Little Egypt - Legacy and Libation

Farheda Mazar Spyropoulos, danced as Fatima "the Seventh Daughter of the Seventh Daughter," or simply "Little Egypt" in the Streets of Cairo exhibit at the Worlds Columbian Exposition of 1893.  Farheda wriggled her way into American culture, introducing the shocking "hoochie-coochie," "shimmy dance," or "shiver dance."

An elderly gentleman in the 1970's who purportedly saw her 1893 performance, stated that "She was something."  "She wasn't beautiful, but she was attractive and her costume was revealing. She was accompanied by high pitched reed instruments.  I remember she put her hands over her eyes with her elbows extended outwards, then she wiggled and wiggled." He went on to say that he saw her perform four times.  While there is no detailed record of the authenticity of her dance, there was a song spoofing her, entitled She Never Saw the Streets of Cairo (1893).  This was not entirely correct as Farheda was indeed born in Cairo, Egypt.

The male public could not get enough of Little Egypt's' rendition of the "danse du ventre", or "belly dance."  In 1896, New York's Tammany Times announced that "Little Egypt will have a new dance she promises will be startling" to be performed at the Olympia Music Hall burlesque.  The Olympia was a first class venue.  With seating for 3800, it was later to become the original venue of the Ziegfeld Follies. 

Memories of Farheda's performance were slow to fade.  Forty years later, an article in a 1933 Time magazine, observed that "Yokels gaped and the nation's bustled churchwomen bawled righteous indignation when Little Egypt undulated her brown, pneumatic belly at Chicago in 1893."  Alas, our memories play us false.  Things are never quite as wonderful as we like to imagine them.  If the existing photo of Farheda is any indicator, the only skin exposed was forearms and ankles.  The torso was hidden under a light blouse, and the legs by a skirt that would have done a Flamenco dancer proud.



Hucksters and carnies knew a good thing when they saw it.  By 1903, performances by a "Little Egypt" could be found everywhere.  For the price one thin dime, or sometimes a quarter, rubes were able to ogle "hoochie-coochie" dancers using her stage name at many a county fair, traveling carnival, and "burly-q" in the U.S.  This was just the start of a long of line of dancers and strippers performing as "Little Egypt" well into the 1950's.

The "Little Egypt" moniker was also used in advertising.  Little Egypt and the Shimmy were found in a line of popular spinner and bacon rind fishing lures, and her image was used to sell cigarettes.

In 1901 there was a prize angus cow named "Little Egypt" and, in 1906, a registered Poland-China pig.  There were also at least three "Little Egypt" mining operations in the United States. 

A comedy, Little Egypt Malone, was filmed in 1915.  The plot sounds as if it was a 1930's "Our Gang" script.  A group of boys buy a tent and signage used by a performer billing herself as "Little Egypt" and  then, predictably, put on a show.  Money rolls in, neighborhood women become outraged at the lewd performance, followed by men getting angry when they find out the performer is a boy in drag and, like all good slapsticks, things end with everyone having a good laugh. 

This was followed later by the movie Little Egypt starring Rhonda Fleming in 1951, and the song "Little Egypt" performed by Elvis in Roustabout - almost 70 years after Mrs. Spyropoulos' landmark performance. 

Today, there is a craft beer named Little Egypt. From the logo, I imagine the brewers were thinking of Rhonda Fleming rather than the original performer.  Farheda would make a poor pin-up by modern standards. (I have not been able to sample the beer here in the desert southwest but, if someone would like to ship a case from Illinois, I will heartily thank them and treat them to a cerveza and free Mexican dinner at Andele, if they ever pass this way.)

What is remarkable, is to see the legacy of that performance in the "Gay Nineties" starting its second hundred years.

When Farheda died on April 5, 1937, the widely used boiler-plate newspaper obituary read:

"First Little Egypt of 1893 Fair Dies - Chicago - Little Egypt, first exponent of the muscle dance which shocked patrons of the Worlds Columbian Exposition in 1893 and gained her sensational publicity, died today.  The wife of a Greek restaurant owner, she died in the house to which she came as a bride 24 years ago.  Her married name was Mrs. Farheda Spyropoulos."

Like Farheda Spyropoulos, the original Little Egypt, there is a cocktail by that name that is largely forgotten.  Actually there are two, however the version I prefer comes from the German Lexicon der Getranke (1913) by Schonfeld.

