February 5, 2025 • 30 mins
Ada Coleman was head bartender at the American Bar at the Savoy Hotel in London in the early 20th century. She created a cocktail that is still served today, and she's an enduring icon of the bartending industry.
Research:
- The Ada Coleman Project. https://theadacolemanproject.com/about/
- Allison, Keith. “Spies at the Savoy Part One.” Alcohol Professor. Oct. 5, 2016. https://www.alcoholprofessor.com/blog-posts/blog/2016/10/05/spies-at-the-savoy-part-one
- Allison, Keith. “Spies at the Savoy Part Three.” Alcohol Professor. October 14, 2016. https://www.alcoholprofessor.com/blog-posts/blog/2016/10/14/spies-at-the-savoy-part-three
- “American Bar.” Savoy London. https://www.thesavoylondon.com/restaurant/american-bar/#:~:text=The%20American%20Bar%20first%20opened,World's%2050%20Best%20Bars%202017.
- Bell, Emily. “Ada Coleman: One Of History’s Most Famous Female Mixologists.” Vinepair. March 17, 2016. https://vinepair.com/wine-blog/ada-coleman/
- Bryant, Miranda. “Savoy’s American Bar appoints first woman as head bartender in 95 years.” Aug. 6, 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/food/2021/aug/06/savoy-american-bar-appoints-first-woman-as-head-bartender-in-95-years
- Haigh, Ted. “Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails: From the Alamagoozlum to the Zombie 100 Rediscovered Recipes and the Stories Behind Them.” Quarry Books. 2009.
- Hotel and Restaurant Employee's International Alliance and Bartenders' International League of America. “The Mixer and Server.” Volume 35. 1926. Accessed online: https://books.google.com/books?id=OcyfAAAAMAAJ&vq=adah+coleman&source=gbs_navlinks_s
- O’Meara, Mallory. “Girly Drinks: A World History of Women and Alcohol.“ Hanover Square Press. 2021.
- “Rupert D’Oyly Carte Dies in London at 71.” The Gazette. Sept. 13, 1948. https://www.newspapers.com/image/421220764/?clipping_id=50107862&fcfToken=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJmcmVlLXZpZXctaWQiOjQyMTIyMDc2NCwiaWF0IjoxNzM3NDAwMDEwLCJleHAiOjE3Mzc0ODY0MTB9.mS2TE4P7Mv_3uB3wevRSJpZDPZYy2a-e7eyG-Hk10Ds
- Saunders, Minott. “Famous Bar Maids Who Worked at Same Bar Twenty Years Without Speaking , Retire.” The Aspen Daily Times. February 16, 1926. https://www.coloradohistoricnewspapers.org/?a=d&d=ADT19260216.2.2&e=-------en-20--1--img-txIN%7ctxCO%7ctxTA--------0------
- Styn, Rebecca. “Toast to Ada Coleman, National Women’s History Month.” Chilled. https://chilledmagazine.com/toast-to-ada-coleman-national-womens-history-month/
- Sutcliffe, Theodora. “Ada Coleman.” Difford’s Guide. https://www.diffordsguide.com/encyclopedia/2857/people/ada-coleman
- “Women as Barmaids: Published for the Joint Committee on the Employment of Barmaids.” King Publishing. London. 1905. https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=B-VNAQAAMAAJ&rdid=book-B-VNAQAAMAAJ&rdot=1
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly
Frye and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. Sometimes there's a historical
topic that keeps coming to the forefront in my day
(00:21):
to day life. I just happens to you as well,
until finally I'm like, fine, I will do it. And
this is one of those. But it's also delightful, So
it's more like one of those, Oh, I won't do that.
I'll save that for a time when I need a
self indulgent episode. But this is a combination of the two.
It's both self indulgent and it keeps flagging in my
life and coming up in various times. So it's time.
(00:43):
I actually mentioned Ada Coleman on the show recently, I think,
and she came up on a recent episode of Criminalia,
and her story has kind of stayed on my mind.
Even though it's really pretty piecemeal, we don't have a
wide range of biographical detail, but it also offers a
pretty unique glimpse into bar culture, luxury hospitality, and the
(01:05):
roles of women in the early twentieth century. Ada was
a head bartender, although women were generally called bar maids
at the time. That connotation of use that comes with
that is important, and we'll talk about why as we
get into some details later. And she had that title
at the American Bar at the Savoy Hotel in London.
(01:27):
She created a cocktail that is still served today both
at the Savoy and elsewhere, and she's kind of considered
an enduring icon of the bartending industry. Ada Coleman was
born in or around eighteen seventy five. That makes it
clear her exact birthday we don't know, and we also
really don't have any information about her formative years. According
(01:51):
to the common story of Ada's early life and introduction
into the hospitality world, her father worked for a man
named Rupert Doyle Kart as a steward in his golf club.
A steward in this case is kind of like a
bar manager. That's the person making sure everything stays stocked
and there are fresh ingredients on hand for any perishable things,
(02:14):
and receipts are accounted for at the end of the day.
All of that. Rupert Doiley Cart was the son of
Richard doily Cart, who had founded the doaly Cart Opera company.
That company was known for its policy of only producing
Gilbert and Sullivan shows. The Savoy Theater was purpose built
(02:35):
to produce the theater duo's shows and to accommodate the
many theatergoers who flocked to London to see those shows.
He also built the Savoy Hotel next door in eighteen
eighty nine. The Savoy Hotel was a very modern construction
project that was entirely electric. There was an elevator, it
(02:55):
had hot and cold running water, and every room had
a speaking tube so that guests a good call for
anything they might need or want. Richard's son Rupert, took
over all of those businesses, and when AIDA's father died
in eighteen ninety nine, Ada went to work. She was
offered a job in the flower shop at Claradge's Hotel,
(03:18):
which was also owned by Doyley Cart. This is often
framed as like a favor he did because he really
liked her father and the family. According to an interview
she gave later in her life, she made her first
cocktail at Clarages that was a Manhattan She was coached
in the making of that drink by the wine butler there,
whose name was Fisher, and who is the person who
(03:39):
taught her about bartending, and she got on quickly, and
soon she was moved from her position in the flower
shop to a position in the hotel bar. She was
reportedly twenty four at the time, and as we'll discuss
in a moment, twenty four would be the point where
a lot of women were aging out of bar made jobs,
but Aida was just getting started. She was the exact
(04:01):
right mix of friendly and naturally good at making drinks
to quickly become a favorite of both management and patrons.
