Originally posted 24 May 2012

Sailors aboard a shipload of rum might be delighted by the opportunities to tap one of the kegs in the hold, but they had to keep in mind one of the dangers inherent in a cargo of flammable liquid.

This painting depicts the last minutes of the Kent, a cargo ship that was on its maiden voyage in 1825 when she caught fire and sank. As a later report put it, ” By the roll of the vessel, a cask of spirits had been displaced; and, as the men were about to fix it in its former position, a heavy sea struck the ship, and precipitated a candle from the hands of one of them. This, falling on a small portion of the spirits, which had escaped from the cask, produced an instant conflagration, which defied every effort to stay its progress.” The ship had been on the way from London to India, but had only made it to a point near the coast of France before burning and sinking. Eighty-one people were killed despite the presence of a nearby ship that picked up the survivors, and captains around the world demanded greater scrutiny of rum cargoes to make sure none had leaked. There can be no accurate accounting of how often this kind of accident happened, since most ships that suffered such an accident must have left no survivors to tell the tale.

Originally posted 23 May 2012

I have been known to experiment with rum in my own kitchen and enjoy the theatricality of flaming dishes, but there is such a thing as going too far. One might surmise that this recipe from the 1950’s for baked beans flamed with rum is an example of style over substance.

Baked Beans Au Glow-Glow
Ingredients:

• 4 c Canned Baked Beans
• 1/4 c Molasses
• 1/4 c Ketchup
• 1 tb Yellow Table Mustard
• 4 slices Bacon (cut in half)
• 1/2 c Dark Rum

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Combine ingredients, except bacon and rum, in large casserole.
Cover beans with bacon slices and bake until the bacon is done — 2 hours.
Warm rum in small sauce pan, ignite and spoon over the hot beans.

Note that the beans are covered with strips of bacon, which the flaming rum is poured over, so you can fill your home with the delightful smell of flaming bacon fat. Note also that this dish was concocted before the invention of the modern smoke alarm, which may be one of many reasons for its fall from favor. The source for this is “Fashionable Food, Seven Decades of Food Fads” by Sylvia Lovegren, and if you wish to visit the chamber of horrors that is cooking in the 50’s and 60’s, this book is a great place to start. Sylvia credits the recipe to John J. Poister, a food and travel columnist for the New Yorker and other magazines, who certainly should have known better. I’ll add a cup of dark rum to a pot of my chili, but this is beyond reason.

Meanwhile, the reviews for the book keep coming in – one just appeared in AllStarCask, a rum blog that I was unaware of before. I keep learning about more people around the world who share an interest in not only drinking good rum, but writing about it. Civilization may not fall after all.

Originally posted 22 May 2012

Though rum was used as a de facto currency in Australia, Colonial America, and other places, I haven’t found any examples of coinage or paper currency that actually feature rum barrels. The case is different with stamps, as you can see from these examples.

First, a distillery from the Netherlands Antilles, date unknown:

From Cuba in 1982, a barrel of rum:

And a stamp that wasn’t issued by a government, but nevertheless will get your mail delivered if you are fortunate enough to live in Hawaii. A local delivery company issues beautiful stamps commemorating Hawaiiana, like this one:

Know of any other stamps or currency that feature rum or distilleries? I’d like to see them.

Originally posted 20 May 2012

After I posted the entry on the Canadian military rum jug, I realized I had another picture that showed one very much like it. This picture of two Scottish soldiers in a bombed-out landscape probably dates from 1916, and is entitled “Sorry, it is empty.”

There is a look of longing and sadness on the poor fellow on the left, watching his comrade drain the last dregs from the rum jug. Soldiers in the armies of the modern world have it much better in every other way – air-conditioned tents in desert heat, modern water-shedding clothing in damp climate, more nutritious and better-preserved food – but they are denied the official rations of liquor that comforted their grandfathers in the fields of Flanders and France. (Photo from the archive of the National Libarary of Scotland, public domain.)

On another topic, “Rum: A Global History” is starting to get reviews. One of the first is from the Swedish drinks blog A Mountain of Crushed Ice, which reprinted the recipe for Martha Washington’s Rum Punch. I have been enjoying this blog for some time and am honored to be featured there. If you have seen other reviews of the book that I might have missed, please let me know.

Originally posted 17 May 2012

Soldiers in the British and Canadian military during the First World War were always delighted when they saw this jug, even though they were unsure of the meaning of the initials on the side.

The contents were definitely rum, and depending on who you talked to, the three letters stood for Special Red Demerara, Service Rum Distribution, or other names of the type beloved by bureaucrats. The soldiers naturally came up with their own acronyms: Seldom Reaches Destination and Soon Runs Dry were both popular. The jugs were delivered to the battlefields in the thousands and can still be found in antique shops in France and Belgium.

