The City’s Coldest Tea: A Prohibition-Era Poke at Seattle’s Saloon Culture
A satirical notice from 1871 captures the tongue-in-cheek public grumbling that followed the closure of a beloved watering hole.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
A public notice headed “TO THE PUBLIC” announces that the old “Snug Saloon” “has gone from us” and that “no more Can be got there.” It says the people of Seattle “mutually agree” that they cannot get along without the proprietor and his “COLD TEA” at the “OR() FINO,” and it is signed “SAM RAYMOND, and 10,000 others.”
The notice runs among saloon and liquor advertisements. The Pony Saloon on Commercial Street, opposite Schwabacher’s, offers cigars, tobacco, wines and “the best of Liquors” and calls itself the place to have “the inner man replenished—and not drugged.” The Star Saloon in Ten-Pin Alley advertises “the best of Wines, Liquors and Cigars.”
“The people of Seattle mutually agree that they can’t get along without Sam Raymond and his COLD TEA.”
This 1871 notice functions as an early form of 'viral' local discourse, using humor to navigate the social upheaval of business closures. It highlights how Seattle's identity has long been tied to its social spaces, a theme that resonates today as neighborhood 'third places' disappear amidst rapid gentrification and economic change.
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