Frank Wells had been head bartender at the Savoy Hotel's
popular American Bar since its opening. When he retired, Ada
was moved into that position. The American Bar was and
(04:23):
still is an institution. It was opened in eighteen ninety
three and has hosted a long list of famous patrons
over more than one hundred and thirty years that it's
been in service. It's touted by The Savoy as the
longest surviving cocktail bar in London. It's considered one of
the best bars in the world. The name American Bar
(04:46):
refers to drinks served in what was called in the
late nineteenth century American style. That just means cocktails or
mixed drinks, even though that was probably not the invention
of the United States. There were a lot of American
bars popping up in Europe in the late eighteen hundreds,
but none of them attained the popularity or legendary status
(05:09):
of the Savoys bar and Aida is sometimes credited for
really putting it on the map and to get a
sense of what the bar scene was like regarding women
employees when Aida was promoted to the American bar head
bartender position. We have a nineteen oh five publication prepared
by the Joint Committee on the Employment of Bar Maids.
(05:31):
They made a whole committee for it, and that publication
is titled Women as bar Maids. This was a document
prepared to support a case to ban women from working
in bars at a time when a lot of women
did so. Some estimates suggest that half of all bar
staff in England at this time were women. You'll also
(05:51):
sometimes see this as like they pull in a quote
or a statistic from the US at the time, where
it's much more lopsided. But in England it was very
common for women to work in bars. Specifically, the introduction
to this document, which was written by the Lord Bishop
of Southwark, is very open about its message that alcohol
(06:12):
plus women equals moral depravity, and includes this commentary on
how women should be treated quote we ought, I think,
to keep them free from the stress of what drives
them towards a life so unsuited for women. In the
case of those who read what is here said about
the use of young women as an instrument of bringing
(06:33):
in business, about the kind of women desired, I shall
be surprised if they do not feel that the practice
of so employing some of our brightest girls is lowering
to the whole moral tone of the community with regard
to women. But though the Lord Bishop states repeatedly that
public morale is at risk when women work in bars,
(06:53):
he concludes by saying quote, I need not point out
that there is no intention to suggest that with withdrawal
of work from any who are already engaged upon it,
So theoretically at this point Ada would have been able
to retain her job. There is also a note at
the beginning of this published report that states, quote, this
book makes no charges against publicans generally, and most certainly
(07:17):
not against barmaids, many of whom remained firm against all
temptations and dangers. The rest of the report goes on
to talk about the distribution of barmaids throughout Great Britain
and Ireland, noting that in some areas bar maids are
never hired, while in others, and most definitely in London,
(07:37):
it's very common. But even so, at a time when
a total of four million, one hundred seventy one thousand,
seven hundred and fifty one women and girls were working
in Britain and Ireland, only seventy eight, eight hundred and
thirty four of them were working in what we would
now call the hospitality industry, which in the report includes
(08:01):
quote inn hotel keepers, publicans, beer sellers, cider dealers, seller women,
barmaids and others in in hotel, eating, house service. Barmaids
made up twenty seven thousand, seven hundred and seven of
these positions per the nineteen oh one census. The report
notes that barmaids averaged twelve shillings a week in pay,
(08:24):
with the low end being five and the high end
being fifteen, and that most positions included board and lodging
as well. While this was only slightly lower pay than
men in similar jobs, the barmaids were not protected by
any labor laws, they could be let go for any reason,
and they were often made to pay for any loss
(08:45):
through breakage from their salary quote, even if caused by
the customer. This was also a job field that the
report described as overcrowded, with many women moving into service
jobs from domestic work thinking that it would be more
or interesting, only to find that it is often far
more strenuous. Two thirds of the people working bar maid
(09:07):
jobs were between the ages of fifteen and twenty five.
The report quotes a trade magazine of the time in
noting that as women age, they cannot compete for these jobs,
with younger women quote in the bar maids calling the
old have no chance against the young. On the proprietor side,
hiring women into bar positions had two clear benefits. One
(09:30):
it attracted more men as patrons, and two having women
as employees made bars appear more respectable to other women,
who then would be more comfortable selecting those establishments over
ones where only men worked. But because there were not
regulations for the hospitality industry on the hours that a
(09:51):
woman could be required to work in the early twentieth century,
there was also the benefit of scheduling them for ridiculously
long shifts. Some establishments were open as many as one
hundred and twenty three and a half hours per week,
and sometimes bar maids were expected to be on duty
from opening to closing, so they could work nineteen hour
(10:12):
days in some cases. The report cites the account of
several women who worked as barmaids, and one who noted
that she is quote one of the lucky sort who
worked at ten am to twelve thirty am shift, with
a total of two hours off throughout the day for
rest and meals. This write up then notes, quote this
great length of hours necessitated by the conditions of the
(10:35):
licensed victualler's trade, from a physical point of view, renders
the calling unsuited for women. Prolonged standing injures a woman
in a way it does not a man, and tends
to incapacitate her for the normal woman's life. There are
also testimonials by doctors noting that working in a bar
is terrible for women's health. Some of these are definitely
(10:59):
from the valid point of view that, for example, preteen
girls should not be working as bar maids, but of
course no one that young should be working. But the
same thing is not stated regarding boys who work in bars.
