Christine Sismondo - America Walks into a Bar

by Malcolm Jolley

Author, academic, journalist and drinks expert Christine Sismondo latest book is America Walks into a Bar, a rollicking history of the watering hole from the Salem witch trials to the Stonewall riots. The book which traces the evolution of the public house on this side of the Atlantic, is subtitled A Spirited History of Taverns and Saloons, Speakeasies and Grog Shops is a fun ripping read (who knew the Puritans were not so pure at all?). But it also makes two serious and important points: that nearly all of the swings of fortune for American liberty had their origins in bars and bar culture and that the bar has always was been the locus of the fight for the right to freedom of association. I sat down with Sismondo, who is a contributor to GFR as well as a friend, to ask her about America Walks into a Bar for the video below. [Hint: if you watch to the end, you’ll receive Christine’s famous recipe for a ‘Corpse Reviver’.]

Can’t see the video? Click here.

Malcolm Jolley is a founding editor of Good Food Revolution and Executive Director of Good Food Media, the non-profit organization that publishes GFR. Follow him at twitter.com/malcolmjolley. Photo: John Gundy.