In Early America, taverns were at the center of social life. Officially, they fulfilled a double public function: they were set up for the “receiving and refreshment of travellers and strangers, and to serve the public occasions of such town or precint”. That is, first of all, they were meant to feed and lodge travelers and strangers suitably. A surprising number of traders and travelers from all ranks of society were always on the move, among them judges and other civil servants who had to travel regularly to the towns and villages. So, there was a steady flow of travelers of middle to upper social rank, and the idea was to offer them the necessary, and possibly comfortable, accommodation. Then, taverns were the gathering place for the local community on various occasions, for example, the sittings of ordinary civil courts. Taverns were so necessary that the authorities obliged all the communities to have at least one. In the villages, but also in the towns, the public places available for gatherings were really few: the church and the meeting house, both usually bitterly cold in winter and where it was always necessary to have a dignified, proper behavior. A tavern provided its customers with a warm, fire-lit place where they could meet in a more relaxed way.
The fact that local people gathered there to drink was of secondary importance, often barely tolerated by the authorities. The tavern keepers were subject to a lot of rules and regulations. They needed a license issued by the authorities, which was granted only to citizens of proven morality. Licenses had to be renewed annually, and the extension could be refused if public decency was not observed. Authorities tried to limit alcohol consumption, gambling, dancing, and the very sojourn of customers. Even the prices were subject to regulations, and the quality of the products and of the service too.
Taverns attracted also vagabonds, adventurers, odd preachers and other people to be wary of. But the authorities kept watch: “In 1637, there were not many houses in the Town of Boston, amongst which were two houses of entertainment called Ordinaries, into which if a stranger went, he was presently followed by one appointed to that Office, who would trust himself into his company uninvited, and if he called more drink than the Officer thought in his judgment he could soberly bear away, he would presently countermand it, and appoint the proportion, beyond which he could not get one drop.” (J. Josselyn “Account of two Voyages to New England” 1675)
In the first decades, they were private houses converted into taverns as best as possible and served the general public, from all ranks of society. Later, in the 1700s, there is evidence of buildings planned and built specifically as taverns and, with population growth, economic development and increasing social complexity, in the cities taverns started to cater to a more specific public. In Boston, New York, Philadelphia and other cities there were taverns for the élites, often in the city center, where the clientele had wine, brandy, chocolate, coffee and other luxuries at their disposal. Then there were taverns for the middle class and regular workers, more modest, but still respectable. Finally, usually on the waterfront, there were scores of lowly taverns for the humble classes, where they drank mainly rum.
Then, there were retailers. They were shops or private houses where they sold beer and spirits which could not be consumed on the premises but had to be taken away. Retailers were forbidden to sell cups or glasses, they had to sell only by the bottle or, anyway, in vessels of a certain capacity. But often the owner added a few tables, dealt out a few drams and it became a poorer version of a tavern.
In the tavern you could drink beer, cider and various kinds of spirits, but mostly rum, “Any account of old-time travel by stage-coach and lodging in old-time taverns would be incomplete without frequent reference to that universal accompaniment of travel and tavern sojourn, that most Americans of comforting stimulants -- rum.” (A. Morse Earle “Stage-coach and tavern days” 1900).
In the1700s, locally produced American rum became plentiful and cheap, very cheap. Tavern account books indicated a preference for rum over all other drinks, both in towns and in the countryside. For instance, in 1728, a group of backcountry surveyors in North Carolina found rum in every place they ventured and marveled that some settlers even used it in the cooking of bacon. According to Wayne Curtis’ “And a bottle of rum” 2006, one tavern keeper’s book for 1774 in North Carolina showed that out of 221 customers, some 165 had ordered rum by itself, and another 41 ordered drinks that contained rum. In Philadelphia, the sales at the One Tun tavern for five months in 1770 show that drinks made with rum, including toddy, grog and punch, out sold beer and wine combined.
Authorities were worried, and there was no lack of attempts to limit the consumption of rum. The highest point of this prohibitionist effort was perhaps reached in 1712 when the General Court of Massachusetts forbade at all the sale of rum and of other distilled beverages in taverns. The ban was largely ignored by tavern-keepers and in actual fact very few Officials attempted to enforce the law which, over time, became a dead letter. Rum was stronger than the worries of the authorities and towards 1740 it was at the core of popular drinking culture. “It comes rolling in, hogshead after hogshead” lamented Rev. Samuel Niles in his 1761 pamphlet.
Everybody could afford rum and it allowed everybody to take part in the collective rounds of booze, and even to get drunk, which led to a loosening of inhibitions and social rules. All this threatened the traditional, rigid control that the upper classed had always exerted on society, “That the upper classes were able to monitor drinking and to impose restraints was due to the hierarchical nature of colonial society. Although men were deemed equal before the law and before God, their social and political inequalities were recognized and respected. New Englanders followed the advice of their educated, socially prominent Congregational clergy, and in free and open elections they chose men from the upper classes as tithingmen, school overseers, town selectmen, and legislative representatives” (W. J. Rorabaugh “The Alcoholic Republic” 1979).