Some of this is because bar maids are, as the
report calls them, sirens who attract men to drink, so
there is a moral issue there as perceived by the
(11:21):
social mores of the early nineteen hundreds, that is not
as much of a consideration for boys. It's interesting that
all of this is leading to a case of removing
women from the trade rather than enacting labor laws to
protect them, particularly when there are other industries like cotton
factories that are noted in the report as having employee
(11:42):
hours that are regulated by law. Will continue talking about
the contents of the Committee's published report on the state
of barmaids in the early nineteen hundreds, including some rather
dark aspects of the job, but first we will pause
for a sponsor break the women as Barmaid's Report, prepared
(12:09):
by the Joint Committee on the Employment of Barmaids also
makes the case that women are more likely to develop
dependencies on alcohol and stimulants in such jobs, and that
in general they will become a moral due to the
constant exposure to men who are likely to speak and
behave immoraly with them in ways they would not normally
(12:29):
with a woman. That isn't really news to anyone who's
ever been in a bar. And there are statements included
from women who worked in the field, one of whom stated, quote,
many and many a time have I cried myself to
sleep after I have been laughing and joking all the
evening because of the things we have to put up
with in the bar. I don't consider it as a
(12:51):
proper occupation for a woman. Any cad who can pay
two pence for a drink thinks he is entitled to
say what he likes to the bar maid. Often women
also faced physical violence from their customers, particularly when they
were intoxicated, but this was not only a problem with patrons.
There are a lot of accounts in this publication of
(13:12):
women being assaulted or pressured into sexual relationships with their employers.
While the study of barmaids notes that many women in
the business end up married to patrons and often to
quote men above themselves in station, it also said that
women who did not get married by thirty five while
working in bars were doomed to quote a gloomy prospect
(13:36):
for some very sad statistics of deaths, including murders and suicides.
The solution to phasing out women working as barmaids. Per
the committee's recommendation was this quote. The form which it
is proposed that legislation should take is that on a
certain date all barmaids then in employee should receive a
(13:56):
certificate stating this fact and provided with means of identification,
and that it should thenceforth be illegal for publicans to
engage as barmaid any woman but one so certificated. That
is how they put it. The calling would thus come
automatically to an end in a few years. This law
would not prevent Republicans employing his own wife or daughter
(14:20):
to serve in his bar, nor would it prevent a
certificated barmaid from entering on a fresh situation whenever she pleased.
There are also additional recommendations that families that would not
be able to ensure a financial future for their daughters
should just start to make sure they train them for
a trade. There is also the recommendation to women's emigration societies,
(14:43):
which is how they put it, that the lack of
jobs for women in England could be addressed if young
women would move to Canada or the various British colonies
that needed teachers and governesses, and somehow in this social
and cultural environment that was in many ways so antagonistic
toward women, working behind a bar, Ada Coleman, who patrons
(15:05):
called Kohli, really thrived to be clear. She was working
in the fanciest bars in the city of London, not
in a tavern or an inn that was likely to
have a rougher clientele and ownership. But she was still
an outlier. Although she wasn't the only woman working at
the American Bar, Another woman named Ruth Burgess was also
(15:26):
a barmaid there. Uh. You might think these two would
become allies in an industry that was so stacked against women,
and that does not appear to have been the case.
We will talk about why in just a moment. The
nature of the Savoy and its bar, tightly tied to
the theater world, was also a perfect fit for Ada.
(15:48):
She was a fan of theater, and she loved to
spend time with the performers and the creatives who put
together shows for the Savoy Theater, often inviting them to
her home forget togethers. Her favorite bar regulars were also
invited if they were lucky, and she was reportedly a
fantastic hostess. She was also very comfortable and at ease
(16:09):
with celebrities of all kinds, so she was able to
banter with them and cater service to their personalities. In
her time as the Savoys head bartender, she served royalty,
millionaires and the most celebrated authors of the day, including
Mark Twain. Her bubbly personality and her skill with a
shaker made her something of a celebrity in her own
(16:31):
right for the wealthy and famous. If you were in London,
you had to have Coali make you a drink, and
she became the favorite bartender of people like Charlie Chaplin
and the Prince of Wales. In short, Coley was the
it bartender of London. Being head bartender also meant she
was managing the bar's various business and logistics needs. She
(16:53):
was the person who developed the menu, who managed the
other bartenders, and who made sure that all the bars
guests were taken care of, while also mixing drinks more
or less constantly. When the US passed its prohibition law,
a correspondent for the periodical The Mixer and Server got
Colly's take on prohibition after speaking to her about a
(17:14):
bartender who said that he professionally served alcohol but personally
believed that no one should drink. She responded, quote, I
don't agree with him at all. If you are looking
for a temperance, sermon, young man, you will have to
move on. Famous men from all over the world have
been in this bar in my time, and I have
seen them go out and become more famous than ever.
(17:37):
When Mark Twain came over from your America to get
a degree from Oxford University, I served him a cocktail here.
Did not brave young men of the war days come
here to have a last drink together and tell each
other goodbye. She also told the writer that England would
never pass prohibition laws because of what she called the
four l's, the lords, the Landlords, the ladies, and the
(17:59):
lad One of Coley's most noteworthy professional achievements, at least
in terms of historical longevity, was the creation of a
cocktail called the Hanky Panky. The story behind it involves
one of her regulars, renowned comedy actor and director, Sir
Charles Henry Hawtrey. Just for disambiguation, he shares the same
(18:24):
name with another English actor. The one we are talking
about today was born in eighteen fifty eight and the
other was born in nineteen fourteen. They were not related.
Our Charles Hawtrey often worked with Gilbert and Sullivan, so
he was tied into the Savoy ecosystem. Here is how
Ada Coleman described the drinks genesis in an interview that
(18:47):
she gave several years later. Quote, the late Charles Hawtrey
was one of the best judges of cocktails that I
knew some years ago. When he was overworking, he used
to come into the bar and say, Coley, I am tired,
give me something with a bit of punch in it.
It was for him that I spent hours experimenting until
I had invented a new cocktail. The next time he
(19:10):
came in, I told him I had a new drink
for him. He sipped it and draining the glass, he said,
by jove, that is the real hanky panky and hanky panky,
and has been called ever since. The hanky panky, incidentally,
is a very spirit forward drink. It consists of equal
parts gin and sweet vermouth with a couple of dashes
of for nebronca. And the term hanky panky was more
(19:33):
of a reference to witchcraft and alchemy in England than
the suggestion of sexual activity that that phrase connotes today
in the US. In a moment, we will talk about
the end of Ada's bartending career and some debate about it.
