How the Nations Capital was far from a dry city. He gives insight into the network of speakeasies and bootleggers across the city as well as some of their clients, including members of congress. The u. S. Capitol Historical Society provided the video. Jane garrett pack is in leads tours garrett pack leads tours through the Nations Capital. He was featured in a twohour documentary about prohibition put on by the smithsonian channel. He researched and pinpointed the washington brewery at navy yard and is especially proud that green pop green hat gin is named for a Character Pack road peck wrote about. It is a real joy that we have a mere today that we have him here today. I was sharing with sam that my own Family History has been on both sides of this issue. My greatgrandmother was a member of the Womens Christian Temperance Union. My grandfather on my mothers side. On my fathers side, my grandfather was a bootlegger. We have got the whole thing going on. As is always the way in washington, there is the story about what happened in politics and what happened in reality. Garrett, telus, how dry where were we during prohibition question tell us how dry were we during prohibition . Garrett not very. All too often those stories go unrecorded because people were making the law in the 1920s and 1930s and people do not want to they were breaking the law and people do not want to write that stuff down. Let me share my screen. We will kick our discussion off. I published this book called prohibition in washington, dc. You can tell from the subtitled that i use a fair amount of irony throughout the book. I was like, what were they thinking . How was prohibition going to work in a city that has always been a wet culture . It was fascinating. This year in particular we are marking two centennial additions of constitutional amendments. Two days ago we commemorated the centennial of women earning the right to vote through the 19th amendment. At the beginning of 2020 was the centennial of the beginning of prohibition, january 16. The 18th and 19th amendments go into effect that year. That is not a historical anomaly. That happens because there is a Progressive Alliance that makes both of those things happen in this year. Talking about prohibition in d. C. , why does particular city . Even though this is a local story, it has national ramifications. It is interesting that congress intended for d. C. To bd to be the model dry city for the rest of the country but we ended up having 3000 speakeasies and congress employed its own bootleggers. We will learn about one of them today. A very famous bootlegger named george cassidy, better known as the man in the green hat. Because this is the u. S. Capitol Historical Society, this will be about what happened on capitol hill and the areas around. I have five maps in the book. Here is the map for capitol hill showing where many shenanigans took place. The book has many images and it. And 11 vintage cocktail recipes. How did we get prohibition . What was the origin of all this . The quick answer is the Temperance Movement. Most americans do not recall the Temperance Movement. The word temperance culturally has largely left our vocabulary, kind of like the Gold Standard or communism. It was once a powerful social Reform Movement of the 19th century that ultimately gave us the 18th amendment to the prohibition amendment the 18th amendment, the prohibition amendment. If you live in d. C. You have walked past the statue. It has been refer to referred to by one u. S. Senator as the ugliest statue in d. C. This is the cause well temperance statue at sevens street and seventh street and pennsylvania avenue. Catty corner to that way is the national archives. Yuko you have all walked past it. Temperance whether huge force. In fact, inside the library of congress, there are beautiful frescoes painted all around. You will see, among all the virtues, there is a temperance virtue. There is a closeup photo there. You might be noticing the woman is very much like in ancient rome where you have these floating figures. Notice she is pouring out water instead of wine. This is because in the Temperance Movement of the 19th century, they seized upon that there was no safe level for anyone to drink alcohol at all. Therefore, for them, temperance did not mean moderate drinking. It went abstaining meant abstaining. Thus, you see this allegorical figure pouring water rather than one, which is what the ancient romans and greeks drink drink drank. Those were painted in the 1890s when the Temperance Movement was reaching its peak of fame. In the u. S. Capitol itself, of our very prominent statue of the very first woman to ever get statue in statuary hall. That is Frances Willard of illinois. Why is she important . She was a progressive leader who led the Womens Christian Temperance Union for 20 years. She is a remarkable woman. The Womens Christian Temperance Union took on an ethic of what they called, do everything. A very strong Progressive Organization that was largely about protecting women