceeded their expectations. Available to travelers were: ham, bacon, and fowl pigeon of one sort or another always to be had upon the road and often fresh meat or fish, dried Venison, Indian or Wheaten bread, butter, eggs, milk, often cheese, drinks of rum, brandy or whiskey, resembling gin. In the 18th century, drinking was the most popular of all tavern recreations. At the turn of the 19th century, due to the availability ofinexpensive whiskey, consumption had climbed to five gallons per person, approximately three times today's levels. The court established the prices for alcoholic beverages. Rum was the most popular distilled liquor of the time. The most expensive variety was imported from the West Indies. Many colonists drank cheaper, fermented beverages made locally. Hard Cider, being sold by the jug, pint, pot or pitcher. Beer was either imported from England or home brewed. Brandy was usually imported, but native varieties were sold, made from peaches, apples, or cherries. Home made liquors gained in poularity during the Revolution when the importation of liquor, beer and wine was halted. Alcohol probably acted as an additional source of calories in the colonists; sometimes inadequate diet. With poor heating in the wintertime, it produced temporary warmth and in the summer had an opposite colling effect. It was also widely held tht alcohol stimulated hard labor. Drinking accompanied every social occasion and special events; births, weddings, funerals, political mettings and church ordinations. In the 17th and into the 18th century, it was common to place beds in every room of a house and in the public rooms of taverns. Sleeping had not yet become the intimate and private act it is today. A traveler from Massachusetts complained of a restless night spent at Warren's Ordinary in New Jersey where he slept in the public room. He complained that privateers brough their girls thither to make merry and was so until two in the morning in the same room where his bed was. Outside the cities, where taverns were usually small ersidences adapted as inn, travelers shared the rooms of the taven keeper's family. Formal dances of self-presentation became popular in the colonies by the early 18th century. Proper posture and gestures of constraint, reinforced by the clothing of the day, were the marks of aspiration toward gentility and refinement. These dances, which required skill and training, became a part of colonial life. Tavern's, were the ideal site for dances and assemblies. Dancing figured prominently in colonial life. The country-dance, usually a square dance, lent them to the physical floor plan of the tavern. Three types of dances were held in taverns; private parties, public balls, by admission ticket, and dancing assemblies. They type of music played during a dance varied in accordance with the pretensions of the tavern, a single fiddler, sometimes a flute and a horn, even an orchestra, were present. Games were brought to early America by English and Dutch settlers. Cards, backgammon, passage, chess, checkers and ninepins became popular tavern recreations. Billiard tables were also prominent features of many taverns in the south. Card playing was one of the most prominent tavern and domestic amusements. Patrons played cards in the tavern public rooms, in private gatherings, even during dances in rooms adjacent to the ballroom. Cockfighting, bear and bull baiting were particularly popular in rural taverns where large outdoor spaces were available. However, the sport was not restricted to the country. An urban public house such as the "Sign of the Fighting Cocks" in New York built its reputation around regular cockfights. John Bourk, a New York City inn owner who died in 1770 had a cockpit in his tavern, which the appraiser of his estate described as "only old boards". New York City tavern keepers sponsored horse races during the 18th century. In the south, these races were sponsored by the gentry and only for the benefit of their social economic group. This was not the case in New York where the events were open to the general public, but there were complaints about the behavior of the crowd. There was a religious coule who lived next door to one of these saloons. The good man decided one night that he should pray that God would remove the house of sin. He prayed and the next morning he ran to the window and looked out and it was still there. The next night the woman said she would pray and see what happened. She prayed and the next morning when they ran to the window and looked out the saloon had burned down during the night. It was gone. The man said that he didn't understand the difference, he had prayed just as earnestly as his wife and nothing had happened. Then she had prayed and it burned down. She said, "I'll tell you the difference. You prayed, we went to bed and went to sleep; I prayed, got me a box of matches and went to work, sometimes the Lord needs help.". A Sure Cure for Drinking Old Bill had a drinking problem. Clara, his wife, said he was a good loving husband except when he started drinking and then he changed ino a low-down, good for nothing wife beater. Clara kept talking about divorcing Bill but didn't. One day a neighbor said before you divorce him, why don't you try something different. In place of your usual greeting when he gets home try being real sweet and loving to him maybe he will be so ashamed he will quit. The next time Bill came in drunk, Clara met him at the door. She gave him one of them big jaw-breaking kisses, like a French lover, helped him into the best arm chair, run and got him a drink of water and then climbed up in his lap and proceeds to give him the loving of his life. Finally it was getting a little late and she says, "Bill, don't you think we ought to go in the bedroom and go to bed?" Poor Bill's eyes are glazed over by now with passion and amazement, his head acts like his neck is broken, like he is in another world. He looks at her with a drunken leer like he is Romeo the First and says in a voice all full of emotion, "We might as well, I'll catch Hell when I get home anyway." One day Clara killed a couple of chickens for supper and was cleaning them in the kitchen sink and she had a brilliant idea. She left the entrails and guts in the sink and thought she would wait and see what would happen. That evening as usual Bill hit the door and staggered through the sitting room and to the kitchen sink and let it all go. Clara was in the sitting room and heard the most awful groans and sounds from the kitchen, they were ghostly, weird and unlike anything she had ever heard. Finally after about half an hour of this, Bill came to the sitting room door, he was white as a sheet, so weak he had to lean against the doorframe for support. He finally, in a very weak voice said, "Clara, honey I nearly died. You believe it; I'll never drink another drink as long as I live. Honey I threw up all my guts but don't worry, I got everyone of them back down where they belong." Bill, formed the first AA organization in his community. Submitted by: Dana Brown http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00005.html#0001067 This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/kyfiles/