First we will hear from the sponsors that keep the
show going. Ada's retirement from the bar is one of
(20:04):
those things that is told differently by different people, but
every story involves Harry Cradock. Cradock, who wrote the Savoid
Cocktail Book in nineteen thirty that is a book we
have mentioned on this show, is sometimes described as an American,
but he was born in Stroud, England. He did move
to the US and become a US citizen in his
(20:24):
early years, though, and in the US he also became
a bartender, and he did really well as a bartender
until prohibition shut down all of the places he had
ever worked. So at that point he moved back to England,
where as Ada had said, the four Els made sure
alcohol stayed legal, and he got hired at American Bar.
(20:47):
There is some debate around Craddock's relationship with Ada at
the American Bar, and that involves like a lot of speculation.
Some accounts note that he worked at American Bar for
five years, while Ada was head bartender, but it does
seem as though he may have really bristled at working
under a woman's supervisor and then launched a campaign to
(21:10):
get rid of Coolie from her head bartender position. In
an interview with Chilled magazine, The Savoys archivist Susan Scott
reiterated that we don't know any of this with certainty, stating, quote,
there was no possibility of getting the top job in
the American Bar as long as miss Coleman was there.
And while it is easy to say there was no
(21:32):
love lost between them, that is just supposition. Yeah, there's
a whole story that some people say is documented that
he kind of made the case to the ownership that
if people came into the bar who were Americans, they
were not used to seeing women bartenders and so they
(21:53):
wouldn't go there or like it. But like at that point,
she had been working for more than twenty years, and
when people came from the US they seem to love her.
So there's a lot of theory going on there. Ruth
Burgess was also retired from the bar at the same
time as Ada in the mid nineteen twenties, and the
(22:13):
bar was also closed at that point temporarily for renovations,
so there's always the possibility that all of this was
merely a logistics and staffing issue. In nineteen twenty six,
an article appeared in various newspapers announcing the quote retirement
of Ada and Ruth from the American Bar. Here's what
(22:34):
it said, quote beloved by all drinking men who come
to them for cheer. From the four corners of the world.
The two picturesque bar maids of the Savoy Hotel have
laid down their cocktail shakers without patching up their differences.
They are Miss Ada Coleman and Miss Ruth Burgess. For
over twenty years they have worked in the same little corner,
(22:56):
handled the same bottles, and beamed on the same good
friend without speaking to each other. This feud, which most
old customers knew about but could not explain, hung over
the backbar like a film of fog when both were there.
But through the years the atmosphere has otherwise remained bright
and cheerful, between happy greetings and fond farewells with customers.
(23:20):
Much merry potter passed across the bar, but the women
between them norrished relentlessly. Their mutual enmity and scorn. So
this article goes on to explain that the root of
the issue and the decades long animosity between the women
is this. Ruth Burgess had been at American Bar since
(23:40):
nineteen oh two, and when Coley started there the following year,
she started making her own newly invented cocktails, which quickly
became the preferred drinks of the bar regulars. When Ada
was not working, those regulars would order them from Ruth,
but she didn't know how to make them, And then
when she asked Ada for the recipes so she could
(24:01):
make them when Ada wasn't working, Ada refused, and at
that point the two stop speaking to one another entirely.
The article continues quote Neither ever dreamed of leaving her
work to be free of the quarrel, but each waited
and hoped that the other would go. Finally, the blow
came to both at the same time. The management explained
(24:24):
that changes were being made the bar renovated, a new
system necessary, and that they had earned a rest. They
were given notice and granted pensions. After that, Harry Krattick
was the head bartender at American Bar, and Aida, who
had not actually retired, was moved into a position at
(24:44):
the Savoy's Flower Shop. When Kradick published The Savoy Cocktail
Book a few years later, he included the Hanky Panky
in it and credited Ada, but it's the only drink
in the book that bears her name, even though it's
likely that multiple signature d banks of the Savoy's Bar
were her creations. Ada's life after the Savoy does not
(25:06):
appear to have garnered a lot of attention. She died
at the age of ninety one in nineteen sixty six,
but the gap between her time at the Savoy and
her death doesn't seem to be well recorded. Today, Ada
is considered one of the most important bartenders of all time.
She was certainly prolific. By her own calculations, she had
(25:28):
made one million drinks during her career behind the bar.
American Bar, as we mentioned earlier, continues to this day.
It's become somewhat difficult to get into as a prestige
bar that also features some of the world's priciest drinks.
This includes a sazarak that costs five thousand pounds because
(25:50):
it's made with vintage spirits. Their vintage Hanky Panky is
one hundred and fifty pounds. American Bar also develops a
new menu periodically, each iteration built around a different theme.
The current one, which features both non alcoholic and alcoholic beverages,
is built around the theme of Liquid Moments, celebrating the people, details,
(26:12):
and events that have become important to the establishment's history.
To be named head bartender at American Bar is one
of the highest honors in the bartending industry, although it
comes with a lot of pressure. In twenty twenty one,
as the Savoy was reopening its various departments after COVID shutdowns,
Shannon to Bay became the first US born bartender to
(26:35):
helm American Bar. That also made her the first woman
head bartender since Ada's retirement in the nineteen twenties. The
relationship between Ada and Ruth was examined in an immersive
theater project in twenty seventeen in Washington, d C. The
Post Shift Theater recreated an imaginary first shift that Ada
(26:56):
and Ruth worked behind the bar together. I wish I
had no about and see that today. There's a professional
organization called the Ada Coleman Project. In the organization's own
words quote, our mission is to not only bring awareness
to the current inequities and the representation of women plus
in educational and recreational bartending roles, but also to offer
(27:19):
meaningful solutions. Our visionists to spotlight the women who innovate
and inspire us as an industry in an effort to
raise awareness and encourage meaningful conversation regarding the need for
a more balanced and diverse selection of leaders, educating, speaking,
and advocating for the next generation and beyond. Their logo
(27:40):
is a stylized version of a nearly empty hanky panky glass,
which is intended to evolve and be represented as fuller
and fuller as the group achieves greater inclusivity in the
bartending industry. Kind of a cool legacy. Uh huh. I
have listener mail. Listener mail is also about an important
(28:01):
woman that we've talked about. This is from our listener Lissa,
who writes, Dear Holly and Tracy, I have just pressed
pause while listening to your episode titled Helen a Blanchard
sewing machine Innovator, so that I could thank you for
a marvelous forty five minutes of listening. I love to sew,
but hand finish my garments because I despise the appearance
(28:22):
of surged edges. I have frequently passed over garments for
purchase for having surged interiors, all the while cursing whoever
invented that blasted machine. And now having heard Helen's story,
I'm quite pleased to know that a smart woman invented it,
and rather disappointed that I'll just have to stew in
my dissatisfaction while not wishing any additional ill toward her memory. Drett,
(28:46):
thank you for your wonderful podcast. I have listened since
the very beginning, originally downloading episodes to the iTunes player
on my desktop computer. The contrast of wandering around with
you two ladies in my pocket now is delightful. I
hope you enjoy writing the show as much now as
you did when you joined it more than ten years ago.