What’s In A Name – The Florodora

I have missed two blogs since my last due to familial obligations and found myself today casting about for a theme to get me back on track.  Since I have an interest in the origin of drinks, and their names, I thought I would borrow from a previous effort and use the title “What’s In A Name” with the related drink(s) appended.  If this works, I may do more in the future.

In the early 1900's, preceded by the operettas of the 1880's, the American public became enamored with musical comedy.  The play Floradora receives much of the credit for this craze.  A popular play in England in 1899, Florodora opened in the Casino Theater of New York in 1900.  

The play involves the imaginary island of Florodora on which a perfume of the same name is made.  Said island was stolen from its rightful owner whose daughter still works in a factory on the island.  The rest of the plot is convoluted to the extreme but the cast, chorus line, and music seem to have compensated successfully.  A feature of the theater was a manikin in the lobby spraying “La Flor de Florodora” on the theatergoers.

After a slow initial start, publicists started promoting the play in a manner seen repeated by the movie studios in their heyday.  TV news coverage of the Kardashians pales to that given the Florodora troupe.  Newspapers featured daily stories about the cast members, their personal lives, how well they regarded one another and worked together, their romances and marriage prospects, and of the huge sums of money that the chorus girls were making by speculating on Wall Street.  To the latter, one has to wonder if their fiduciary success was due more to the stage door sugar daddies than Wall Street, but maybe I have seen too many old movies.  Ultimately, Florodora exceeded 500 performances.

Florodora was the first  musical comedy to use the device of “stunning” fashionable evening gowns, worn by attractive women, to create a memorable high point in a performance, a trend continued in the Follies of the 1920’s and 30’s.  Women would go to see the latest fashions, men to see attractively dressed women. 

At the time, the music was considered “bewitching,” and people were often heard humming or whistling the tunes.  Leslie Stuart, the composer, said his formula for writing the music of Florodora was to:

“…take one memory of Christy Minstrels, let it simmer in the brain for twenty years.  Add slowly for the music an organist’s practice in arranging Gregorian chants for the Roman Catholic Church.  Mix well and serve with a half dozen pretty girls and an equal number of well-dressed men.”

The original “Florodora sextette” or the “big six,” none over 5’4”, was so popular with the American public that chorus girls for years afterwards, claimed to have been part of the original sextette. Francis Belmont, an original “sextetter,” in true movie showgirl fashion, managed to marry an English duke.

Florodora, its music, and its stars were immensely popular in the early 1900's.  Like movie related marketing today, the musical comedy became linked to a variety of products.  A soft drink in Cuba, race horses and pedigreed dogs, assorted food products, china, dolls, cigars (“three for 10 cents”) and a hybrid long staple cotton named Florodora were but a few.  Having a fondness for ice cream, one of my favorites is the “Florodora Sundae” – 1 banana, strawberry ice cream, strawberry fruit, nuts, and whipped cream.

In 1920, there was a revival of Florodora, with more chorus girls, and more lavish costumes and staging.  It was so popular that Fannie Brice was inspired to do a parody in the Follies.

Riding its second wave of popularity, it once again gave advertisers a useful marketing hook.  Florodora actresses modeled veils in Cosmopolitan magazine.  A massage vibrator was advertised to help women achieve “Florodora” beauty and sponsored a Florodora beauty contest.  Use of “Florodora” in marketing persisted into the 1930’s, as both a product name, and as a derogatory expression for something passé from a previous era.  There was also a movie entitled “The Florodora Girl.”

In my books, there are at least three "Florodora" related recipes.  The first two, the Florodora cocktail and the Florodora Fizz, from a 1913 text, are the earliest recipes I have found.  The Florodora Fizz definitely predates the book. 

A 1902 advertising magazine, The Advisor, states “The Florodora Fizz has replaced the Ping Pong Punch as the fashionable drink of the season.”  

The Florodora Cooler, easiest for the home bar, is from a publication of the 1930’s.  It is probably a Prohibition era drink being gin based, its other ingredients doing well to make the “bathtub” gins of the Roaring Twenties more palatable.

My Imaginary Packard

As mentioned in a previous blog, in 1965 my father bought me a 1951 Dodge "B" series pickup truck.  It was a well-used farm vehicle and I was kept busy looking for used parts, nominally better than its existing components.  This necessitated outings to junkyards filled with interesting vehicles of all description, as well as farm and industrial machinery.  Expeditions to these emporiums of cast-offs were as enjoyable as any amusement park.  I was able to find and remove the parts desired, and had the opportunity to “salvage” fair bit of pocket change.  While scavenging parts, I would run my hand through the space between the seat back and bottom of the old bench seats and usually come up with a bit of coin---not to mention the odd bit of filth.

