I found most these images at Photo Basement, but all were originally posted at The November Coalition’s Random History of Alcohol Prohibition page.
“Good for the engine, but not for the engineer. Good for commercial purposes, but not as a beverage.”
The white man’s burden isn’t infantile non-whites in need of oversight, it’s saloons.
Connecting drinking alcohol with nationalism and the downfall of America.
Again, being anti-alcohol is patriotic.
Do you love drink more than you love your children? Or America?
But we see many of the same themes in the anti-Prohibition campaign:
So now if you love your kids and want them (and, implicitly, America) to be secure, you’ll repeal Prohibition.
“Protect our youth. Stamp out Prohibition. Love our children.”
At first I wasn’t sure if this was pro- or anti-Prohibition (asking people to vote to repeal it, or to overturn the repeal). But according to this history of Prohibition, Democrats came out with a “wet” (anti-Prohibition) platform as a way of drawing “ethnic” (i.e., European immigrant) and working class votes. So the message here is that we need to protect our children (and wives?) from the hordes of gangsters and bootleggers who emerged because of Prohibition, and their way to do this is to vote Democratic.
Thanks for the tip, Miguel!
Gwen Sharp is an associate professor of sociology at Nevada State College. You can follow her on Twitter at @gwensharpnv.
Comments 12
Dubi Kanengisser — July 4, 2008
About the first image - first, ugh, and second, you have to keep in mind that the prohibition movement started out as a women's movement, and the impetus was most likely the effects of (male) alcohol use on wives. That also sort of explains the Democratic poster, trying to show that prohibition achieved the opposite of what it was supposed to do.
Gwen — July 4, 2008
Oh, yeah. I wasn't really criticizing the posters, just pointing out the themes and the way that things like appealing to motherhood or patriotism can be used to support completely opposing positions.
My great-great grandma was actually named Frances Willard, after an anti-liquor activist and president of the Women's Christian Temperance Union.
Le — July 4, 2008
Well the first image is ironic because normally, alcohol is portrayed as something that helps guys get laid.
From a racial perspective, I am thinking of the history of Chinese in America. When they first arrived, they were hated by whites. During WWII, they were loved. Then, during McCarthyism, it was back to the hate. If you can dig up ads and propaganda reflecting these different eras, it will paint the same picture: the contradiction of messages serving the messenger of any given time period or side of the fence.
Coco — July 4, 2008
The first image has circulated widely on the internet and is widely believed to be a movie still from the 1930s (early Three Stooges, maybe?), not a genuine prohibition advertisement. A quick Google of the phrase in the picture produces a number of discussions speculating on the origins of this picture.
The "joke" is that these women are not sexually attractive enough for one to want to kiss in the first place, making this an interesting case of anti-feminist revisionism by the media more than anything else.
Friday Ephemera – Carrie the Bar Room Smasher | indiainkelephant — January 9, 2011
[...] Images from the Prohibition Era [...]
Hank Phillips — September 2, 2016
The Liberal Party organized in 1930 came out with a repeal platform in 1931. This is what tipped the Democrats off that repeal was a vote-getter. he Liberal Party called for legalizing liquor, no-fault divorce and repealing blue laws, but no dole.
YEETER MCYEETLEAN — March 13, 2020
YEET
Anonymous — March 13, 2020
YEET
YEETER MCYEETLEAN — March 13, 2020
YEET YEET YEETED
YEETER MCYEETLEAN — March 13, 2020
GET YEETED YOOTER!
YEETER MCYEETLEAN — March 13, 2020
LANUE IS A YEETY YETEET.
James — February 22, 2023
hahaha