"The population of the United States in 1919 was 104,514,000, and those folks were serviced by 180,000 licensed saloons and many, many unlicensed ones. Per capita consumption of alcohol hovered around 20 gallons a year, and most of that (90 percent, by some sources) was beer. Whether or not the dries had actually been winning their war against ardent spirits, tastes had been changing with immigration, transportation, and refrigeration. Whatever we drank, however, we drank quite a bit. We were, just as we had always been, tipsy." - Max Watman from Chasing the White Dog
In honor of Max Watman's book I will be reviewing this weekend I thought I would publish a short post on the up-and-coming three-part, five-and-a-half-hour documentary film series directed by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick: Prohibition. As Max Watman states in Chasing the White Dog, "For thirteen weird years, the Constitution of the United States of America made beverage alcohol illegal." Prohibition is bound to be an interesting and informative documentary of those thirteen years. To be released this fall:
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