While my friends were interested cars like the '57 Chevy, the Mustang, and even the Corvair, I had a penchant for anything odd, massive, and quirky.  For that matter, I still do.

In one salvage yard near Carthage, NY, there was a smallish 1920's fire engine that the owner said he would sell for $300.  The red paint and gold lettering were still shiny, the chrome bright, and it was replete with a bell and a chrome radiator cap with a glass thermometer.  The only thing it lacked was ladders.  Unfortunately, $300 was no more easily available than $3000.  Sometimes one has to be content to admire from afar.

My old Dodge was reliable.  It ran as well at 15 below zero as it did at 85F.  Most problems were not difficult to resolve and it would run fine with the cheapest grade of gasoline available, which was sometimes as low as 74 octane.  The truck was meant for work, not for youthful bravado.  It wouldn’t "burn rubber"---except in reverse.  Never the less, it was all mine and just the ticket for fishing or rabbit hunting.

The single most annoying problem was the gearshift.  The "three on the tree" had an "L"-shaped crank at the bottom that operated the shift linkage to the transmission.  The serrated hole in the crank, that secured it to the shift column, was stripped and it would slip, no matter how tightly I torqued the nut, leaving me stuck in, or out, of gear.

Having saved up some money, working as a stock clerk in the Camp Drum Post Exchange, I finally decided to have it repaired.  The nearest garage was in the village of Black River.

Smelling of dust and petroleum products, with an exposed wood beamed ceiling, decorated with the usual "cheese cake" calendars put out by auto parts companies, and with well used tools hanging on the walls, it looked like a movie set for the St. Valentine's Day Massacre.  My kind of place.

At the time, the owner/mechanic seemed old, though in hindsight he was probably in his 50's.  He was also friendly, helpful, and cheap.  After explaining that the part was no longer available, he said to give him a day and he would see what he could do.  When I returned, he explained that he had braised over the stripped out serrations in the crank and hand-filed new ones, charging me less than $25.  The repair worked fine.  Twenty years later, I benefitted from his explaining this field-expedient repair, using it to fix a similar problem on an arbor press.

While my Dodge, the mechanic, and the garage are all history, they are not the reason I recall the visit.  In the dim, back corner of that old garage, against the right wall, there was a hulking form covered by a dusty tarpaulin.  When I asked what was under the canvas, the mechanic took me over and removed the tarp.  It was a 1936 Packard sedan with a "straight eight."  The car was big, black, dusty, and had the ominous grace of a dreadnought.  That behemoth sparked my imagination.  I asked how much he wanted for it, laughable today since I had no  prospects of having funds and there is no way my father could have been talked into being involved in such a bit of whimsy.  The shop owner said it was not for sale and that it had a cracked block anyway.  The End.

Well, not quite the end.  From that time forward, I have had a nagging desire for a 1936 Packard sedan.  Marriage, children, jobs, age, and a singular lack of ability to focus on anything for any length of time, have all conspired to move me from "cool" and "fun" vehicles (in my eye, not necessarily that of others) to more reliable, and less interesting transportation.  I drive a Toyota Tundra, my spouse a Buick Enclave.  Both are good, solid transportation and more reliable than anything made in the 20th century.  Still, while our cars are good, I would not use "great" in any sense of the word.  That "great" Packard only exists when I daydream about what I would do, or could have done, if I were single and fancy free---about as likely as flying pigs.

There are two vintage cocktails, the Twin Six and the Packard Twins (yep, an engine not a pair of porn stars,) named for another masterpiece of Packard engineering, the "Twin Six," a V-12 engine which was to be later replaced in popularity by the “Single Eight”.  First produced for the 1916 model year, there were 24,000 vehicles with Twin Six Engines manufactured by 1920.  In that same year, Packard announced that they would double production of the Twin Six.  True to Robert Burns comment on the plans of mice and men, sales of the Twin plummeted between 1920 and 1924 with sales of about only 11,000 Twin Six equipped vehicles during that time.

So, let us raise a toast to Packard for giving us the stuff of dreams.