Cheers to Youlyssa. She mentions she doesn't have a PhD
(29:09):
because she skips over the spooky episodes, but one of
them she listened to because twenty years ago my husband
wrote a musical version of the Greenbrier Ghost Story, so
I enjoyed hearing your version. Thank you for all the rest,
though that sounds amazing. I would love to hear that musical,
so please feel free to send it along if you
have any recordings that tickled me immensely. My hat is
(29:33):
off to people who hand finish all of their garments
when they sew, because I am lazy, and I am
in it because I want more clothes that I can't
probably find elsewhere, and I am a big fan of
the searcher as she heard so. But again my hat
is off people that do game finishing. It is beautiful.
(29:54):
If you would like to write to us and share
your dismay at sarger for or your delight at learning
that a smart woman did it, or anything else, you
can do that at History Podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.
You can also subscribe to the show. It is the
simplest thing in the world. You can do that on
the iHeartRadio app or anywhere you listen to your favorite shows.
(30:20):
Stuff you Missed in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly
Frye and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. Sometimes there's a historical
topic that keeps coming to the forefront in my day
(00:21):
to day life. I just happens to you as well,
until finally I'm like, fine, I will do it. And
this is one of those. But it's also delightful, So
it's more like one of those, Oh, I won't do that.
I'll save that for a time when I need a
self indulgent episode. But this is a combination of the two.
It's both self indulgent and it keeps flagging in my
life and coming up in various times. So it's time.
(00:43):
I actually mentioned Ada Coleman on the show recently, I think,
and she came up on a recent episode of Criminalia,
and her story has kind of stayed on my mind.
Even though it's really pretty piecemeal, we don't have a
wide range of biographical detail, but it also offers a
pretty unique glimpse into bar culture, luxury hospitality, and the
(01:05):
roles of women in the early twentieth century. Ada was
a head bartender, although women were generally called bar maids
at the time. That connotation of use that comes with
that is important, and we'll talk about why as we
get into some details later. And she had that title
at the American Bar at the Savoy Hotel in London.
(01:27):
She created a cocktail that is still served today both
at the Savoy and elsewhere, and she's kind of considered
an enduring icon of the bartending industry. Ada Coleman was
born in or around eighteen seventy five. That makes it
clear her exact birthday we don't know, and we also
really don't have any information about her formative years. According
(01:51):
to the common story of Ada's early life and introduction
into the hospitality world, her father worked for a man
named Rupert Doyle Kart as a steward in his golf club.
A steward in this case is kind of like a
bar manager. That's the person making sure everything stays stocked
and there are fresh ingredients on hand for any perishable things,
(02:14):
and receipts are accounted for at the end of the day.
All of that. Rupert Doiley Cart was the son of
Richard doily Cart, who had founded the doaly Cart Opera company.
That company was known for its policy of only producing
Gilbert and Sullivan shows. The Savoy Theater was purpose built
(02:35):
to produce the theater duo's shows and to accommodate the
many theatergoers who flocked to London to see those shows.
He also built the Savoy Hotel next door in eighteen
eighty nine. The Savoy Hotel was a very modern construction
project that was entirely electric. There was an elevator, it
(02:55):
had hot and cold running water, and every room had
a speaking tube so that guests a good call for
anything they might need or want. Richard's son Rupert, took
over all of those businesses, and when AIDA's father died
in eighteen ninety nine, Ada went to work. She was
offered a job in the flower shop at Claradge's Hotel,
(03:18):
which was also owned by Doyley Cart. This is often
framed as like a favor he did because he really
liked her father and the family. According to an interview
she gave later in her life, she made her first
cocktail at Clarages that was a Manhattan She was coached
in the making of that drink by the wine butler there,
whose name was Fisher, and who is the person who
(03:39):
taught her about bartending, and she got on quickly, and
soon she was moved from her position in the flower
shop to a position in the hotel bar. She was
reportedly twenty four at the time, and as we'll discuss
in a moment, twenty four would be the point where
a lot of women were aging out of bar made jobs,
but Aida was just getting started. She was the exact
(04:01):
right mix of friendly and naturally good at making drinks
to quickly become a favorite of both management and patrons.
Frank Wells had been head bartender at the Savoy Hotel's
popular American Bar since its opening. When he retired, Ada
was moved into that position. The American Bar was and
(04:23):
still is an institution. It was opened in eighteen ninety
three and has hosted a long list of famous patrons
over more than one hundred and thirty years that it's
been in service. It's touted by The Savoy as the
longest surviving cocktail bar in London. It's considered one of
the best bars in the world. The name American Bar
(04:46):
refers to drinks served in what was called in the
late nineteenth century American style. That just means cocktails or
mixed drinks, even though that was probably not the invention
of the United States. There were a lot of American
bars popping up in Europe in the late eighteen hundreds,
but none of them attained the popularity or legendary status
(05:09):
of the Savoys bar and Aida is sometimes credited for
really putting it on the map and to get a
sense of what the bar scene was like regarding women
employees when Aida was promoted to the American bar head
bartender position. We have a nineteen oh five publication prepared
by the Joint Committee on the Employment of Bar Maids.