and the family from Domestic Violence from alcohol. I do not personally agree with her about alcohol, but we still have a huge amount of respect for her because this is an era before women had the vote. They found other ways to lobby to get womens voices heard. Another key person we will talk about is wayne wheeler. The wtc you got into classrooms and try to educate the Womens Christian Temperance Union got in the classroom and try to educate children. I saw that with my own grandma born in 1913 who was raised with this ethic of that anyone sees you drinking they will think you are a drunk. Women did not have the right to vote yet. All they could do is lobby and try to influence. In 1893, there was a new organization founded in ohio called the Antisaloon League. Right out of oberlin college, they hired a young man named wayne wheeler, who moved to d. C. In 1916 to be the legislative superintendent for the asl. The asl, for better or for worse, most people have never heard of them. They existed from 1893 to 1933, and then effectively went out of business because they were blamed for prohibition. They got the 18th amendment passed. This man, wayne wheeler, was so powerful. The asl was probably the most powerful lobbying organization in our Nation History our nascent our nations history. By leveraging his minority votes of evangelical protestant ministers, he was very bipartisan. He forced democrats and republicans to vote dry or else. A politicians first job is to get reelected. If someone did not toe the line, he would guarantee they did not get reelected. He was powerful. He is the one who oversees the 18th amendment getting through congress in 1917. Another key person for our story is a progressive senator from texas named maurice sheppard. Why is he important . He leads the charge for the 18th amendment in the senate, the prohibition amendment. In addition, for those of you who are fans of home role and d. C. , d. C. Had no home rule at this point. He passes the sheppard act during world war i, clearing that d. C. Is hereby a dry city. D. C. Had no vote in this. Congress mandated it because it was effectively the domain of congress. D. C. Went dry against public will. There were 267 licensed saloons in the city that had to shut down that night. Several thousand people lost their jobs on november 1. We will come back to Morris Sheppard later on during the repeal battle, sober member that name. D. C. Goes dry on november 1, 1917. That means all breweries instantly have to shut down. What is going on is world war i. That is a reason why the Antisaloon League managed to push its message forward. The biggest ethnic group at the time in the country were germans. We had just declared war against germany. Germanamericans were also brewers. They were the biggest obstacle in the country against the forces of temperance. In and around the d. C. Area there were six major breweries. Two on capitol hill, two in foggy bottom, and one each in arlington and alexandria. I will show you the two on capitol hill. This is a National Capital brewing company. It produces about 100,000 barrels of beer per year. During prohibition it became a dairy, the medical dairy company, and produced ice cream. That lasted until 1964. Then it became a safeway. It is in the process of being redeveloped as a Community Center on the 14th street southeast, not too far from congressional cemetery. Another capitol hill brewery was the washington brewery. We had six breweries in the citys history that which by the name of washington brewery. We do not have one right now. Go figure. This with another large brewery that set shut down in 1917. It is today the site of Stuart Thompson middle school, a large two block facility. When you go by that school, you will see how big it is. That is how large this brewery was. No one was ever compensated for the fact that they lost their business. All of these Business Owners had to figure out what else to do with their property. Meanwhile, they still had to pay property taxes. The 18th amendment here, for those of you who like to read the call the constitution, here is the first portion of it this was ratified january 16, 1919. It went into effect exactly one year later. It is seen as a wartime measure. It would onto the state and was ratified in only 13 months. That is incredible. This is largely because of world war i. Everyone was thinking, it is our patriotic duty. We have got to have sobered soldiers to fight the german army. Alcohol was always a tradition for soldiers, but art of the propaganda was we need this for the war effort to beat the germans. Here is the actual wording of the 18th amendment. I put it in bold, what do you not see on there . No mention of banning personal possession, right . The asl understood it would not be popular. It would make it harder to sell. They were naive to think that americans would simply just drink up whatever they had stockpiled and after that go dry. Like that was going to work out, but that is what they believed. But quickly the bootleggers started