Fancy Drinks and How to Make Them, 1935

The Savoy Cocktail Book, 1930

Yes Virginia, There Are Italian Bar Books

Two years ago, several members of my family had the opportunity to return to Italy, visit family, and do the obligatory tourist rounds.  I asked my brother George to see if he could find me a vintage, or any, Italian bar book. After much searching, and asking around, he reported that he had been told there were none and that, in Italy, drinks were not measured.  Neither sounded likely.  To make any drink, as in preparing food, a basic recipe is needed.  The ingredients need to be added in appropriate amounts and mixed in an appropriate manner. While a skilled bartender may not use an actual measuring device, he/she can make an accurate pour through practice.  Since mankind (and womankind) have a compulsion to chronicle any topic of interest, from ardvaarks to zydeco, where were those elusive Italian mixology texts?

Being told there were none, like being told something cannot be done (or shouldn’t be done), is a challenge too good to pass on.  I set out to find a trophy for my collection and, in twenty-four hours, there were two being shipped from Italy despite outrageous shipping charges.

Those of you who grew up post-internet do not fully realize how easy life has become. Back in the 60's, when I was studying geology,  doing research meant spending endless hours in a dull  library, without coffee or beer, poring over index card files.  Then, with a fistful of notes,  roaming the stacks looking for texts that were often not there, or did not have the hoped for information.  After exhausting the local university library, you would travel to another seeking the elusive grains of gold for your research paper. Today, you can sit with your electronic device of choice, in your skivvies with a cup of joe, browse the contents of libraries around the world, then request the titles at your local library. Damn young whipper-snappers just don't know when they have it good!

Trying the easy way first, searching eBay, over my morning coffee, was a bust.   There were several rather dull looking Italian pieces from the 1980's or newer, nothing I felt worth the effort to order or work with.  Not all was lost though.  I found a bargain priced, odd little 70’s drink book from Venezuela entitled Tragos Magicos.

Deciding the bigger gun of a serious resource was in order, I went to my favorite online used bookseller, AbeBooks, and the hunt was on.  Hunting a book online when you do not have a title, author or publisher, is a matter of utilizing key words.  What key words would you use in searching for a mixology text in a foreign language? Think about it.

 I once worked with a physician who was an excellent diagnostician.  Like

Dr. House of TV fame, he could diagnose unusual illnesses with minimal information, later to be proven correct in testing. A favorite saying of his was "Common things are common."  In other words, you need to rule out the ordinary before you move to the exotic. 

While there are many words related to imbibing, sometimes the obvious are the best. The word I use is "cocktail" in its various translations.  Though the term limits you to books from the late 1800's forward and will totally miss specialty books dedicated to punches or other esoterica (for example, the German text Bowlen und Punche), it is a great starting point.  The down-side to key word searches is that you may end up with hundreds of titles to peruse, many of which are totally unrelated to what you seek.  Italian drink books of quality do seem to be as scarce as hens teeth.  I successfully located two, i cocktails and Il Barman e i Suoi Cocktails. Both are well worth having and the former is todays topic.

When it comes to enjoyable books, some are a pleasure to read, others a pleasure to look at.  i cocktails is a blend of both.  Written by Luigi Veronelli, published in 1963, i cocktails is a hefty 365 pages including the index. The recipes include the old, as the Bee's Knees, and the obscure like the Zakusky and Monachino.  Perusing the index of recipes, one is led to believe that i cocktail is an amalgam of drinks from around the world. If you enjoy gin as I do, there are over 200 recipes calling for it.

For the visual individual, the book is a cornucopia of liqour labels. These labels are not the usual color photos as found in so many publications. In i cocktails there is page after page of heavy paper with individual labels neatly mounted, usually two to the page.  The lables represent products from around the world.  Very Old Fitzgerald - Barrelled in 1955 bottled in 1963, Cederlund Schwedenpunsch, Drioli Marachino and Tequila Sauza are but a few.  I am inclined to think the labels genuine since the Sauza label has printing on the back that would only be seen from the opposite side of the bottle.

The author uses  a pictorial key with each recipe that indicates the number of servings (usually two), the type of  glass in which to serve, how to mix (mixing glass or shaker), and if the drink is short, long, or hot.  

Units of  measure are always a challenge to translate.  Sure, a gocce (drop) in Italy, is susceptible to the same laws of physics as a  drop in the New Mexico desert, but when we get to bicchiere and bicchierino, glass and small glass, we have work to do.