(05:31):
They made a whole committee for it, and that publication
is titled Women as bar Maids. This was a document
prepared to support a case to ban women from working
in bars at a time when a lot of women
did so. Some estimates suggest that half of all bar
staff in England at this time were women. You'll also
(05:51):
sometimes see this as like they pull in a quote
or a statistic from the US at the time, where
it's much more lopsided. But in England it was very
common for women to work in bars. Specifically, the introduction
to this document, which was written by the Lord Bishop
of Southwark, is very open about its message that alcohol
(06:12):
plus women equals moral depravity, and includes this commentary on
how women should be treated quote we ought, I think,
to keep them free from the stress of what drives
them towards a life so unsuited for women. In the
case of those who read what is here said about
the use of young women as an instrument of bringing
(06:33):
in business, about the kind of women desired, I shall
be surprised if they do not feel that the practice
of so employing some of our brightest girls is lowering
to the whole moral tone of the community with regard
to women. But though the Lord Bishop states repeatedly that
public morale is at risk when women work in bars,
(06:53):
he concludes by saying quote, I need not point out
that there is no intention to suggest that with withdrawal
of work from any who are already engaged upon it,
So theoretically at this point Ada would have been able
to retain her job. There is also a note at
the beginning of this published report that states, quote, this
book makes no charges against publicans generally, and most certainly
(07:17):
not against barmaids, many of whom remained firm against all
temptations and dangers. The rest of the report goes on
to talk about the distribution of barmaids throughout Great Britain
and Ireland, noting that in some areas bar maids are
never hired, while in others, and most definitely in London,
(07:37):
it's very common. But even so, at a time when
a total of four million, one hundred seventy one thousand,
seven hundred and fifty one women and girls were working
in Britain and Ireland, only seventy eight, eight hundred and
thirty four of them were working in what we would
now call the hospitality industry, which in the report includes
(08:01):
quote inn hotel keepers, publicans, beer sellers, cider dealers, seller women,
barmaids and others in in hotel, eating, house service. Barmaids
made up twenty seven thousand, seven hundred and seven of
these positions per the nineteen oh one census. The report
notes that barmaids averaged twelve shillings a week in pay,
(08:24):
with the low end being five and the high end
being fifteen, and that most positions included board and lodging
as well. While this was only slightly lower pay than
men in similar jobs, the barmaids were not protected by
any labor laws, they could be let go for any reason,
and they were often made to pay for any loss
(08:45):
through breakage from their salary quote, even if caused by
the customer. This was also a job field that the
report described as overcrowded, with many women moving into service
jobs from domestic work thinking that it would be more
or interesting, only to find that it is often far
more strenuous. Two thirds of the people working bar maid
(09:07):
jobs were between the ages of fifteen and twenty five.
The report quotes a trade magazine of the time in
noting that as women age, they cannot compete for these jobs,
with younger women quote in the bar maids calling the
old have no chance against the young. On the proprietor side,
hiring women into bar positions had two clear benefits. One
(09:30):
it attracted more men as patrons, and two having women
as employees made bars appear more respectable to other women,
who then would be more comfortable selecting those establishments over
ones where only men worked. But because there were not
regulations for the hospitality industry on the hours that a
(09:51):
woman could be required to work in the early twentieth century,
there was also the benefit of scheduling them for ridiculously
long shifts. Some establishments were open as many as one
hundred and twenty three and a half hours per week,
and sometimes bar maids were expected to be on duty
from opening to closing, so they could work nineteen hour
(10:12):
days in some cases. The report cites the account of
several women who worked as barmaids, and one who noted
that she is quote one of the lucky sort who
worked at ten am to twelve thirty am shift, with
a total of two hours off throughout the day for
rest and meals. This write up then notes, quote this
great length of hours necessitated by the conditions of the
(10:35):
licensed victualler's trade, from a physical point of view, renders
the calling unsuited for women. Prolonged standing injures a woman
in a way it does not a man, and tends
to incapacitate her for the normal woman's life. There are
also testimonials by doctors noting that working in a bar
is terrible for women's health. Some of these are definitely
(10:59):
from the valid point of view that, for example, preteen
girls should not be working as bar maids, but of
course no one that young should be working. But the
same thing is not stated regarding boys who work in bars.
Some of this is because bar maids are, as the
report calls them, sirens who attract men to drink, so
there is a moral issue there as perceived by the
(11:21):
social mores of the early nineteen hundreds, that is not
as much of a consideration for boys. It's interesting that
all of this is leading to a case of removing
women from the trade rather than enacting labor laws to
protect them, particularly when there are other industries like cotton
factories that are noted in the report as having employee
(11:42):
hours that are regulated by law. Will continue talking about
the contents of the Committee's published report on the state
of barmaids in the early nineteen hundreds, including some rather
dark aspects of the job, but first we will pause
for a sponsor break the women as Barmaid's Report, prepared
(12:09):
by the Joint Committee on the Employment of Barmaids also
makes the case that women are more likely to develop
dependencies on alcohol and stimulants in such jobs, and that
in general they will become a moral due to the
constant exposure to men who are likely to speak and
behave immoraly with them in ways they would not normally
(12:29):
with a woman. That isn't really news to anyone who's
ever been in a bar. And there are statements included
from women who worked in the field, one of whom stated, quote,
many and many a time have I cried myself to
sleep after I have been laughing and joking all the
evening because of the things we have to put up
with in the bar. I don't consider it as a
(12:51):
proper occupation for a woman. Any cad who can pay
two pence for a drink thinks he is entitled to
say what he likes to the bar maid. Often women
also faced physical violence from their customers, particularly when they
were intoxicated, but this was not only a problem with patrons.
There are a lot of accounts in this publication of
(13:12):
women being assaulted or pressured into sexual relationships with their employers.
While the study of barmaids notes that many women in
the business end up married to patrons and often to
quote men above themselves in station, it also said that
women who did not get married by thirty five while
working in bars were doomed to quote a gloomy prospect
(13:36):
for some very sad statistics of deaths, including murders and suicides.
The solution to phasing out women working as barmaids. Per
the committee's recommendation was this quote. The form which it
is proposed that legislation should take is that on a
certain date all barmaids then in employee should receive a
(13:56):
certificate stating this fact and provided with means of identification,
and that it should thenceforth be illegal for publicans to
engage as barmaid any woman but one so certificated. That
is how they put it. The calling would thus come
automatically to an end in a few years. This law
would not prevent Republicans employing his own wife or daughter
(14:20):
to serve in his bar, nor would it prevent a
certificated barmaid from entering on a fresh situation whenever she pleased.
