Prohibition - Speakeasy | 3

Published: Feb. 21, 2018, 8:05 a.m.

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While Prohibition was successful in closing the saloon, it didn\\u2019t quench America\\u2019s thirst. Enterprising bootleggers found more ways to provide more alcohol to parched Americans \\u2013 so much that there was finally enough supply to meet demand. New drinking establishments popped up across the nation: speakeasies.

Forced underground, these new types of saloons operated under new rules, too. Women drank right alongside the men, and both black and white patrons danced together to Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway, all while local cops shrugged or were paid off to look the other way.

But the Feds hadn\\u2019t turned their backs on the bootleggers. They went undercover, arresting thousands in stings that some claimed were entrapment. Increasingly, Federal agents took the job of enforcing Prohibition seriously. They had to; the business of illicit alcohol was growing dangerous \\u2013 and violent.

To learn more about Izzy Einstein and Moe Smith and the problems involved in the enforcement of Prohibition, check out Professor David J. Hanson\\u2019s, \\u201cAlcohol Problems and Solutions,\\u201d is an excellent resource.

If you want to read more about the raids on Prohibition-era speakeasies in New Orleans, this \\u201cIntemperance\\u201d map by Hannah C. Griggs is an amazing resource that shows every single raid over in that city. For New York speakeasies, Michael Lerner\\u2019s Dry Manhattan is a thorough investigation of that city. Queen of the Nightclubs by Louise Berliner is also a fun read.

To learn more about Harlem and the generation gap in the 1920s, Terrible Honesty by Ann Douglas is required reading.


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