Random Insane True Story Behind America's History with Alcohol (10 items)

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  (#5) Booze Was Once Used As Payment For Laborers

  And you thoughts the benefits at your job were bad. 

  There are numerous reports of alcohol being used as a payment for workers in the 19th and early 20th centuries (commonly among lower-class workers, such as house servants and laborers) but the most famous example featuring alcohol as payment was for the builders of the Eerie Canal. The mostly Irish team of laborers were paid a combination of 50 cents and 32 ounces of whiskey per day (including a two ounce shot every morning before work at 6am). The free-flowing alcohol led to a lot of violent fights, fun, Irish drinking songs and, of course, the completion of the canal that helped turn New York into a leader in the growing, global economy.

  And it was all done for 50 cents and 32 ounces of whiskey. What a steal.   
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  (#6) There Was A Pre-Prohibition Wine Mega Sale

  Now that America had several decades of hard, unmonitored drinking under its belt, it was time to take stock of the country and slow down its aggressive drinking habits. This lead to the brief banning of alcohol in America known as "Prohibition."

  In the time leading up to Prohibition, many winemakers saw the writing on the wall and knew they had to dispose of their wares. Leading wine makers of the period had the equivalent of 75 Olympic swimming pools of wine to offload before the law took effect. Americans stepped right up to the boozy plate and stocked up for the apocalypse – over 141 million bottles of wine were sold within three months. That was quite a bit of wine, especially considering that some of the population was already on board with the Prohibition movement.

  A smart business man named Horatio Lanza also bought a huge amount of wine, about 1.3 million gallons worth, and made quite a bit of money for himself during that period.

  We're not trying to force a second Prohibition or anything, but summer BBQ season is coming up, so if the threat of another alcohol ban could drive down the prices of booze real quick, that would be really helpful. 
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  (#2) In The Early Days, There Was No Legal Drinking Age

  The drinking age of the United States is one of the highest in the world at 21 years old. It took effect in all states in 1984, after Ronald Reagan threatened to cut the federal highway budget of any state that didn't comply with the mandate. But, back before Prohibition, the rules were a lot more loose. 

  From 1176 to 1919 (the beginning of Prohibition), there was no set drinking age for the country as a whole. States set their own drinking ages – and 15 was a pretty common one –  but most states didn't enforce a drinking age at all. 

  Really, the concern with the drinking age is mostly related to drunk driving accidents. The reason the drinking age was changed from 18 to 21 was because there was an increase in drunk-driving-related accidents in the 1960s and 1970s, the majority of which came from drivers under 20. 

  But why were we letting so many young children drink beer way in the past? Well, that brings us to our next point...
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  (#9) Bootleggers Created NASCAR

  With all the moonshine being illegally produced in the early 1900s, there was a huge need for drivers to distribute the product. Men would trick out their cars, making the engines more powerful and adding secret storage compartments to carry the white lightning. 

  These bootleggers became extremely skilled at outrunning the police and developed into excellent drivers. Not surprisingly, they began to practice with each other and compete in backwoods races.

  Eventually, the car races began to take shape into a real organization. NASCAR was founded in 1948, and almost every driver, mechanic, and car owner had been involved in bootlegging in some form.  
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  (#8) Moonshine Was A Way To Beat A Tax As Well As A Way To Poison Yourself

  Moonshine first began as a way for people in rural areas to produce their own whiskey; after the Revolutionary War, it became a way to avoid the recently established alcohol tax. It was also HUGE during Prohibition because there's no way people were going to suddenly give up their drinking. It was known by many names (firewater, white lightning, mountain dew, hooch), but the moniker "moonshine" comes from the way the farmers made it in secret, by the light of the moon. 

  The process of making moonshine was completely unregulated, which was the other reason for the government's concern. There was no cap on alcohol content, and it could be made from anything the brewers wanted to use. If a mistake was made, a bad batch could cause blindness or even death. Man, people really wanted their booze back then, regardless of the risk.

  But accidental poison wasn't the only surprising invention that came from moonshine...
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  (#3) People Drank Beer for Hydration Because It Was Safer Than Water

  George Washington was a producer of what was known as "small beer," a low-alcohol version of the popular hoppy beverage. See, in the early days, alcohol was often consumed instead of water, since it couldn't harbor potentially harmful bacteria like water often did. People (wisely) trusted beer more than they did water. Beer that wasn't too strong was needed back in those days, since water was sometimes not drinkable, and the colonists and early Americans needed a substitute whistle-wetter. The usual consumers of small beer were soldiers, paid servants, and male workers (usually of a lower class). 

  George Washington's small beer recipe has been reproduced by many modern beer makers to get a taste of what drinking was like in colonial America. The custom of drinking them while on the job, however, has not been recreated in America.

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