Also a future Founding Father was worried. “Fifty-three years ago – remembers John Adams after the Revolution - I was fired with a zeal, amounting to enthusiasm, against ardent spirits, the multiplication of taverns, retailers and dram-shop and tippling-houses. Grieved to the heart to see the number of idlers, thieves, sots and consumptive patients made for use of physicians, in these infamous seminaries, I applied to the Court od Sessions, procured a committee of inspection and inquiry, reduced the number of licensed houses, etc. But I only acquired the reputation of a hypocrite and an ambitious demagogue by it. The number of licensed houses was soon reinstated, drams, grog and sotting were not diminished, and remain to this day as deplorable as ever. You may as well preach to the Indians against rum as to our people.”
Taverns were also the main place to share news about what was happening in the world. Today we often tend to forget that modern mass media are a recent thing. Back then, ordinary citizens heard the news from traders, travelers, visitors, people who came back from a journey, people who had spoken to someone and knew something. So in taverns, in-between glasses, people talked, discussed, shared information, expressed their views; in the 1700s people could also find a copy of the first newspapers and some pamphlets. What is now called public opinion was created that way.
As time went on, taverns became the center of political life; therefore, those who aspired to be a leader of their people, had to face up to this new reality: the winning over of the citizens’ minds, and votes, had to go through taverns and rum. Taverns became a sort of constituencies. Therefore, candidates went to the taverns, spoke to the customers, made themselves popular and bought people drinks, a lot of drinks.
In 1758 George Washington stood as candidate in the Virginia House of Burgesses. Taking his usual pragmatic approach, in the electoral campaign he paid a long liquor bill where the largest items of expenditure were 40 gallons of Rum Punch, 18,5 gallons of wine and 26 gallons of “best Barbados rum”. He was elected with 301 votes, “the largest number cast for any candidate”.
But let’s see how a young John Adams describes the new relationship between taverns and political life, in his Diary, on 29th May, 1760:
“Few things I believe have deviated so far from the first Design of their Institution, are so fruitful of destructive Evils or so needful of a speedy Regulation, as Licensed Houses. The Accomodation of Strangers, and perhaps of Town Inhabitants on public occasions, are the only warrantable Intentions of a Tavern and the supply of the Neighbourhood with necessary Liquors, in small Quantities … and at the cheapest Rates are the only excusable Designs of a Retailer; and that these Purposes may be effected, it is necessary, that both should be selected from the most virtuous, and wealthy People who will accept the Trust, and so few of each should be erected, that the Profits may enable them to make the best Provision, at a moderate Price. But at the present Day, such Houses are become the eternal Haunt, of loose disorderly People of the same Town, which renders them offensive and unfit for the Entertainment of a Traveller of the least delicacy; and, it seems that Poverty, and distressed Circumstances are become the strongest Argument, to procure an Approbation, and for [these?] assigned Reasons, such Multitudes have been lately licensed, that none can afford to make Provision, for any but the trifling, nasty vicious Crew, that most frequent them. The Consequences of these Abuses are obvious. Young People are [illegible] tempted to waste their Time and Money, and to acquire habits of Intemperance and Idleness that we often see [illegible] reduce many of them to Beggary, and Vice, and lead some of them at last to Prisons and the Gallows. The Reputation of our County is ruined among Strangers who are apt to infer the Character of a Place from that of the Taverns and the People they see there. But the worst Effect of all, and which ought to make every Man who has the least sense of his Priviledges tremble, these Houses are become in many Places the Nurseries of our Legislators; An Artful Man, who has neither sense nor sentiment may by gaining a little sway among the Rabble of a Town, multiply Taverns and Dram Shops and thereby secure the Votes of Taverner and Retailer and of all, who will be induced and the Multiplication of Taverns will make many who may be induced by Plip and Rum to Vote for any Man whatever and for These I dare not presume to point but any Method, to suppress or Restrain these increasing Evils; but I think for these Reasons it would be well worth the Attention of our Legislature, to confine the Number of, and retrieve the Character of Licensed Houses; least, that Impiety, and Prophaneness, that abandoned Intemperance, and Prodigality; that Impudence and brawling Temper, which these abominable Nurseries daily propagate, should arise at length to a degree of strength, that even the Legislature will not be able to control.”
Customs and laws varied slightly from colony to colony and in every colony they changed over the years, yet certain general characteristics can be recognized. To simplify, in the taverns for the élites the clientele was made up almost exclusively of white males. Entrance to slaves, black freemen, Indians and white servants was often absolutely forbidden. At other times it was discouraged: for example, they could purchase alcoholic drinks only if their master was present, or with his written authorization. By contrast, there were no laws which explicitly forbade women to frequent taverns, but the influence of the all-pervasive moral values was such that in actual fact it prevented women from frequenting them. Of course, female travelers were exempted from this rule, but, if possible, it was considered more socially acceptable to find accommodation for them in a guest house or in the private home of some relative or acquaintance.
Things were very different in low-rank taverns. There, the laws were not really respected and poor white workers of both sexes, whores, occasional seamen, thieves and receivers of stolen goods, slaves, black freemen, mulattos and even Indians would congregate and interact. Actually, according to the prosecution, the so-called New York Slave Conspiracies of 1712 and 1741 took shape in the poor, low-rank taverns and ale houses of the waterfront. And they were washed down with rivers of rum.
And now, just as I did last year, I’m taking my summer leave. See you again in November.
Marco Pierini
