Friday, December 08, 2017
What Whiskey City, Texas, Taught Me
By Donovan Baldwin
Mankind will bend over until its collective spine breaks to do something it's not "supposed" to be doing.
In 1968, the U.S. Army transferred me to Texas. It was hard to believe such a historically hard-drinking, cowboy state could have laws against selling hard liquor. More surprising, was the fact that, near many Texas towns, could be found "Whiskey City".
This was a collective term for a shopping center, outside the town's legal jurisdiction, where booze could be bought.
I learned of this, when I got stationed at Goodfellow Air Force Base, in San Angelo, Texas, in 1967.
Of course, soldiers, and airmen stationed at the base could buy anything on base. However, non-military citizens could not buy hard liquor in town.
One day, a friend of mine took me into the desert surrounding the town. We turned down a nondescript road, and, after a mile or two, we came around a bend, literally in the middle of nowhere, and there was a modern, multi-unit, strip mall selling only booze.
People didn't want hard liquor in their town,.
So, they banned it. Some of them, and others, still wanted booze, just not in town, so they built a special place to sell it, and buy it.
What's the saying?
"Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive...", ourselves?
In 1968, the U.S. Army transferred me to Texas. It was hard to believe such a historically hard-drinking, cowboy state could have laws against selling hard liquor. More surprising, was the fact that, near many Texas towns, could be found "Whiskey City".
This was a collective term for a shopping center, outside the town's legal jurisdiction, where booze could be bought.
I learned of this, when I got stationed at Goodfellow Air Force Base, in San Angelo, Texas, in 1967.
Of course, soldiers, and airmen stationed at the base could buy anything on base. However, non-military citizens could not buy hard liquor in town.
One day, a friend of mine took me into the desert surrounding the town. We turned down a nondescript road, and, after a mile or two, we came around a bend, literally in the middle of nowhere, and there was a modern, multi-unit, strip mall selling only booze.
People didn't want hard liquor in their town,.
So, they banned it. Some of them, and others, still wanted booze, just not in town, so they built a special place to sell it, and buy it.
What's the saying?
"Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive...", ourselves?
Labels: booze, buying booze in Texas, donovan baldwin, Goodfellow Air Force Base, San Angelo, texas, Whiskey City
# posted by Donovan Baldwin @ 7:33 PM 