In a recipe where all the units of measure for liquor are identical, all bicchiere or all bicchierino, the recipe is easily converted into a ratio.  When we combine dis-similar units, we need to know what each unit’s volume is. The chart below will help in translating volumes of measure in Italian cocktail books. Unfortunately, Italian measures seem to have as many differences in definition as Italy has had governments since World War II, so the selection shown is the product of multiple sources.

Having completed the laborious task of converting measures, we may now attempt the pleasurable task of  mixing a unique drink from an allegedly non-existent book.

Being an enthusiast of both gin and Campari, I was pleased to find yet another  cocktail using both. If you enjoy an occasional Americano or Negroni, you will probably enjoy the "Gin On Top" cocktail.  Served in a chilled cocktail glass it is an excellent aperitif.  Having the peculiar moniker of "Gin On Top" would lead you to believe it is a layered drink, but this is not so.  It is a conventionally prepared, stirred not shaken, cocktail.  In real life, I prefer shaken cocktails as I like mine colder  than the proverbial witches' breast in a brass brassiere.  The introduction of air causing a cloudy  drink, and hence "bruising" it, is of little importance to me. For me, there is no discernible difference in taste. Neanderthal that I am, I also do not raise my pinkie when I drink tea, or other beverages,  unlike a well-bred  Canadian I once worked with in Etobicoke (who disliked me for being "loud", and I him for being prissy) -- but that is another story.

Without further adieu, here is the Gin On Top:

This drink is distinctly on the bitter side. I find it best served with cheeses, crackers, or other hors d ovres  of your choosing. This recipe for two, would work well in three smaller, old school cocktail glasses.

Gin On Top (for two)

150 ml dry gin

25 ml Campari

25 ml lemon juice (1/2 lemon) filtered to remove pulp

2 wild strawberries

Ice cubes.

Place ice in mixing glass. Pour in the lemon juice, dry gin and Campari. Stir briskly with bar spoon, leave one or two seconds, then stir again slowly. Serve immediately in chilled cocktail glass garnished with a wild strawberry (in the New Mexico desert, you will get powerful thirsty looking for a wild strawberry)

What’s In A Name - Or, why I think you should add 3 Bottle Bar to your collection

In my last blog, I mentioned a book by H.i. Williams, 3 Bottle Bar.

Let me begin by saying that I have always had a fascination with oddities in names - quirks in the spelling, why people have the names they have, or where names originated.

Thirty years ago, I met a woman, now long passed, named Voltarine. She spelled her name as I have written it.  Not having encountered that name previously, I asked her if the name had a family history.  Those of you well read, and interested in feminist studies, are probably thinking “She must have been named after Voltairine de Cleyre, feminist writer and orator, and her parents misspelled her name.”  Not so.  Voltarine explained that her parents were enthusiasts of Voltaire and thought that Voltarine would be the feminine derivative of his name.

I am terrible with names, even those of people I know well.  At the store a few weeks ago I ran into a nurse that I had recently worked with for five years. I repeatedly called her “Kathy” (the name of an RN I hadn’t worked with in 15 years) instead of Marianne. She did not correct me and it didn’t dawn on me until I had gotten home. I still remember Voltarine Williams’ full name, because of her little story, though we met but twice.

On another occasion, when employed as lead nurse in a pediatric clinic, I was attending to a mother whose sons were named Donatello, Michelangelo, Leonardo and Raphael. When I asked if she liked Italian art, she gave me a puzzled look.  I then explained that I was curious about the names of her sons.  As you have probably guessed, she had named them after the Ninja Turtles.

In the hospital, and clinics, where a large part of the patient population spoke only Spanish, I made my name a private pun.  Some Spanish speakers have difficulty with the name “Charles.”  Knowing this, and since I conversed with these patients in passable medical Spanish, I would introduce myself as Carlos Madera – a literal translation of my given name.  For a time, it caused some confusion among co-workers when I was asked for by that name.

Back to the book and the name of interest.  The first thing I noticed about 3 Bottle Bar was the curious spelling of the authors name on the fly leaf.  Initials capital “H.” lower case “i.” Surely there had to be a story.  I was correct.  H.i. Williams was born Harney Isham Williams in Ladoga, Indiana, 1886.  In his youth, his friends took to calling him “Hi.”  This name stuck and he used it throughout his life in both a personal, and professional, capacity.  “Hi” is certainly an easier handle to remember than “Harney” or “Isham” and conveys a friendly nature.

