Five Things You Didn’t Know About Prohibition

December 5 marks the anniversary of Repeal Day – when in 1933 the U.S. ratified the 21^st Amendment and officially repealed Prohibition after 13 long, dark years. Toast to your freedom to drink next Saturday by sipping the Stone Fence cocktail at Drink.Well in Austin . Made with Cutty Sark Prohibition Edition blended Scotch whisky, it pays tribute to the infamous alcohol smuggler Captain Bill McCoy, whose uncut and unadulterated shipments during the 1920s and early 30s led way to the term “The Real McCoy”.

Five Things You Didn’t Know About Prohibition

1. Not all states enforced Prohibition, in fact Maryland never even enacted an enforcement code, and eventually earned a reputation as one of the most stubbornly anti-Prohibition states in the Union. (Source: History.com)
2. Drug stores were allowed to sell “medicinal whiskey” to treat everything from toothaches to the flu. With a physician’s prescription, patients could legally buy a pint of hard liquor every ten days. (Source: PBS)
3. Cutty Sark found its way to America (from Canada and The Bahamas) during Prohibition via Captain Bill McCoy’s famed smuggling route along “Rum Row”. Every shipment of his arrived “unadulterated, uncut and clean,” leading to the phrase “The Real McCoy” being coined. (Source: Cutty Sark)
4. Hollywood is making an action movie based on the bootlegging alcohol smuggler captain William “Bill” McCoy that will star Chris Pratt as the infamous rum runner. (Source:Hollywood Reporter)
5. Some say President Roosevelt celebrated the repeal of Prohibition by enjoying a dirty martini, his preferred drink. (Source: History.com)