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Weird Mafia Myths Popularized by the Godfather and Media

Khalid Elhassan July 15, 2022 37 min

23. Prohibition Did Not Arise in a Vacuum: America Had a Serious Alcohol Problem

Colonial Americans boozing it up. The Appendix

As the history and ultimate fate of Prohibition demonstrate, it was a flawed and misguided attempt to address a problem. However, Prohibition did not occur in a vacuum, and the problem it sought to address was all too real, and quite serious. In a nutshell, America was, collectively speaking, a lush. A straight-up alcoholic country, in which booze was consumed and abused at levels far greater than any we are used to today. The British were never slouches at drinking, but in 1839, British traveler Frederick Marryat marveled at American drinking habits in A Diary in America:

Flappers drinking bootleg alcohol during prohibition, summer 1925. Photo via the New Yorker.

“I am sure the Americans can fix nothing without a drink … If you meet, you drink; if you part, you drink; if you make acquaintance, you drink; if you close a bargain you drink; they quarrel in their drink, and they make it up with a drink. They drink because it is hot; they drink because it is cold. If successful in elections, they drink and rejoice; if not, they drink and swear; they begin to drink early in the morning, they leave off late at night; they commence it early in life, and they continue it, until they soon drop into the grave“. Or as historian W. J. Rorabaugh put it: “Americans drank from the crack of dawn to the crack of dawn“.

Also Read: Fabulous Facts About Flappers.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.