There are also additional recommendations that families that would not
be able to ensure a financial future for their daughters
should just start to make sure they train them for
a trade. There is also the recommendation to women's emigration societies,
(14:43):
which is how they put it, that the lack of
jobs for women in England could be addressed if young
women would move to Canada or the various British colonies
that needed teachers and governesses, and somehow in this social
and cultural environment that was in many ways so antagonistic
toward women, working behind a bar, Ada Coleman, who patrons
(15:05):
called Kohli, really thrived to be clear. She was working
in the fanciest bars in the city of London, not
in a tavern or an inn that was likely to
have a rougher clientele and ownership. But she was still
an outlier. Although she wasn't the only woman working at
the American Bar, Another woman named Ruth Burgess was also
(15:26):
a barmaid there. Uh. You might think these two would
become allies in an industry that was so stacked against women,
and that does not appear to have been the case.
We will talk about why in just a moment. The
nature of the Savoy and its bar, tightly tied to
the theater world, was also a perfect fit for Ada.
(15:48):
She was a fan of theater, and she loved to
spend time with the performers and the creatives who put
together shows for the Savoy Theater, often inviting them to
her home forget togethers. Her favorite bar regulars were also
invited if they were lucky, and she was reportedly a
fantastic hostess. She was also very comfortable and at ease
(16:09):
with celebrities of all kinds, so she was able to
banter with them and cater service to their personalities. In
her time as the Savoys head bartender, she served royalty,
millionaires and the most celebrated authors of the day, including
Mark Twain. Her bubbly personality and her skill with a
shaker made her something of a celebrity in her own
(16:31):
right for the wealthy and famous. If you were in London,
you had to have Coali make you a drink, and
she became the favorite bartender of people like Charlie Chaplin
and the Prince of Wales. In short, Coley was the
it bartender of London. Being head bartender also meant she
was managing the bar's various business and logistics needs. She
(16:53):
was the person who developed the menu, who managed the
other bartenders, and who made sure that all the bars
guests were taken care of, while also mixing drinks more
or less constantly. When the US passed its prohibition law,
a correspondent for the periodical The Mixer and Server got
Colly's take on prohibition after speaking to her about a
(17:14):
bartender who said that he professionally served alcohol but personally
believed that no one should drink. She responded, quote, I
don't agree with him at all. If you are looking
for a temperance, sermon, young man, you will have to
move on. Famous men from all over the world have
been in this bar in my time, and I have
seen them go out and become more famous than ever.
(17:37):
When Mark Twain came over from your America to get
a degree from Oxford University, I served him a cocktail here.
Did not brave young men of the war days come
here to have a last drink together and tell each
other goodbye. She also told the writer that England would
never pass prohibition laws because of what she called the
four l's, the lords, the Landlords, the ladies, and the
(17:59):
lad One of Coley's most noteworthy professional achievements, at least
in terms of historical longevity, was the creation of a
cocktail called the Hanky Panky. The story behind it involves
one of her regulars, renowned comedy actor and director, Sir
Charles Henry Hawtrey. Just for disambiguation, he shares the same
(18:24):
name with another English actor. The one we are talking
about today was born in eighteen fifty eight and the
other was born in nineteen fourteen. They were not related.
Our Charles Hawtrey often worked with Gilbert and Sullivan, so
he was tied into the Savoy ecosystem. Here is how
Ada Coleman described the drinks genesis in an interview that
(18:47):
she gave several years later. Quote, the late Charles Hawtrey
was one of the best judges of cocktails that I
knew some years ago. When he was overworking, he used
to come into the bar and say, Coley, I am tired,
give me something with a bit of punch in it.
It was for him that I spent hours experimenting until
I had invented a new cocktail. The next time he
(19:10):
came in, I told him I had a new drink
for him. He sipped it and draining the glass, he said,
by jove, that is the real hanky panky and hanky panky,
and has been called ever since. The hanky panky, incidentally,
is a very spirit forward drink. It consists of equal
parts gin and sweet vermouth with a couple of dashes
of for nebronca. And the term hanky panky was more
(19:33):
of a reference to witchcraft and alchemy in England than
the suggestion of sexual activity that that phrase connotes today
in the US. In a moment, we will talk about
the end of Ada's bartending career and some debate about it.
First we will hear from the sponsors that keep the
show going. Ada's retirement from the bar is one of
(20:04):
those things that is told differently by different people, but
every story involves Harry Cradock. Cradock, who wrote the Savoid
Cocktail Book in nineteen thirty that is a book we
have mentioned on this show, is sometimes described as an American,
but he was born in Stroud, England. He did move
to the US and become a US citizen in his
(20:24):
early years, though, and in the US he also became
a bartender, and he did really well as a bartender
until prohibition shut down all of the places he had
ever worked. So at that point he moved back to England,
where as Ada had said, the four Els made sure
alcohol stayed legal, and he got hired at American Bar.
(20:47):
There is some debate around Craddock's relationship with Ada at
the American Bar, and that involves like a lot of speculation.
Some accounts note that he worked at American Bar for
five years, while Ada was head bartender, but it does
seem as though he may have really bristled at working
under a woman's supervisor and then launched a campaign to
(21:10):
get rid of Coolie from her head bartender position. In
an interview with Chilled magazine, The Savoys archivist Susan Scott
reiterated that we don't know any of this with certainty, stating, quote,
there was no possibility of getting the top job in
the American Bar as long as miss Coleman was there.
And while it is easy to say there was no
(21:32):
love lost between them, that is just supposition. Yeah, there's
a whole story that some people say is documented that
he kind of made the case to the ownership that
if people came into the bar who were Americans, they
were not used to seeing women bartenders and so they
(21:53):
wouldn't go there or like it. But like at that point,
she had been working for more than twenty years, and
when people came from the US they seem to love her.
So there's a lot of theory going on there. Ruth
Burgess was also retired from the bar at the same
time as Ada in the mid nineteen twenties, and the
(22:13):
bar was also closed at that point temporarily for renovations,
so there's always the possibility that all of this was
merely a logistics and staffing issue. In nineteen twenty six,
an article appeared in various newspapers announcing the quote retirement
of Ada and Ruth from the American Bar. Here's what
(22:34):
it said, quote beloved by all drinking men who come
to them for cheer. From the four corners of the world.
