Alcohol in American History - John Barleycorn Tells Some of His Story
Wikimedia Commons-NARA
April is Alcoholism Awareness Month
The National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence designates April as Alcohol Awareness Month. I have lost friends and family members to alcoholism, so I am well aware of alcohol’s destructive impact on human lives. Yet, I am honest enough to admit I like a glass of wine and realistic enough to know that forbidding people to drink alcohol does not stop them from making it a part of their lives as Prohibition in America graphically illustrated. Americans have a history with alcohol that goes back to before America became America. After pondering how to illustrate the close relationship between alcohol and American history, I decided to let John Barleycorn tell the American version of his story in fact and in fiction and make his own underlying points about using alcohol responsibly.
A few links about John Barleycorn:
John Barleycorn
John Barleycorn
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/318 John Barleycorn by Jack London. A personal memoir about Jack London’s relationship with alcohol.
The National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence designates April as Alcohol Awareness Month. I have lost friends and family members to alcoholism, so I am well aware of alcohol’s destructive impact on human lives. Yet, I am honest enough to admit I like a glass of wine and realistic enough to know that forbidding people to drink alcohol does not stop them from making it a part of their lives as Prohibition in America graphically illustrated. Americans have a history with alcohol that goes back to before America became America. After pondering how to illustrate the close relationship between alcohol and American history, I decided to let John Barleycorn tell the American version of his story in fact and in fiction and make his own underlying points about using alcohol responsibly.
A few links about John Barleycorn:
John Barleycorn
John Barleycorn
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/318 John Barleycorn by Jack London. A personal memoir about Jack London’s relationship with alcohol.
A Chapter From John Barleycorn, Journalist
Rum and Whiskey Rebelling
Chicago Star
April, 1791
Thanks to the Georgia settlers, rum was the first drink distilled in America. The colonists learned how to make it from pure cane sugar or fermented molasses and Yankee merchants hit the big time when they brought molasses to New England to be made into rum.
When their rum was finished, they took it to Africa and traded it for slaves, then took the slaves to Barbadoes in the West Indies and traded them for the sugar cane that was grown there. They brought the sugar cane back to New England to be made into more rum to be traded for more slaves. The "ring‑ around‑the‑rosy game went on and on.
This set up grew to be so profitable that by 1750 there were 63 rum distilleries in Massachusetts alone and more than 1,000 ships engaged in the rum trade out of Boston. Rum became the basis for the early economic prosperity of the colonies. Rum was the everyday drink of the colonists and they consumed about 12 million gallons of it a year. Rum flowed at weddings, house risings, log rollings, the christening of churches, funerals, town meetings and most community affairs and gatherings.
The minister drank rum as liberally as the merchant. It was the common beverage of the rich and poor, both sexes and all ages. There were very few abstainers. Rum was used as a household remedy, in recipes such as hot buttered rum and a hot strong punch called Rumbo. Parents spoon fed rum to their children and mothers rubbed it on the gums of teething babies to ease their pain.
It was even used as a "cure for baldness."
When the English levied taxes on it, rum‑smuggling was responsible for the colonists developing fast sailing ships and skillful sea captains. Sailors used rum as a basis for chants and rhythms that helped them keep time when they were rowing, loading casks and hauling up ropes. The words Rumbolo and Rum Tee Dee were sung as accompaniments and later incorporated into folk songs and children's games. Sailors jeered at someone too freely indulging in rum as "carrying too much sail."
About the only dissenting voice in the rum soaked colonies was Cotton Mather's. He was a colonial minister and writer who deplored the fact that anyone could buy rum, "The poor and wicked" included. But despite the good minister's opinion, rum remained the key to colonial prosperity, trade, and the development of commerce.
The Revolutionary War brought a rum shortage to the soldiers and colonists alike, because trade from the West Indies was cut off and there were no more imports of rum or the molasses needed to make domestic rum. Profiteering flourished because of the shortages and finally, a substitute for rum was introduced in the form of whiskey.
