Blind Tiger

Milady and I were talking tonight about things that interested us and she said that when she was young, the Jena Times would often run a police blotter and the term Blind Tiger was bandied about as a charge. She wondered where Louisiana got that name for a bootleg joint?

So, I went to the Louisiana Law and found in RS 26:711 that a Blind Tiger is defined as:

A "blind tiger" is any place in those subdivisions of the state in which the sale of alcoholic beverages is prohibited where such beverages are kept for sale, barter, or exchange or habitual giving away, whether in connection with a business conducted at the place or not.

So, the name has a connection to Louisiana law.

We turn next to Wikipedia and learn that during the semi-prohibition that exists in certain parts of the various states, it was customary for such establishments to have an unusual animal in the joint. If a customer paid a fee to see the animal, then the tavern would throw in a cocktail free of charge. They weren't selling alcohol, they were giving it away. In some parts of the country, these places were called Blind Pigs.

Such is the culture you find in PawPaw's House when the bar is open.