His book, 3 Bottle Bar - Hospitality Poured From 3 Bottles, published in 1943, is a rather thin book on mixology. A mere 64 pages, with 26 personally created recipes. You might overlook it as a potential addition to your collection.  The drinks aren’t bad and it is an easy to find out-of-print book, on eBay or Amazon, for less than $15 in hardback.

In 3 Bottle Bar, Hi talks about only needing three bottles of liquor to make most drinks requested by guests - whiskey, gin, and dry white wine (which he substitutes for vermouth). In the section entitled Afterthoughts, he relents and says that it would be OK to expand to a 5 bottle bar, adding rum and scotch if desired.  In the course of his book, like most other authors of the genre, he offers suggestions on how to best prepare a drink, requirements for a bar, and related trivia.  I like his less than elitist attitude regarding liquors.  Discussing “whiskey,” he does not mean bourbon or rye. He suggests using whichever whiskey you enjoy.

You may be thinking, “Meh, doesn’t sound like much to bother with.”  There is more. 

A large part of the pleasure of using a vintage drink book, or a favorite cookbook, is that the handful of paper is a tangible link in a chain to the the past.  A link not only to those who used that book, but to the author who wrote it.  While H.i. Williams appears to be merely the writer of a mildly entertaining bar book, he was so much more. To quote the foreward to 3 Bottle Bar:

In earlier years, he relied on drawing as his medium, and he did well with it; painting followed, and he did well with it, too. Currently photography is his choice, and his colorful compositions, which are reproduced in millions of magazines each month, have identified H.i. Williams as one of the foremost photographers in America.

H.i. Williams career spanned 50 years.  He was renown for his contribution to the “food as fashion” movement of the 1930’s. This influenced advertising art as we know it today. He was much sought after for his ability to create engaging, brightly colored commercial photographs of food.

A graduate of the Cincinnati Academy of Art, he earned reputation as a sculptor and artist.  In 1919, he moved on to New York and became a commercial photograper in the 1920s.  Williams shot iconic compositions for many companies including Fiestaware and Fleishmanns Yeast. Pillsbury used his images in their advertising and on cake mix boxes. Examples of his work are in many homes today.  If you look, you may have some, too.

  

Prior to the 1930s, images in cookbooks were hand drawn, sometimes hand colored, but more often, lifeless black and white photos.

Do you remember your mothers, or grandmothers, cookbooks of the 1930s, 40s and 50s?  Sprinkled with pages of brightly colored, full bleed images, of food perfectly prepared, appearing as it should when served at the family table?  These were added to give the cookbooks a bit of dash and appeal to homemakers.  Much of that color imagery was provided by “H.i.” or his disciples.

Williams was a perfectionist. He had a test kitchen with a staff that included professional cooks and bakers. Meats and fish were professionally cut so that the end product would look flawless. One anecdote alleges he would have his staff go through 20 boxes of crackers to find those that were “pristine.”

Creating his compositions was time consuming.  He would first meticulously arrange the layout, when it was completed to his satisfaction, he would discard and replace anything that was damaged or had lost its’ look of freshness.  Only then would he photograph the result.

I have a friend, Mark, who likes to say, regarding selling, that “it is the sizzle that sells the bacon.”  Well, H.i. Williams put the sizzle in food advertising and cookbooks. For this, he was recognized world-wide, and virtually every professional photography magazine of the 1940’s and 1950’s featured interviews as well as articles about his work and techniques.

The photographic process Williams favored to make food appear life-like is known as the trichrome carbro.  Carbro is short for carbon and bromide. The trichrome carbro is very time intensive. Taking 80, or more, steps, it is said that a person working a 40 hour week could complete about twelve of these photographs.

The trichrome carbro process requires three negatives taken utilizing red, green, and blue filters.  These negatives are then transferred to pigmented gelatin sheets which when developed, are then layered. Registration has to be perfect to achieve the final color image.  While this is a very quick and dirty explanation, the results are impressive. There are many articles online that explain the process more completely.

3 Bottle Bar, is a book by a creative genius of the advertising age whose influence is wide spread. As a link to a bit of modern history, the text is an item of drink related arcana worthy of your attention.

From 3 Bottle Bar, the drink of the day is the Carbro. A drink by  H.i. Williams, with a name of his choosing that we can now understand and appreciate.

The Jeep

It recently came to my attention that this is 73^rd anniversary of the US Army’s issuance of a request for proposals that culminated in the manufacture of the venerable jeep.  This brought back personal memories, as well as an opportunity to mention a forgotten cocktail that did not achieve the fame of its namesake.