In time, whiskey grew to rival rum and surpass it as the drink of the new nation. One of the reasons the brew of the future was whiskey was that by 1775, one third of the American population was Scotch‑Irish. These Scotch‑Irish immigrants brought with them and shared freely their whiskey distilling knowledge acquired in the misty green glens of Scotland and the Emerald Isle.
After they immigrated to America, the Scotch‑Irish settled in frontier Western Pennsylvania and back country Virginia and grew crops of rye and corn for distilling whiskey.
Not only did they need whiskey to drink, but they desperately needed it as a trade item. It was a matter of practicality. Two gallons of home made whiskey represented about one bushel of grain. A horse could carry about four bushels or 240 pounds of grain to market up and down the thickly wooded hills and valleys at no profit. The same horse could carry two eight gallon jugs of whiskey at a healthy profit. The backwoods farmer needed his whiskey to barter for goods like nails and cloth and the other things he couldn't grow or make for himself. Whiskey became such a popular trade exchange that in some regions, prices of commodities were figured in barrels of whiskey. The frontiersmen needed whiskey for economic survival.
Around the year 1775, city distilleries began to operate and whiskey drinking increased so much in popularity that there was a potential grain shortage for bread. Some people feared a national famine. The Continental Congress and a few of the states tried to adopt strict laws limiting the amount of grain to be converted into whiskey, but these laws weren't enforceable. People fiercely defended their right to individual liberty, "especially in the matter of drink."
After the Revolution, the financially pressed new American government levied a liquor tax as a way to raise funds. In 1789, the first tariff bill of Congress put a tax on all imported alcoholic beverages and on all of the molasses for making rum. Two years later, Secretary of Treasury Alexander Hamilton pushed a bill through Congress that taxed whiskey imports and also the American manufacture of whiskey. This bill led to an armed rebellion that was called "The Whiskey Rebellion."
Congressman Fisher Ames of Massachusetts commented about the bill. He said "If any man supposes that a mere bill can turn the taste of people from ardent spirits, he has a romantic notion of legislative power."
There you are Reverend Ernshaw! I'm going to have this quote printed in large, red, capital letters so you can read it again and again. I'm going to write them in the sky above your house! Because you know what happened in Pennsylvania? This whiskey tax bill inflamed the entire Pennsylvania countryside and the people took up arms. President Washington called up the militia of three states. Soon the tramp of 15,000 soldiers marching was heard in the state. He personally led the troops in putting down the rebellion and the frontiersmen agreed to pay the tax. The new government had demonstrated it could enforce the laws of Congress no matter how unpopular, but the law was bitterly resented and disobeyed at every opportunity.
Tell me Reverend, do you think the government today is prepared to send battalions of our Doughboys throughout the country to enforce Prohibition?
John Barleycorn
More of the story of John Barleycorn, Journalist
Chicago Star
April, 1791
Thanks to the Georgia settlers, rum was the first drink distilled in America. The colonists learned how to make it from pure cane sugar or fermented molasses and Yankee merchants hit the big time when they brought molasses to New England to be made into rum.
When their rum was finished, they took it to Africa and traded it for slaves, then took the slaves to Barbadoes in the West Indies and traded them for the sugar cane that was grown there. They brought the sugar cane back to New England to be made into more rum to be traded for more slaves. The "ring‑ around‑the‑rosy game went on and on.
This set up grew to be so profitable that by 1750 there were 63 rum distilleries in Massachusetts alone and more than 1,000 ships engaged in the rum trade out of Boston. Rum became the basis for the early economic prosperity of the colonies. Rum was the everyday drink of the colonists and they consumed about 12 million gallons of it a year. Rum flowed at weddings, house risings, log rollings, the christening of churches, funerals, town meetings and most community affairs and gatherings.
The minister drank rum as liberally as the merchant. It was the common beverage of the rich and poor, both sexes and all ages. There were very few abstainers. Rum was used as a household remedy, in recipes such as hot buttered rum and a hot strong punch called Rumbo. Parents spoon fed rum to their children and mothers rubbed it on the gums of teething babies to ease their pain.
