Taverns

Taverns, or public houses (in England and Australia, pubs) serving food, beer and rum, performed a major social and communications role in many countries.

Colonial America

Taverns were essential for colonial Americans, especially in the South where towns hardly existed. In the taverns the colonists learned current crop prices, arranged trades, heard newspapers read aloud, and discovered business opportunities and the latest betting odds on the upcoming horse races. For most rural Americans the tavern was the chief link to the greater world, playing a role much like the city marketplace in Europe and Latin America.

In the colonial era, about two-thirds of the taverns were operated by women--especially widows. Local magistrates--who had to award a license before a tavern could operate--preferred widows who knew the business and might otherwise be impoverished and become a charge to the county.

Taverns absorbed leisure hours and games were provided--always decks of cards, perhaps a billiards table. Horse races often began and ended at taverns, as did militia-training exercises. Cockfights were popular. At upscale taverns the gentry had private rooms or even organized a club. When politics was in season, political talk filled the taverns.

Larger taverns provided rooms for travelers, especially in county seats that housed the county court.

Further reading

American

• Conroy, David W. In Public Houses: Drink and the Revolution of Authority in Colonial Massachusetts (1995)
• Thompson, Peter. Rum Punch and Revolution: Taverngoing and Public Life in Eighteenth-Century Philadelphia (1999)
• Meacham, Sarah Hand. "Keeping the Trade: The Persistence of Tavernkeeping among Middling Women in Colonial Virginia," Early American Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal, Volume 3, Number 1, Spring 2005, pp. 140-163 in Project MUSE
• Rice, Kim. Early American Taverns: For the Entertainment of Friends and Strangers (1983),
• Salinger, Sharon V. Taverns and Drinking in Early America (2002)