Flashback : Dallas

Pat Hannon’s dreams are about to be dashed…

by Paula Bosse

The 101 Bar was located at 323 North Ervay, on the southwest corner of Ervay and Bryan — it is now the site of Thanksgiving Square. The owner was Patrick Hannon who had worked in saloons in Dallas from at least 1908. The bar pictured above opened around 1917 but lasted only a few months — by the time the 1918 directories were printed, 323 N. Ervay was listed as “vacant.” Pat had worked his way up the competitive saloon trade in Dallas, from bartender to owner, only to be cut down by Prohibition. Had Prohibition not gone into effect in 1918 (with Dallas County voting to start even earlier, in October, 1917), this fine-looking  bar might have had a long, boozy life. Pat disappeared from the directory completely in 1918, but he was back in 1919, with a new occupation: butcher. Meat-cutting is all well and good and certainly pays the bills, but I bet in his idle moments, Pat’s thoughts turned to daydreams of his old Ervay St. bar.

The 1917 Dallas directory showed 183 bars operating in Dallas; the next year, zero.

Bad timing, Pat.

***

Sources & Notes

I’m not sure where the photo came from — some random web page, I think.

Why did Dallas County go dry so early? Because of a “local option” vote in September 1917. The city of Dallas voted against it, but the surrounding communities voted overwhelmingly FOR it. (You could still drive over to Fort Worth for legal beer and hooch, though.) Election results below (click for larger image). 

Dallas Morning News, Oct. 20, 1917

How were things faring a year later?

DMN, Oct. 20, 1918

This has been a rather tenuously-associated St. Patrick’s Day post (Irish name, bar, green border), but … Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

*

Copyright © 2016 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.