The two picturesque bar maids of the Savoy Hotel have
laid down their cocktail shakers without patching up their differences.
They are Miss Ada Coleman and Miss Ruth Burgess. For
over twenty years they have worked in the same little corner,
(22:56):
handled the same bottles, and beamed on the same good
friend without speaking to each other. This feud, which most
old customers knew about but could not explain, hung over
the backbar like a film of fog when both were there.
But through the years the atmosphere has otherwise remained bright
and cheerful, between happy greetings and fond farewells with customers.
(23:20):
Much merry potter passed across the bar, but the women
between them norrished relentlessly. Their mutual enmity and scorn. So
this article goes on to explain that the root of
the issue and the decades long animosity between the women
is this. Ruth Burgess had been at American Bar since
(23:40):
nineteen oh two, and when Coley started there the following year,
she started making her own newly invented cocktails, which quickly
became the preferred drinks of the bar regulars. When Ada
was not working, those regulars would order them from Ruth,
but she didn't know how to make them, And then
when she asked Ada for the recipes so she could
(24:01):
make them when Ada wasn't working, Ada refused, and at
that point the two stop speaking to one another entirely.
The article continues quote Neither ever dreamed of leaving her
work to be free of the quarrel, but each waited
and hoped that the other would go. Finally, the blow
came to both at the same time. The management explained
(24:24):
that changes were being made the bar renovated, a new
system necessary, and that they had earned a rest. They
were given notice and granted pensions. After that, Harry Krattick
was the head bartender at American Bar, and Aida, who
had not actually retired, was moved into a position at
(24:44):
the Savoy's Flower Shop. When Kradick published The Savoy Cocktail
Book a few years later, he included the Hanky Panky
in it and credited Ada, but it's the only drink
in the book that bears her name, even though it's
likely that multiple signature d banks of the Savoy's Bar
were her creations. Ada's life after the Savoy does not
(25:06):
appear to have garnered a lot of attention. She died
at the age of ninety one in nineteen sixty six,
but the gap between her time at the Savoy and
her death doesn't seem to be well recorded. Today, Ada
is considered one of the most important bartenders of all time.
She was certainly prolific. By her own calculations, she had
(25:28):
made one million drinks during her career behind the bar.
American Bar, as we mentioned earlier, continues to this day.
It's become somewhat difficult to get into as a prestige
bar that also features some of the world's priciest drinks.
This includes a sazarak that costs five thousand pounds because
(25:50):
it's made with vintage spirits. Their vintage Hanky Panky is
one hundred and fifty pounds. American Bar also develops a
new menu periodically, each iteration built around a different theme.
The current one, which features both non alcoholic and alcoholic beverages,
is built around the theme of Liquid Moments, celebrating the people, details,
(26:12):
and events that have become important to the establishment's history.
To be named head bartender at American Bar is one
of the highest honors in the bartending industry, although it
comes with a lot of pressure. In twenty twenty one,
as the Savoy was reopening its various departments after COVID shutdowns,
Shannon to Bay became the first US born bartender to
(26:35):
helm American Bar. That also made her the first woman
head bartender since Ada's retirement in the nineteen twenties. The
relationship between Ada and Ruth was examined in an immersive
theater project in twenty seventeen in Washington, d C. The
Post Shift Theater recreated an imaginary first shift that Ada
(26:56):
and Ruth worked behind the bar together. I wish I
had no about and see that today. There's a professional
organization called the Ada Coleman Project. In the organization's own
words quote, our mission is to not only bring awareness
to the current inequities and the representation of women plus
in educational and recreational bartending roles, but also to offer
(27:19):
meaningful solutions. Our visionists to spotlight the women who innovate
and inspire us as an industry in an effort to
raise awareness and encourage meaningful conversation regarding the need for
a more balanced and diverse selection of leaders, educating, speaking,
and advocating for the next generation and beyond. Their logo
(27:40):
is a stylized version of a nearly empty hanky panky glass,
which is intended to evolve and be represented as fuller
and fuller as the group achieves greater inclusivity in the
bartending industry. Kind of a cool legacy. Uh huh. I
have listener mail. Listener mail is also about an important
(28:01):
woman that we've talked about. This is from our listener Lissa,
who writes, Dear Holly and Tracy, I have just pressed
pause while listening to your episode titled Helen a Blanchard
sewing machine Innovator, so that I could thank you for
a marvelous forty five minutes of listening. I love to sew,
but hand finish my garments because I despise the appearance
(28:22):
of surged edges. I have frequently passed over garments for
purchase for having surged interiors, all the while cursing whoever
invented that blasted machine. And now having heard Helen's story,
I'm quite pleased to know that a smart woman invented it,
and rather disappointed that I'll just have to stew in
my dissatisfaction while not wishing any additional ill toward her memory. Drett,
(28:46):
thank you for your wonderful podcast. I have listened since
the very beginning, originally downloading episodes to the iTunes player
on my desktop computer. The contrast of wandering around with
you two ladies in my pocket now is delightful. I
hope you enjoy writing the show as much now as
you did when you joined it more than ten years ago.
Cheers to Youlyssa. She mentions she doesn't have a PhD
(29:09):
because she skips over the spooky episodes, but one of
them she listened to because twenty years ago my husband
wrote a musical version of the Greenbrier Ghost Story, so
I enjoyed hearing your version. Thank you for all the rest,
though that sounds amazing. I would love to hear that musical,
so please feel free to send it along if you
have any recordings that tickled me immensely. My hat is
(29:33):
off to people who hand finish all of their garments
when they sew, because I am lazy, and I am
in it because I want more clothes that I can't
probably find elsewhere, and I am a big fan of
the searcher as she heard so. But again my hat
is off people that do game finishing. It is beautiful.
(29:54):
If you would like to write to us and share
your dismay at sarger for or your delight at learning
that a smart woman did it, or anything else, you
can do that at History Podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.
You can also subscribe to the show. It is the
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(30:20):
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