Thanks to Wolf for sending this tidbit. Do you know an interesting facet of rum history, have questions about a traditional tipple, or have a clear picture of an unusual or mysterious rum-related artifact? Send it to me using the link at the bottom of this page, and I will be happy to research it or feature it here.

Originally posted 16 May 2012

Political cartoonist Thomas Nast was one of the best artists of his generation, so it is unfortunate that his talents were frequently put to supporting bigoted candidates and causes. One of the odder examples combines two of Nast’s obsessions: alcohol and immigration to the United States. Given those two concerns, what could be better than a cartoon about rum-crazed Irishmen?

The cartoon is a savage caricature of a riot in New York that was provoked when police broke up a St. Patrick’s day parade. Rum isn’t the alcohol usually associated with Irishmen, but it was the cheapest liquor available and Nast, like many others of his day, associated it with violence and debauchery. Like many modern media personalities, he wasn’t about to let facts get in the way of a good story. Less confrontational cartoons by Nast have been more enduringly popular – he created the popular images of Santa Claus, Uncle Sam, and other American icons, and toward the end of his life drew cartoons that showed sympathy for the plight of immigrants.

Originally posted 15 May 2012

The American Presidential election of 1831 was a flowering of dirty politics, featuring savage satire by both sides. The Whig candidate, William Henry Harrison, was branded the “log cabin and hard cider” candidate by his opponents, suggesting that he was an old man who had nothing better to do than sit at home and drink the alcohol most associated with country hicks. The strategy backfired when Harrison embraced the accusation, realizing that it reflected the homespun image he sought to project. Since their first strategy hadn’t worked, supporters of rival Martin Van Buren came up with a surprising strategy, namely to claim claim that Harrison actually preferred rum. Harrison, whose other nickname was Tippecanoe, was on the ballot with James Tyler, and both are mentioned in this little ditty:

Rockabye, baby, Daddy’s a Whig
When he comes home, hard cider he’ll swig
When he has swug
He’ll fall in a stu
And down will come Tyler and Tippecanoe.
Rockabye, baby, when you awake
You will discover Tip is a fake.
Far from the battle, war cry and drum
He sits in his cabin a’drinking bad rum.

The new campaign against Harrison was another failure, and Van Buren lost the subsequent election. Harrison did not enjoy his triumph for long, as he died of pneumonia only a month after taking office.

Originally posted 13 May 2012

Just typing the header of this post made me smile; we associate eggnog with Christmas, not flailing fists. The sweet milky beverage is favored by children, and it seems unlikely that it could have once have been at the center of an altercation that imperiled the careers of men who would later become famous. Nevertheless, in 1826 a battle among West Point cadets over an illicit bowl of rum-laced eggnog resulted in the court-martial of twenty candidate officers and one enlisted man. Among the riot participants who was not prosecuted was Jefferson Davis, who later became President of the Confederacy and as such commander of a fellow student who tried to maintain discipline, Robert E. Lee. It all began when the administration of the academy tried to crack down on the drinking of eggnog around Christmas, which had always been against the rules but was unofficially tolerated. In response a group of cadets decided to throw the biggest party West Point had ever seen. This picture shows the cadets enjoying a convivial mug before things got ugly.

Many broken windows and minor injuries later, some cadets had been expelled while others were reduced in rank. Some promising careers had been cut short, and the Academy enforced the rules with renewed vigor. Next time you sip some eggnog as a winter refresher, remember that the seemingly harmless drink was once a focus of contention at America’s elite military school.

Originally posted 11 May 2012

When I was researching the chapter on the rise of the Prohibition movement, I found some fairly odd suggestions on how to reform those who imbibed rum to excess. My favorite so far is this one from the late 1900’s:

I think this might actually work, having once drunk a Korean liquor with a dead pit viper in the bottom of the bottle. Just looking at the scaly creatures pickled in my beverage induced both melancholy and a complete lack of thirst. If you are interested in seeing more of this type of useful information, I recommend you to Questionable Advice, a blog that is filled with wisdom from the pens of advertisers through the ages.

Originally posted 11 May 2012

I was looking up the earliest recipe for a Canadian rum concoction called Moose Milk when I found the following passage about the annual Levees held by governors of Canada. These meetings between the executive and his constituents sound like a jolly time, if you like drinking rum before dawn.

Governor George Simpson’s Athabasca Journal reports that on January 1st, 1821, “the Festivities of the New Year commenced at four o’clock this morning when the people honoured me with a salute of fire arms, and in half an hour afterwards the whole Inmates of our Garrison assembled in the hall dressed out in their best clothes, and were regaled in a suitable manner with a few flaggon’s of Rum and some Cakes. A full allowance of Buffalo meat was served out to them and a pint of spirits for each man.”

It goes to show once again that rum was an integral part of cultures far away from any canefield. As for what it’s like to start your day with a pint of rum and a plate of buffalo meat, that is not recorded. I welcome any chance to find out.