showing up and bootlegging to supply the market. The way i look at it it its kind of like an economist. If your member this from econ 10 one, you have a supply and demand curve. This is addressing the supply side of the equation. You are trying to take away supply without really addressing demand. Why do americans want to drink . If there is still that demand, guess what, someone will find a way to supply it. Very quickly, the bootleggers start stepping up and supplying the market. I should mention here as well, and i love this photo, they had to pass enabling legislation to enforce prohibition. You got this 18th amendment, but you also have to have a law that defines, for example, what is in talks getting liquors, which is defined as anything lower than 0. 5 alcohol. So you cant even have near beer at this point. Theyre quite a number of loopholes, for example sacramento wine. Sacramental wine and medicinal whiskey. The person who got this law passed was the head of the house judiciary committee. His name was andrew. From minnesota his name was andrew. His name was Andrew Volstead from minnesota. He was discredited by the volstead act and lost his seat in congress. He gets blamed throughout history. I think you with a moderate drinker himself. I love this photo on the cover of the book. On january 16 at midnight, this is when prohibition nationwide begins. You see this really cool for photo of georgia congressman William Upshaw holding this umbrella over the u. S. Capitol. It is highly symbolic. He is saying we, as congressmen, are now dry. Does anyone here think congress was ever dry . If you do, i have a some beachfront property in nebraska to sell you. Congress never went dry. Other than William Upshaw and a handful of senators. By and large, congress was still drinking. Even though we had banned alcohol from our country, the manufacture, sale, and transportation of it, and gotten 36 plus states, and ultimately only two states did not ratify the amendment. Those estates had a heavy catholic population. Those were connecticut and rhode island. Two new england states. The catholics in the country understood that prohibition, in so many ways, was targeted at them. It was in part a nativist movement. We were going through this huge wave of immigration and overwhelmingly the people coming in were catholics. The protestants felt like, gosh, we are about to be overthrown by catholics, so we need to do something culturally to get them to conform, because catholics never had theological issues with alcohol. The irish, the germans, the checks, the russians, they the italians, all brought their drinking habits with them. You have to really question, because we got the 18th amendment ratified during world war i, was there actually a National Consensus about banning alcohol . I do not have a definitive answer but i think the answer is no. Most people simply thought this was what we needed to do to win the war. In addition, they really thought they were bent voting to ban liquor. But they still thought that beer and wine would be legal, when in fact, come january 17, they woke up and there were like oh, you took away our beer . This with the National Beverage this was the National Beverage. People were stunned. Wayne wheeler had his work cut out because the Congress People started complaining to him. Prohibition itself lasts nearly 16 years in d. C. However, nationwide, hl mencken call that 13 awful years. I quoted throughout my book. He is such i quoted i quote it throughout my book. He is a wonderful crank. In essence, this with an evangelical movement designed to make americans better people and he generally cast askance at Reform Movements like this. He, interestingly enough, right before prohibition started had a car that he sold and filled up a seller of alcohol with proceeds a cellar full of our call with the proceeds. He discovered there were so many bootleggers already offering beer and liquor. He decided he would not obey prohibition and encouraged other people not to. I found this incredible quote. You have the lost generation in the 1920s. Sinclair lewis is one of the greatest satirists in American History. In 1922 lewis was living in d. C. On dupont circle. He wrote his great novel, babbitt, for which he won the nobel prize in 1930. In this novel he has this scene where he basically explains why prohibition will fail. This is only two years into prohibition. If you have ever read babbitt, in the setting you have this antihero, george babbitt, going on a fishing trip, in a railway car. An unnamed man pulls out a flask of gin and passes it around. This guy makes this statement. I dont know how you fellows feel about prohibition, but way it strikes me is it is a mighty beneficial thing for the poor zob that does not have willpower. So you see how lewis has captured how prohibition will fail. Because prohibition is something for everyone else to obey, not me. I can handle my liquor. In a nutshell, that is it. Everyone says they will not obey the law. It is remarkable. Already, by the 