Who would’ve thought that conservative Virginia would ever allow “to go” alcoholic beverages? And yet, the COVID-inspired innovation of “one to go” is now enshrined in the Virginia Code as part of the state’s Alcoholic Beverage Control rules.

And you can get a toddy to go in Smithfield, where just over a half century ago, voters didn’t want an ABC store located here, and wouldn’t have dreamed of allowing liquor by the drink.

All of which is part of Smithfield’s — and Isle of Wight County’s — love/hate history with Demon Rum. The county and town, if arguments published in this paper going back to the late 1920s are an indicator, for decades frowned on making liquor available, all the while knowing that the illegal stuff could be had pretty easily.

The late 1920s, when the earliest preserved papers were published, saw the national debate over Prohibition play out locally. The Smithfield Times published a rather obscure and unattributed comment in October 1929 that seemed to favor an end to the national ban on regulated and taxed liquor. Restrictions on the use of corn in alcohol, the paper alleged, had reduced the price of corn by 10 cents a bushel, “yet, the farmer votes for prohibition and howls to Congress for help.”

The same month, the paper joked about bootleg whiskey in a column titled “What We Think.” 

“Put flowers in a quart jar of bootleg and they will burst into song,” the columnist wrote.

There was no local paper here in 1919 when the 18th Amendment was enacted, banning alcoholic beverages nationwide, but there was one in the early 1930s when the 21st Amendment that would repeal Prohibition was being debated. And local feelings were strong on both sides of the question.

The Anti-Saloon League of Virginia ran a letter in the Times opposing repeal, saying it would mean a return to the saloons of old and the perceived damage they did to society.

On the pro-repeal side, the paper ran an opinion piece by Gen. John J. “Black Jack” Pershing of World War I fame, who charged that a criminal network had been built up around bootleg whiskey thanks to the national Prohibition, and had grown to the point that it “defies the very government itself.”

Locally, Sheriff W. Colgate Whitehead, in what may have been a subtle endorsement of ending Prohibition, put a locally confiscated moonshine still on public display to show the poor quality of illicit whiskey production. The not-so-subtle implication was that regulated production was safer.

The pro-repeal voices failed to persuade the local anti-liquor forces, however, and in October 1933 Isle of Wight residents voted against repeal. 

The tide had turned, however, and rural counties like Isle of Wight couldn’t hold it back. Statewide, Virginians voted for the national repeal of the 18th Amendment and for the sale of alcoholic beverages in Virginia. 

That didn’t end the debate among Virginians, however. Gov. John Pollard declared that those counties that voted against having local liquor sales should be respected. Subsequent governors agreed, and Virginia restricted the placement of ABC stores in communities that voted to have them.

That set the stage for a showdown in Isle of Wight 24 years later. Local businesses signed a petition asking for a referendum that they hoped would endorse opening of an ABC store in Smithfield, and a vote was slated in March 1958.

Anti-liquor residents pushed back, however. Smithfield Baptist Church and Trinity Methodist Church both signed on to an ad in The Smithfield Times declaring that the sale of liquor in the town “would be detrimental to the moral, and spiritual welfare of the citizens of Smithfield and vicinity and would especially expose the young people and also adults who have a weakness for intoxicating beverages, to the temptation in the intemperate use” of liquor.

The churches won that round. The referendum failed by a narrow vote of 158 against to 107 for.

Business favoring a local store didn’t give up, and in 1964 called for a new referendum. The newspaper took no position on the issue but urged residents to vote.

This time, a group called Smithfield Citizens for Legal Control ran a quarter-page ad arguing that illegal liquor sales had fallen wherever liquor could be purchased legally, and that tax dollars from liquor sales were leaving Isle of Wight and going to neighboring localities that had ABC stores. The group ran several ads urging a “yes” vote for an ABC store.

The Baptist church weighed in again opposing a store here, but the Methodists didn’t take a public position that time.

The vote wasn’t close. Those favoring an ABC store in town won the referendum 315 to 114.

The debate over liquor continued. In 1975, Isle of Wight held a referendum on whether to allow liquor by the drink in the county. The referendum squeaked through with 2,142 voting for the referendum and 2,120 voting against it. The paper reported that liquor by the drink had passed “just by a jigger.”

 

John Edwards is publisher emeritus of The Smithfield Times. His email address is j.branchedwards@gmail.com.