It was even used as a "cure for baldness."
When the English levied taxes on it, rum‑smuggling was responsible for the colonists developing fast sailing ships and skillful sea captains. Sailors used rum as a basis for chants and rhythms that helped them keep time when they were rowing, loading casks and hauling up ropes. The words Rumbolo and Rum Tee Dee were sung as accompaniments and later incorporated into folk songs and children's games. Sailors jeered at someone too freely indulging in rum as "carrying too much sail."
About the only dissenting voice in the rum soaked colonies was Cotton Mather's. He was a colonial minister and writer who deplored the fact that anyone could buy rum, "The poor and wicked" included. But despite the good minister's opinion, rum remained the key to colonial prosperity, trade, and the development of commerce.
The Revolutionary War brought a rum shortage to the soldiers and colonists alike, because trade from the West Indies was cut off and there were no more imports of rum or the molasses needed to make domestic rum. Profiteering flourished because of the shortages and finally, a substitute for rum was introduced in the form of whiskey.
In time, whiskey grew to rival rum and surpass it as the drink of the new nation. One of the reasons the brew of the future was whiskey was that by 1775, one third of the American population was Scotch‑Irish. These Scotch‑Irish immigrants brought with them and shared freely their whiskey distilling knowledge acquired in the misty green glens of Scotland and the Emerald Isle.
After they immigrated to America, the Scotch‑Irish settled in frontier Western Pennsylvania and back country Virginia and grew crops of rye and corn for distilling whiskey.
Not only did they need whiskey to drink, but they desperately needed it as a trade item. It was a matter of practicality. Two gallons of home made whiskey represented about one bushel of grain. A horse could carry about four bushels or 240 pounds of grain to market up and down the thickly wooded hills and valleys at no profit. The same horse could carry two eight gallon jugs of whiskey at a healthy profit. The backwoods farmer needed his whiskey to barter for goods like nails and cloth and the other things he couldn't grow or make for himself. Whiskey became such a popular trade exchange that in some regions, prices of commodities were figured in barrels of whiskey. The frontiersmen needed whiskey for economic survival.
Around the year 1775, city distilleries began to operate and whiskey drinking increased so much in popularity that there was a potential grain shortage for bread. Some people feared a national famine. The Continental Congress and a few of the states tried to adopt strict laws limiting the amount of grain to be converted into whiskey, but these laws weren't enforceable. People fiercely defended their right to individual liberty, "especially in the matter of drink."
After the Revolution, the financially pressed new American government levied a liquor tax as a way to raise funds. In 1789, the first tariff bill of Congress put a tax on all imported alcoholic beverages and on all of the molasses for making rum. Two years later, Secretary of Treasury Alexander Hamilton pushed a bill through Congress that taxed whiskey imports and also the American manufacture of whiskey. This bill led to an armed rebellion that was called "The Whiskey Rebellion."
Congressman Fisher Ames of Massachusetts commented about the bill. He said "If any man supposes that a mere bill can turn the taste of people from ardent spirits, he has a romantic notion of legislative power."
There you are Reverend Ernshaw! I'm going to have this quote printed in large, red, capital letters so you can read it again and again. I'm going to write them in the sky above your house! Because you know what happened in Pennsylvania? This whiskey tax bill inflamed the entire Pennsylvania countryside and the people took up arms. President Washington called up the militia of three states. Soon the tramp of 15,000 soldiers marching was heard in the state. He personally led the troops in putting down the rebellion and the frontiersmen agreed to pay the tax. The new government had demonstrated it could enforce the laws of Congress no matter how unpopular, but the law was bitterly resented and disobeyed at every opportunity.
Tell me Reverend, do you think the government today is prepared to send battalions of our Doughboys throughout the country to enforce Prohibition?
John Barleycorn
More of the story of John Barleycorn, Journalist
| john_barleycorn_journalist.pdf |