1920s, americans are developing relationships as bootleggers. It is a americans are developing relationships with bootleggers. Sinclair lewis is an author who is worth reading again. He has a great satirical voice. A couple different photos of prohibition in the Nations Capital. I have more in the book. I love this one showing the largest still in captivity. This is early on in prohibition. Most of the speakeasies we had in d. C. Were in peoples homes. People would put up a small still in their bathroom. You could buy a tub at the Hardware Store and then once a week your local bootlegger would come and collect the supplies. There were so many people getting involved in this game because there was so much money to be made. You would also be putting your house in danger, because any time you put a still somewhere, there will be combustion. There are more than a few stills that catch fire or blowup. There is always that danger. It was safer to have a still in the backyard. If you have ever been around distiller, it smells. You will smell it. You will smell and they have to produce the beer and the alcohol as it comes off of it. Stills kind of stink. They smell like alcohol. The Prohibition Bureau, backed up by the metropolitan Police Department of d. C. , had his job cut out for them. I love this photo. This is one of the most famous photos from prohibition. This is in the federal triangle. This is the carl hamel buffet lunch. A lunch cafe, very typical for us a speakeasy in d. C. A legitimate business upfront, and a dark room in the back. If you knew someone, you could say the password and they let you into the back and you can get a drink of beer. This place got rated three times. Here they are. You can tell they are pulling out pure barrels. You can tell they are pulling out beer barrels. The address is 922 pennsylvania ave. If you look that up on google maps, that is the site of the department of justice today. No small irony there. Fascinating story here involving senator frank greene of vermont. We largely did not have a lot of violence in d. C. , not a lot of organized crime, lots of disorganized crime, but we never had like the Italian Mafia or irish mob or anything. It was largely amateur bootleggers getting involved in the action. Not too much violence. A few shootouts here and there. But there were a few shootouts involving senator greene walking up pennsylvania avenue at the base of capitol hill by do just yearly by judiciary square. Right by the courthouse, there were the bootlegger. The metropolitan Police Department and the Prohibition Bureau were trying to raid these bootleggers operating their. The prohibition agent open fire. This is right as senator greene and his wife are walking past. The bullet missed the bootlegger and hit senator greene. He became an unintended casualty of prohibition violence. There was not that much violence in d. C. Itself, but senator greene was seriously injured and out of action for a number of months. Eventually, he did make his way back into the senate. If you go to capitol hill, there is a famous dive bar on pennsylvania avenue known as twine in twining. It was a candy store and out of the basement they sold liquor. The access to the basement is right behind cast register that cash register. Right behind the cash register. They would wrap up your purchase and give it to you. It opened up in 19 27. They say they are the second business in the city to get a license. The first one was the National Press club in 1934. On the night they gave out all the licenses, the National Press club got the first one, because that was a press opportunity. Then the police drove around the city that morning and dropped off the rest. They do mention this at the restaurant. Because we are at these two major anniversaries for prohibition and suffered, lets talk about women in prohibition. This is the photo from a courtmartial that took place at navy yard. These two women nurses wearing mens hats were formerly stationed in cortona bay cuba at the u. S. Naval installation Guantanamo Bay cuba at the u. S. Naval installations and got transferred to the Washington Navy yard. And they got transferred up to the Washington Navy yard. Customs look through their suitcases and found bottles of rum. The secretary of the navy demanded that these two women get courtmartialed. Look, they were doing what everyone else is doing. We get transition from one post to the other, everybody is bootlegging alcohol back. The defense said they had to play that they were given these bottles as gifts. They did not know what they were and put them in their suitcases. Of course, they were found not guilty. Some of their own sailors, for doing something that everyone was doing. The secretary of the navy is trying to make a point out of, a symbolic point out of these two nurses. It is kinda cool. In addition, there is a cool photo and ill give you some context from the book. This is a young woman who was a dancer at a theater on 15th street near the white house. The scofflaw was invented in 1924. He was