As a young man, I passed through a stage of life in which I was enamored of 4 wheel drive vehicles, particularly “jeeps”. 

I had always liked old pick-up trucks.  My first love was a green, two-wheel drive, 1951 Dodge truck, fresh from a farm. This truck came complete with “three on the tree,” half-moon hubcaps, bald snow tires, a rotted out wood bed and rust in the running boards and fenders.  It did have a working radio and heater.  What could be better than that?  Only something as reliable, as sexy as a sow, and with 4 wheel drive – obviously a Jeep!

The military variants of the jeep are no more closely related to the modern civilian toys than the Wright brothers Flyer 1 is to a Boeing 777.  The basic construction, power train, and hardware were incredibly simple and lent themselves to easy maintenance and field expedient repairs. 

On one occasion, when the fuel pump failed on an M38A1, I rode 20 miles on a dirt road in the Gila Wilderness, sitting on the cowl, while pouring gas into the carburetor.  After removing the windshield, a friend drove while I poured the gas from a canteen cup, into an improvised aluminum foil funnel that was wrapped around a piece of rubber tubing.  The tubing was jammed onto the carburetor fuel line, which we had bent upward.  The other passenger refilled my canteen cup from a 5 gallon jerry can sans spout. Gasoline was splashed everywhere.  When we finally got to civilization, I had a pretty good chemical dermatitis on my hands and torso, and smelled like a refinery.  I don’t recommend trying this at home, as it was clearly a case of God protecting “fools, lovers and drunkards.” Unfortunately, we were the former rather than the latter.

My unrequited lust for a 4WD vehicle was turned into reality by my father-in-law, Al.  When I told Al that I would like to buy a jeep from a surplus yard in El Paso, but was short the money and mechanical talent to restore it, he offered up the needed funds and the mechanical know-how.  Al was a retired Army mechanic who had been raised on a poor farm in Michigan.   Though a functional illiterate, he could fabricate, restore, or otherwise return to life damn near anything.  While a difficult person, his “can do” belief that everything broken could be fixed, and that everything needed can be made or found, augmented by a staunch refusal to accept otherwise, is still a wonder.  This life lesson has stood me well, and I have tried to pass it on to my children.

The first jeep we rebuilt was a 1955 Willys M170 Frontline Ambulance.  

It had a Hurricane F-head engine with an accursed Carter YF carburetor, a T-90 3-speed transmission (which I had to tear down and rebuild a second time after finding an omitted synchronizer ring in a rag), Dana transfer case and axles, and a super heavy duty suspension since the jeep was designed to handle a driver, passenger, and three litters.  Best of all, it had features that would make any vehicle a dream.  Ample storage compartments in both wheel wells and under the passenger jump seat, canvas covered wheel well bench cushions, which along with the front seats that were resistant to foul weather. The passenger jump seat could be hung from a bar on the dash to make room for a third stretcher – or camping gear, and the spare tire was carried vertically in a wheel well next to the passenger.  All this, plus it still had the original military paint and insignia. It was as if all my adolescent dreams had come true.

Recollections of the M170 are bittersweet.  

It was rebuilt the year we were married, and I spent more time with my father-in-law building the jeep, than with my wife—something she has reminded me many times over the last four decades.  I was oblivious to everything except the jeep project.

From the first, the M170 was so much more useful than the 1964 VW that it had replaced.  Once, parked in a dirt lot, I returned from class and found my “jeep” hemmed in on all sides.  No problem!  I engaged the 4 wheel drive and pushed the car in front of me out of the way so that I could leave. 

Yes, I was a jerk. 

The following year I went into the Army and the M170 stayed with us. We struggled through a blizzard in Raton Pass to get to my first duty station, Fitzsimmons Army Hospital, Denver Colorado.  Later, it easily, albeit slowly climbed the mostly dirt and gravel road up Pikes Peak, while newer automobiles sat overheated at the side of the road.  I fondly recall watching my very pregnant wife, in the short dresses of the early 70’s, stepping high over the spare tire to get to the jump seat and, on a later trip, complaining about oil dripping from the oil pressure sending unit onto her stockings (imagine a time when women wore stockings everywhere, even in a jeep!).  I told her, quite seriously, that it was “clean oil.”  A very poorly received comment. Young men can be such boors.

