If you live in the small township of Gardner in Sangamon County, Illinois, you might wonder whether you’re voting in 1920 or 2020. The residents of Gardner, all 1464 of them, will have the opportunity to vote on a referendum asking the citizens whether their...
The shining city on the lake turned one hundred eighty-three years young this week! While we celebrate another year, it’s worth looking back to see how things looked one hundred years ago. Picture it, March 4th, 1920: “Billboard” didn’t exist so we can’t know for sure...
During Prohibition, and especially in Chicago, jazz was a cultural touchstone that riled just as many in anger as it did others on the dance floor. What was it about jazz that caused Thomas Edison to say that jazz would sound better played backwards? What...
This being the month that we celebrate former President Abraham Lincoln’s birthday in the “Land of Lincoln,” it only seems right that we turn the clock back nearly two hundred years to better understand what Lincoln thought of the early cries for Prohibition. Lincoln being...
Were the hallowed halls of the United States Capitol Building dry during Prohibition? Not at all! These drinkers, though, didn’t buy their moonshine from Capone or in a dirty speakeasy in DC. Like most Congressional scandals, they had an in-house guy for the dirty work. ...
When we think about the 1920’s, we have a sense of nostalgia for a simpler time. Alcohol was illegal, but people seemed to have more fun drinking. Jazz was brand new, women were just entering the polling booths to vote, and people were generally prospering. ...
Oh, the places you’ll go. You can’t drink it in a bar, you can’t drink it in your car. You can’t drink it in a boat, you can’t drink it with a goat. The late, great Dr. Seuss should have written a book about all...
For better or worse, Chicago is infamous for its St. Valentine’s Day Massacre and no amount of candy hearts and red roses can help this city outrun its bloody Valentine’s day legacy. What really happened on February 14, 1929? Who was there and why? Prohibition...
"Cheers to 100 years" Last weekend the company celebrated that on January 17th 1920 the 18th amendment (which had been ratified 1 year prior in 1919) actually went into effect thereby giving us the ability to become a business in 2014! It was Snorky's 21st birthday...
Chicago’s historical landmarks can tell a story. If the walls inside Chicago’s famous Palmer House could talk, the stories would go as far back as Chicago’s Great Fire. Built in 1871, the original building was intended as a wedding present from Potter Palmer to his...