so upset at seeing all the drinking going on at his alma mater harvard university. He sponsored a nationwide competition to come up with a word for the lawbreakers. It had to start with the s. Two people submitted the winning entry, scofflaw. This word was invented in 1924. On the fourth anniversary of national prohibition. Meaning that someone who scoffs had the law. One week later at harrys bar in paris, the scofflaw cocktail was invented. It is a delicious little number. It is one of my alltime favorite cocktails. The secret ingratitude ingredient is grenadine. Real grenadine, which is easy to make, you can make your own with simple syrup and pomegranate juice and 5050 platinum. Super simple. It is a delicious cocktail. Give it a try sometime. As the nation was really debating, especially as prohibition went on, and of course with the great depression, we lost so many jobs. By 1930, much of the nations calling for prohibition. Memory that name, senator Morris Sheppard . He was sort of a stone wall and congress. He did not want to repeal the 18th amendment. In september 1930 he made a famous statement that is up on the screen. There is as much chance of repealing the 18th amendment as there is for a hummingbird to fly to the planet mars with the Washington Monument tied to its tail. That sounds like an invitation, doesnt it . So first off, there is this guy rufus lusk. He was a data guy. He was an irishman who fought as a captain in world war i and was catholic. He was very much opposed to the Temperance Movement and prohibition. His family is still here in the d. C. Area. They provided this photo for me here. He, being a real estate and data person, decided he was going to embarrass the dry caused by showing how wet d. C. Was. He wanted to show the d. C. Was failing as a model dry city. He put all of these data points from police raids on a map using several months of 1920 data. It had 900 points of data, just incredible this went global. By effectively, creating a graphic showing how effective this was. He did it again two years later and i found this one here in the library of congress, the original. I am going to show you the one produced in 1932 and this is such a clever piece of propaganda. It is jawdropping. You ready for this . It is so cool. This is based on 1931 police data. Dots mark the spot where booze has been bought. Do you see all the dots all over there . That marks 1,155 places where the police and prohibition rated and found alcohol. In addition, there were also about 600 grades will they found no alcohol at all and those did not go on the map. You might look at some of the details on this map. For example, there are a couple stars. Below the u. S. Capitol, those are federal buildings where raids took place. You will see very cleverly things were put off like the antisaloon headquarters, which is where robert taft park is crossing the u. S. Capitol. Put the methodist building which is across the from the supreme court. The temperance headquarters, and around all these buildings you will see these dots because all over the city there were raids taking place. He really wanted to show that d. C. Was not a wet not a dry city at all. One month later, the Washington Post got one of its greatest scoop they have ever got with watergate as well as the pentagon papers. This was a great scoop on its own and that they got the main bootlegger from congress to come forward and tell his story. That mans name was george cassidy. Here is a picture of him, better known as the man in the green hat. You can see his hat in the background. He was the main bootlegger for congress for 10 years starting in 1920. He got arrested in 1925 and after that, he spent a short. In jail. After that, he shifted, by the way he worked in the Cannon House Office building. They gave him an office in the basement so he could supply the alcohol to the congressman. He also had a place to play cards, he had such a great personality that the congress loved hanging out with him. After his first arrest, he shifted to the Russell Senate office because senators are more discrete. They tend to send their secretaries down to collect their alcohol rather than come down themselves. He is arrested for the second and final time in february of 1930. Washington post approached him asking him if he wanted to write stories about his experience as a bootlegger. Yes he would. He published six frontpage articles for the Washington Post. The last one ran one week before the Midterm Election of 1930. Washington post by this point, was a wet newspaper and was doing everything they could to discredit the dry cause. You then saw this big election in 1930. By the way, this is the Cannon House Office building. They flipped congress in the 1930 largely due to the great depression, but the democratic congressman and the few republicans who were elected were wet congress and centaurs. There is this growing wave of calling for the end of prohibition. Ultimately, this idealism of a dry nation shattered on a hard reality. In 1932, fdr runs on