Asheville takes Manhattan: Bar Wars celebrates Repeal Day
Though Asheville is perhaps best known as Beer City, its former status as a dry town lasted longer than most. That's because North Carolina prohibited alcohol in 1909, 12 years earlier than the rest of the country.
And on Dec. 5, 1933, while much of the U.S. celebrated Repeal Day, North Carolina watched from the sidelines, refusing to legalize alcohol for another four years.
"In New Orleans, they fired the cannons in jubilation," Arthur W. Everett wrote in a 1958 Asheville Times article celebrating the 25th anniversary of Repeal Day. "Crowds whooped it up in Chicago's Loop. They hanged 'Old Man Prohibition' in effigy in Gotham's Times Square.'"
For those who think Repeal Day celebrations are better late than never, there's Bar Wars, which takes place Nov. 26 through Dec. 5 in celebration of the end of Prohibition. Fittingly, the citywide cocktail competition challenges bartenders to make their best versions of the first modern American cocktail, the Manhattan.
The final four bartenders will compete at Salvage Station Dec. 4, followed by a Repeal Day celebration at Smoky Park Supper Club.
While today there's no shame in celebrating booze going legal, in 1933, most Asheville Repeal Day celebrations likely took place underground. Or at least far from the disapproving glares of the fairer sex.
After all, it's women who were largely responsible for Prohibition in the first place, said Anne Fitten Glenn, who wrote "Asheville Beer: An Intoxicating History of Mountain Brewing." For the most part, women weren't allowed to drink in public, while their husbands spent all their earnings on drink, Glenn said.
"At this point, women didn't even have the right to vote, but they spearheaded this movement toward Prohibition and — when you look at it from their perspective — it's understandable," she said.
Prohibition in Asheville sent booze quite literally underground.
Glenn said Pack's Tavern may mark the site of a former booze-smuggling operation, with tunnels rumored to have run to the police station and under what's now the Roger McGuire Green.
"The story goes that those tunnels were used to move illegal whiskey around downtown and that (Pack's) was a blind tiger of sorts for purchasing illegal whiskey," she said.
During Prohibition what was known as Saloon Row, a thick knot of bars near what's now the Fine Arts Theater, went neglected and remained boarded up until the late-'80s, said Glenn.
But the whiskey trade remained lively, buoyed by Asheville's longtime status as a tourist city, said Dr. Dan Pierce, professor of history at UNC Asheville and author of "Real NASCAR: White Lightning, Red Clay, and Big Bill France".
According to Pierce, enterprising moonshiners would sometimes add coloring to their own house brew and pass it off as top-shelf whiskey. But there was also a thriving local smuggling operation.
Pierce said Gene Sluder, who built and owned the Asheville-Weaverville Speedway where North Buncombe High School now stands, had a side business dealing in what was then known as "red liquor."
Sluder's sister, who looked younger than her years, would even dress as a schoolgirl headed to an elite Canadian all-girls academy in order to smuggle whiskey across the border and eventually to Asheville. "There were these strong Detroit-to-Asheville connections," Pierce said. "There was practically a pipeline during Prohibition."
Among the tourists in fancy hotels, liquor flowed freely. "Some of the more elite places, it was a wink and a nod thing with the local authorities," Pierce said. "The secret knock wasn't hard to figure out."
Indeed, hotel bellhops could easily find bottles of liquor for the right kind of money. And by and large, the authorities looked the other way, though they'd bust bootleggers on occasion to keep up appearances, he said.
With all the whiskey around, it's likely well-heeled tourists were knocking back more than a few Manhattans, said Pierce.
It's that drink, made with whiskey, sweet vermouth, and bitters, that's stood the test of time above all others, said Philip Greene, a cocktail historian and author of 2016's "The Manhattan: The Story of the First Modern Cocktail."
The martini, Manhattan, daiquiri and Old Fashioned make up what Greene calls the "Mount Rushmore" of cocktails. "And all but the Manhattan have been corrupted," he said.
"Martini" has come to refer to anything in a martini glass, he said. "And a slurpy with rum in it is not a daiquiri. The Old Fashioned was corrupted when people decided it needed a whole orange and five cherries."
Not so for the Manhattan, which Greene said helped lay the foundation for a variety of drinks. There's the Rob Roy, made with Scotch. There's the Harvard, made with Brandy. There's the Cuban Manhattan, made with rum. "And then you have the Bronx, Palmetto and Brooklyn," said Greene.
The Manhattan essentially turned the world of cocktails on its ear, Greene said, ushering in an era of spirit-forward drinks. To be sure, other pre-Prohibition drinks have stood the test of time, including the Sazerac and the Whiskey Sour.
"But nothing as groundbreaking as you did when some genius took Vermouth and added it to an Old Fashioned and basically came up with the Manhattan," Greene said.
Asheville takes Manhattan
Explore the flavor and history of the Manhattan in the coming days as part of Bar Wars and Repeal Day celebrations, Nov. 26 through Dec. 5, presented by Spirit Savvy.
The nine-day event includes the citywide competition and voting for general public, with industry events and evenings with brand representatives.
A cocktail competition has several bars (MG Road; The Montford Rooftop Bar; Post 70; Nightbell; Smoky Park Supper Club; Salvage Station; Sovereign Remedies; Imperial Life) creating their version of the Manhattan starting Nov. 26. and ending closing time Dec. 2.
Participants can pick up a subway map-style voting card at participating bars. Order a Manhattan, get a different stamp at each venue. Three or more stamps qualify card holders to cast their votes for their favorite bars. The final four will compete at a ticketed Iron Chef-style event at the Salvage Station, 468 Riverside Drive, Dec. 4, 3-5 p.m. $10.
Philip Greene will host an industry event at the Hyatt Place's Montford Rooftop Bar, a major sponsor of the event, Dec. 5, 1 p.m.
The Manhattan theme for Bar Wars is inspired by Greene, an attorney, writer and cocktail historian who co-founded the American Cocktail Museum in New Orleans. His book, "To Have and Have Another – A Hemingway Cocktail Companion," has received critical acclaim from The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Food & Wine, Wine Enthusiast, Garden & Gun, Kirkus Reviews, HuffingtonPost.com, and more.
Bar Wars ends with a Repeal Day celebration and cocktail affair with Greene at Smoky Park Supper Club, 350 Riverside Drive, Dec. 5, 6-9 p.m.. The ticketed event ($75) includes cocktails created by the author, hors d'oeuvres and a book signing.