1935 Old Waldorf-Astoria Bar Book

PREAMBULARY 3 the young, not sparing young women. It became "smart" to affect the speakeasy and to make it a place of assemblage; and "drunk" and "souse" became humorous rather than disreputable terms. But avast with moral discussions! The story has been written, and we are trying to recover from what in effect was a national spree-with headaches, and sometimes worse. The fact was that, deprived of legal liquor, we had embarked, as it were, upon an unknown sea of al– coholic beverages. ,Thirsts were drowned, rather than quenched, in "bathtub" or synthetic gin-that or "whiskey" made from supposedly denat'o/ed wood-alcohol. Fatalities were frequent. The c~cktail, long considered an aid to good appetite and digestion and cheer, often proved an enemy to digestion, health, morals and even mind. In sum, the art of drinking, according to the tenets of .the long established American School, was lost, except one found in Havana, or Nassau, or elsewhere abroad, some veteran barman whose training and experience qualified him to compose qrinks in the old, standard American way. The men employed in speakeasies to mix cocktails and other drinks as a rule knew nothing about the job and did not have valid liquors to start with. A "cocktail" was apt to prove just something with so-called gin in it, or a mix– ture of two or more of the 'imitations that masked behind well-known names. Self-respecting bartenders of the old day-or most of them-had found other means of ea:rning a living. Some had emigrated. There were exceptions. Breaking the law of the land-a frequent avocation for many of us-most of our social clubs found employment for experienced bar– men. But rare it was that this particular searcher for truth