the web program. For he is even sworn into office, he was the last one sworn in on march 4. For he was sworn in, congress had passed the 21st amendment and it was on to the states. The very first state that ratified it was michigan which is on april 10. Eight months later, the state of utah is the 36th state that puts it over the top. Estate where, is mostly mormon, once youve lost them it is game over. Even the mormons were voting in favor of repeal because prohibition was not working. We count repeal date as december 5, 1933. Also now knows known as single they drink over cinco de drinko. Prohibition actually ended on march 1, 1934 because congress had to pass the law. They may be three chart system that the nation had copied and it worked out fairly successfully. We kind of put our stamp on the nation as a model but city or the rest of the country. Kind of a cool story about this and we mentioned this in my biography in the beginning, but 2012 a new distillery opened up and they wanted a local story behind their name. They wanted to name their product after george cassidy, so they approached me because they write about my story in my book and i put them in contact with fred cassidy who you see in the middle. He is a son of george cassidy. He was over the moon with this idea. One thing he asked for, was for the first case of jan in this photo. He distributed to his family. Gin. It was a lot of fun. New columbia and has become this cool distilling district in d. C. Last couple slides here and will take some q a. Completely off topic here but, i have a brandnew book that came out in june called a decade of disruption alerica in the new millennium. Everyone has had their lives disrupted. It is a history of that first decade squeezed in the. Com melt out and of course the big recession on the other hand. And everything in between from 9 11, the iraq war, the housing bubble, and so on. I have written eight books and this is my favorite. It was a fun book to write and research. It took about 13 years to write. This is my last slide. My talk came out of my book prohibition in washington dc. I also wrote a chapter in my book the great war in america called the prohibition begins. It gives you an opportunity to put in context with world war i and how they sold it to the american public. With that, i want to thank you so much for coming here today. I want to think sam and jane for having this. I want to thank you, the audience, even some of your lunchtime here. I will be thrilled to take any questions you have. Jane, take it away. You are an engaging speaker i read the book. The prohibition book is very engaging. Thank you so much for telling stories that we would not have known otherwise. We have got a couple of questions. You spoke about this a little bit, but the influence of the immigrants that were coming in right at the same time that prohibition was going into effect. We had irish and italians. How did that play in together . It is so interesting. Considering that the peak, right before prohibition started, we had the highest number of immigrants in our society ever. It is one third of americans are either firstgeneration or have a parent who was born overseas. Highest proportion ever in american society. What happens in 1924, we passed this Immigration Law that slams the gate shut. People thought that culturally, we were under threat by all these Eastern Europeans who were coming in who wall ourselves off from anyone of asian descent from coming in. Xenophobia was very strong in the country. As you have seen over our history, it has swung back and forth. Currently, we are dealing with that question right now. We are sorely overdue for a Immigration Reform bill. Its hard to get any collective will behind it. Certainly, that was part of the prohibition debate. There was a very strong nativist sentiment. The protestant who became the protestant dominant culture, these Eastern Empire Eastern European brought their dreamy habits with them. People thought that they could not be americans. We were polls, italians, and so on. Poles. Hence, we wanted the gate to be shut so that they could not come in. Nativism was a big factor behind prohibition. That the kkk put weight behind it because they wanted to keep alcohol away from africanamericans. There is a whole, a coalition movement. Each one with their own agenda behind it. A lot of it was about cultural dominance and trying to keep the other groups under control, basically. It is all the same groups. Fine, we are catholic . We will not obey this law and bootleg anyway. You will see all kinds of bootlegging because of that. What can i say . Tell me, president hoover, did he have a stance . You talked about fdr there are five president s from Woodrow Wilson all the way up to frank to franklin resmed. Hoover roosevelt. Hoover got congress to pass a law called the jones five and 10 act. People got a slap on the wrist, you might have your business bootleg for year, you might pay a fine, but you would reopen your business afterwards. This act meant that