1929 The Bon Vivant's Companion or How to Mix Drinks by Jerry Thomas

INTRODUCTION

Dan Coombs and Charley Stevens, all very famous singers and blackface comedians. The show prospered, but when winter came Professor Thomas suddenly abandoned the enterprise and sailed for Central America. The reason for his departure remained a mystery until a miner, another bewhiskered giant, boasted that he had asked Professor Thomas to prepare a certain beverage,and that the Professor was obliged to hang his head and admit that he had never heard of it. The bewhiskered giant explained that the drink was peculiar to Central America. Within a few months Professor Thomas had stocked his mental reservoir with the wisdom of the Central Americans, and then took ship to New York. There he learned that the Yale boys were again strutting boastfully about New Haven with no bartender to guide them. He immediately answered the call of duty and hastened to his home town, where he opened a barroom, introduced the Blue Blazer, and soon put the Yale lads in their proper places. His task completed. Professor Thomas disposed of his New Haven holdings,and journeyed to South Carolina to study the julep in its native haunt. When he had added this famous concoction to his repertoire he went to Chicago,and for several months eked out a lonely existence in that outpost of civilization, which had not then been subjected to the refining influences of machine guns and Big Bill Thompson. But he was not long able to endure the crudities of the lake settlement, and he soon dropped down to St. Louis, where he became Principal Bartender of the Planters' House, one of the most famous hotels in America. It was especially noted for its fried chicken and waffles, and for catfish and candied sweet pota toes. It was while he was presiding over the Planters' House bar, in the early 'fifties, that Professor Thomas reached the apex of his career by inventing the beverage which has thundered down the years as the Tom and Jerry. A few historians have expressed the opinion that the Tom xxxi