…and we’re back! Just in time to celebrate the end of Prohibition

Because it’s been a season of many illnesses (I finally beat you, bronchitis!), and some incredibly busy work with the whole job thing (we can’t say no to extra work in this economy), blogging was put on the backburner for a while. But beer drinking has officially commenced! And what better way celebrate than on the official drinking holiday – today is the anniversary of the ratification of the 21st Amendment to the Constitution, and thus ended Prohibition in the United States in 1933.

What did they do 79 years ago to celebrate? Why, drink, of course!

Image #00100925 via Los Angeles Public Library photo collection

The photo above is just one of many, many celebrations around Los Angeles (and across the country, of course). This one is of particular interest because they are celebrating the drinking of… Beer! The date of the photo is actually April 7, 1933 when Roosevelt introduced and Congress passed “The Beer Bill,” which in effect was a first step toward dismantling Prohibition.

Better yet, the photo takes place within Eastside Brewery in Lincoln Heights – which we now know as The Brewery Lofts over there on Main Street. The brewery was built between 1898 and 1908, was formerly the Los Angeles Brewing Co., then the Eastside Brewery, and was bought by Pabst in 1979.

The caption, via the LAPL website, reads:

When the first truckload of beer rolled away from a Los Angeles brewery as beer became legal just after midnight, Jean Harlow, beautiful platinum film star, ‘christened’ it by breaking a bottle of geer [sic] over it. Left to right, R. Mentier, Miss Harlow, Walter Huston, noted actor, and Charles J. Hick, brewery manager.

According to an LA Times article, cars lined up bumper to bumper outside to watch the event unfold.

Cheers!