2020 marks the 100 year anniversary of two important events in American History: On January 1, 1920 the 18th Amendment outlawed alcohol, and on August 18, 1920 the 19th Amendment gave women the right to vote. And yes, these are connected!
Women’s independence flourished during the Roaring 20s. Many took over “men’s” jobs during WW1 in the previous decade and handled the household purchases rather than simply clean and breed children. They had no intention of being shoved back into the kitchen as jazz blared, skirt hems rose and female American poets and authors such as Anais Nin, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Zelda Fitzgerald traipsed across America and Europe writing bawdy, pointed, colorful works. (Side note: During this time, my French grandmother was taking flying lessons and helped run her family’s brasserie in Alsace before marrying and moving south to Nice, and my English Great-Grandmother was marching for women’s right to vote in England, which passed in 1928, and she later became a Union leader and London Country Councilor.)
So, why wouldn’t the free-thinking women of the 1920s want to lubricate their fight for rights with a nice stiff drink? Well, that’s more complicated. The Victorian Women of the late 1800s were more than a little straight-laced (literally) and, for several decades, they led the fight to make alcohol illegal. They believed alcohol led their husbands into debauchery and their families into poverty. And, although women are blamed for outlawing liquor, the truth is that in January 1919, when the topic came up for a vote, 80% of legislators vote in favor of outlawing liquor, and 98% of them were men! This quote from Hugh Abrose, author of Liberated Spirits, further explains:
“Men had argued for years that women should be denied the vote because politics didn’t directly impact their lives, but the new laws put the government into a woman’s domain. Prohibitionists—male and female—had long employed images of the home and motherhood as under attack from drunken husbands who spent their wages in the saloon, beat their wives and children, and brought financial ruin upon the family. If the government truly wanted to help families, women argued, they needed to enact prohibition and suffrage.”
Important to note: While women of color participated in protests and activism, many were not given the same voting rights as white women until years later. See this article for more information on that.
So… back to the booze. After 13 long years of underground drinking, bootlegging and homemade swill, the government finally realized the ridiculousness of outlawing liquor and repealed Prohibition with the 21st Amendment as of December 5, 1933. It has since been known as Repeal Day, and celebrations around the country continue to modern times.
This year, The Liquid Muse Repeal Day Party is going online. I’ll share a Prohibition-era recipe with you each of the first five days of December in The Liquid Muse Cocktail & Culinary Club Facebook group. (Request membership at link.) As people tippled during Prohibition in ‘underground’ Speakeasies, new cocktail recipes were still being created. And, of course, in Europe, the liquor was flowing so as American bartenders hopped across the pond, they also kept mixing drinks.
The first one I’m sharing is a stiff little doozie called the Twelve Mile Limit. As stated in this article, while Prohibition outlawed “the sale, manufacture and transport of intoxicating beverages” within the United States, revelers continued to drink and party on cruise ships just outside the twelve-mile liquor-free radius around the country’s shores. The Twelve-Mile Limit recipe appears, with further description in this Saveur Magazine link.
Twelve Mile Limit
1 oz white rum
½ oz rye whiskey
½ oz brandy
½ oz grenadine
½ oz fresh lemon juice
Lemon twist, for garnish
Shake all ingredients well with ice in a cocktail shaker and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon twist.