Prologue article, "Spirited Republic: Alcohol's Evolving Role in U.S. History" (Winter 2014)

Prologue article by National Archives senior curator Bruce Bustard introducing the exhibition "Spirited Republic: Alcohol in American History", and pointing to National Archives records on Prohibition.

Date: 2014
Kind: agency-history
Source: National Archives, Prologue magazine
Retrieved: 2026-10-11
Rights: Federal agency publication by a National Archives curator (17 U.S.C. § 105). The page notes that articles do not necessarily represent the views of NARA.

The article by Bruce Bustard, senior curator, appeared in Prologue, Winter 2014 (Vol. 46, No. 4). It introduces the National Archives exhibition “Spirited Republic: Alcohol in American History,” which covers attitudes to alcohol from the colonial period through the modern presidency and cites National Archives records. The page links to NARA teaching material on the Volstead Act and to a Prologue post on Prohibition and the rise of gangsters. The page notes that articles do not necessarily represent the views of NARA.

Only the opening and closing sections were read closely for this archive, and the linked post on gangsters redirected to the general blog index and was not read. The article is useful here as the pointer to the “Spirited Republic” exhibit records filed in this archive, among them the Doran letter to the Wickersham Commission and the Seattle memorandum.

itemCommissioner of Prohibition Doran to the Wickersham Commission on a Chicago residence converted to a distillery (4 October 1929)National Archives letter from J. M. Doran, Commissioner of Prohibition, to George W. Wickersham, chairman of the National Commission on Law Observation and Enforcement, describing enclosed photographs of a Chicago residence converted into a large illicit distillery.

itemBureau of Prohibition memorandum recording a minister's allegations about Seattle (9 January 1931)National Archives confidential Bureau of Prohibition memorandum from a Seattle special agent recording a minister's allegations of graft and protected bootlegging, gambling and prostitution. The memorandum says the minister had no concrete evidence against the officers he named.itemNational Archives lesson, "The Volstead Act" (Educator Resources)National Archives teaching lesson pairing the Eighteenth Amendment, the Volstead Act, a Bureau of Prohibition letter on transporting liquor from California to Washington, the proclamation of repeal and the Twenty-first Amendment resolution. A finding aid to records filed here.