you went to jail for five years and you paid a 10,000 fine which is a norm is rate what happened enourmous. Everyone started demanding jury trials. You can imagine how much this is gummed up the entire legal system one every bootlegger were talking about, hundreds of thousands of people, are demanding a jury trial. It really backfired. The public was quite cynical at this point and people said that this was not working. By the way, by 1929 you have heard about the st. Valentines day massacre. Violence is very greater across the country as the mafia and the mob are engaging in territorial warfare over turf. By 1930, the country said that they wanted to get this over worth because it was not working. He saw very prominent defectors, who formulate firmly supported prohibition and then said no. He did ousted in 1932. Interesting. Poorer hoover. He gets a bad reputation. In the beginning when you are talking about the enactment of prohibition and what it did to the businesses, the bar owners, the employees who are workers. Where is there any attempt to compensate people for their loss of business or was it just sorry about your luck echo the latter, basically. We passed the constitutional amendment to band manufacturing and producing it. All of them were sol. The biggest brewery in d. C. Which is now the site of the Kennedy Center, and he stayed in business. He had just produced an ice plant. This is the age of the icebox so you had ice delivered to your house. He complained about this in his memoir. I could not produce bare anymore but i had to pay for property tax on the speech facility he had great many of the bar owners tried to convert into soft drink emporiums. Very quickly, they learned that nobody was interested. The fans just stopped coming. Nobody wanted to have soft drinks. Hence, pretty quickly, bootleggers caught onto this. They started buying and drinking at home or in legal speakeasies. One of my listeners is particularly interested in the highland brewery, which as you say is the Kennedy Center. How long did it last echo when did that transformation, it go directly from the brewery to the Kennedy Center . You know the center story of that . There is another book i wrote called capital beer. It has a history of brewing in the d. C. Area. It managed to reopen after prohibition was over. He lived until march of 1945. He saw both the war one and the antigerman hysteria and saw world war ii as well. He was three weeks shy of his 100 and third 103rd birthday. After prohibition was over. What happened, before prohibition started, everybody drink beer. Afterwards, they were not drinking beer anymore. The market had evaporated. That is in part because bootleggers were bringing in distilled spirits because it was so concentrated and therefore higher profit for the bootleggers. The public got a taste of the spirits and produce cocktails. His market has largely evaporated. Even when he reopened in 1934, and the brewery state open until 1956. It just trudged along and by that point, the sales were gently on the downhill slope. The federal government wanted the land at that point and the family agreed that they would sell it to the federal government. However, the facility still stood for five more years. They were not blown up until 1961. A cool little side note here, in that five year. , there was a very famous local stage that opened up and used it as their stage. They called the stage the old that. Vat. The stage, the actual stage was arena stage. That started in the brewery. Now, they are down in southwest by the waterfront. That is where they kept their start at the brewery. This is great. Garrett, you have been so generous with your time and talent. We hope to have you back again on another matter because you are fun to talk to and you know the story of d. C. Take you very much for being with us. Thank you garrett for your time. Take care, byebye. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] exploring our nations past, created by americas cable companies. Today, we are brought you by these companies were brought to you by a public service. Today on the civil war, Mccormick Civil War Institute director lets at sheridans ride and its commemoration in art, literature, and popular culture. Here is a preview. I dont think you could ever imagine that this poll would be received in such dramatic fashion. Murdoch recalled of this moment that he is just uttering the final words of the poem sheridans ride and the crowd is going wild. Cheering for him, cheering for sheridan, cheering for union victory. He wrote simply, the sound of my voice uttering the last word had not died away when chair after cheer went up from the great concourse that shook the building to its very foundation. In the days after murdochs performance, the poem was published in newspapers across the north. It became not only a celebrated work, something to stir the patriotic emotions of individuals in the north, but it became a political tool. For, the Republican Party to garner votes for lincoln, among undecided