Serving in the military, vehicle parts were amazingly easy for an enterprising soldier to acquire – Korean War vintage run-flat tires from Rocky Mountain Arsenal, fuel, oil and water pumps from sundry Army Reserve units, assorted parts as needed from military cannibalization points, and litters from the hospital (the litters were also our first bed, until we could afford used furniture, at my next duty station).  It was a first rate vehicle, fit to pass any inspection. When it broke down, it was usually a minor problem that, with what I had learned from Al, was repairable with basic tools and bruised knuckles.  The most persistent, and annoying, problems were vapor lock and a sticking carburetor float.

The last trip we made in the M170 was truly epic.  Keep in mind this was our family car, not a beater used for hunting and fishing.  In 1973, on a two week leave, we travelled from San Antonio, Texas to New York City, by way of Jacksonville, Florida, then back.  We started with $50 cash and a gas credit card.  This would be a journey of over 3800 miles.  I planned to drive long days and minimize expenses by staying with relatives along the way.

Now, for those of you driving those pimp-mobiles that pass for a modern Jeep, the drive may sound a little long, but not particularly difficult.  Try it in hot weather, without air conditioning but with engine heat radiating through the firewall, an incredibly stiff suspension - not so wonderful now, run-flat tires so hard you felt every pebble in the asphalt, a top speed of 55 mph – the very definition of “getting nowhere fast”, hard rubberized horse hair seats which, by the end of the day,  felt like sitting on sandbags, a 6 month old child in a bassinet, and a German wife ready to point out any shortcomings I might have missed. Also, there was no radio to break the monotony or drown out heat and fatigue inspired tirades.  Trip safety planning meant taking my 9mm FN Hi-power, a fire extinguisher, an extra fuel pump, water pump, and oil pump, and a few hand tools.  Seat belts and air bags were not part of the picture. Thinking about it still makes me tired.

The trip was a series of minor adventures. Somewhere outside Houma, Louisiana we broke down.  It was a simple problem, once found.  A loose distributor ground, repaired with a minimum of snarling.  My main memory of Houma is the suffocating heat.  It was hotter than the hinges of Hades and the humidity had to be 110%. In Tuscaloosa, Alabama, we were rear ended by a lady driving an Olds 88, slightly damaging our left rear quarter panel.  We ran out of gas in Quincy, Florida late at night. I hitched a ride to a gas station, with some teenagers, while my wife and child stayed in the car.  My spouse remembers that night slightly differently. She recalls being alone and afraid, in the dark, with the baby.  Days later, safely arriving in New York, we were just in time for rush hour traffic. My wife was incredibly tense and annoying as a “backseat driver.” I felt great driving the only cool vehicle on the road in New York City.  No lack of hubris in that other me of long ago.

Ultimately, this trip was the death knell of the M170.  Getting home, we were all tired and sore.  I could barely tolerate having to use the jeep to go to work at Brooke Army Medical Center.  Within weeks of returning, I sold the M170 to a fellow sergeant for $400, along with plenty of spare parts and GI manuals so generously provided by Uncle Sam.  Sadly, when sold, I told him that I thought the oil pump was failing and to install one of the spares.  Lazier than even I, he failed to do so and, ignoring the oil pressure gauge, seized up the engine two weeks later. While the M170 was followed by a Jeep Commando and two M38A1’s, none were so loved, nor so traveled, but all have their stories.

The drink I choose to pair with this blog, is called “The Jeep.” It comes from the 3 Bottle Bar by H.i. Williams, 1943. No, the little “i” in the second initial is not a typo. Born Harney Isham Williams, he went by “H.i.” in credits, or when he signed his name.

The drink, the author says, is “Designed for rough sledding, the Jeep has a three power drive with a pick up robust enough to pull even the weariest wayfarer out of the deepest rut.”

My wife and I find the drink quite tasty. 

In older bar books, when gin was not otherwise specified as "dry," "Plymouth" or "Holland," an Old Tom was the choice inferred.  Old Tom gins, sweeter and generally milder tasting, are harder to find now, but very pleasant to the palate in a mixed drink or cocktail.  I used Brothers Old Tom Gin, made here in New Mexico by the Left Turn Distillery of Albuquerque. For “whiskey”, I used Old Overholt rye, an American classic, as I personally find rye whiskey more pleasant and less “boozey” in mixed drinks.  The wine was a nice, inexpensive, California Beringer Chenin Blanc. The juice came from two tiny Cutie oranges. Cheers!