voters. Without explanation of the day of the election, the new york tribune published the entire poem on the front page. This was done to serve as a reminder to voters to remind them of the success that sheridan enjoyed. As we talked about on our session monday, everything that happens in 1864 prior to the election has the election looming over it. Publishing that poem is a very clear start reminder of Union Success to the valley. Start. Stark. Had lincoln not given permission for sheridan to be the commander, but he did. We are winning that and we are going to restore the union. We will crush the confederacy. If you are undecided, you need to vote for lincoln. The importance of this poem, it transcends the power it gives to sheridans legacy. Learn more about sheridans ride today at 6 p. M. Eastern, 3 p. M. Pacific on American History tv. On march 30 1980 one, John Hinckley junior fired six shots at president reagan outside the washington hilton hotel, two miles from the white house. The author of rawhide down, recreates that afternoon. Here is a preview. Now, around 2 00, 1 30, John Hinckley from evergreen colorado who is obsessed with jodie foster we all know, infamously obsessed with jodie foster. He is a strange character. I tried to write him in the most balanced way possible. People differ on whether he was really insane at that moment. The jury decided he was. He had an obsession with jodie foster and it had started a few years earlier. He saw the movie taxi driver and he began to fantasize about her. His life began to mirror the main character of taxi driver. A very violent film where as a tractor driver, former army that, wants to kill president ial candidate. He starts focusing on jodie foster who played a prostitute in the movie, and over time it becomes more obsessive. He realizes that in his mind he can impress her in a blaze of the only way he can impress her is to shoot the president of united states. He hangs out in blair house live in early 19 81 stocking the president , he actually stopped carter in october. In october 1980, he was in dayton ohio and he got within arms reach of the president. He let his guns and his luggage in the bus station. He had been stocking president s and stuff that he is in l. A. He takes a bust across the country. He arrives one day before the shooting. The people interviewed him, he had not made his mind to kill or shoot the president. He does not even know that he is in town. He wants to take a bus from d. C. To get foster. He is fascinating about getting killing all of them and or g of balance. He eats breakfast the morning of the shooting. He buys the washington star newspaper. He flips the paper open and he sees the president schedule. He will take his little 22 caliber gun and go and see how close he can get. He is waiting right there about 15 feet past where the open door is for the limousine. He has a 22 caliber gun in his pocket. It is loaded with devastator bullets which are tipped with lead onsite. They love when they hit things. Hinckley cant believe he is this close. 15 feet from the president. There are three cops at the rope line and another agent right there. He pulls out his gun and he envisions himself in a burst of gunfire, suicide by cop and secret service agent. He starts shooting. Mr. President. What they measured it, and he was 15 feet from hinckley when he was shot. If you get on the freethrow line, and you look at it, it is the distance of a freethrow. Thats how close he was. No one had seen his fbi interview. That was sealed and i got it unsealed through my fouryear process. Reagan was coming out, he saw the reporters, he was not going to talk to the press. You can infer from that that the reason he did not want to talk to the press, he had kinda made some stumbles and he wanted to keep it on message before. He was not going to answer impromptu questions. It was not worth it to him. He also said that if hinckley had only waited, he was about to climb onto the limousine and raise himself up and waved to a group of 200 spectators across street. Healy did not wait. He started shooting. Hinkley. Learn more about the 1980 one attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan sunday at 6 p. M. Eastern, 3 p. M. Pacific on american artifacts here on American History tv. This is American History tv on cspan three. Each weekend we feature 48 hours of programs exploring our nations past. Up next, kate bullock, author of spencer making a life of ones own. In the author of all the Single Ladies on the rise of the independent nation. Talk about the women and the growth of unmarried american women in the past decades. War institute director. Jonathan noyalas looks at sheridans ride and explores its commemoration in art literature and popular culture. Well, i thought having i want to buy it. I dont think now it sounds like its working. You all can hear me . Okay . All right. Id like to welcome you all. Thank you for coming and my very good friend. Katie flato has given me a set of rules to and to impart to you and i know if i don