p. 669 | Beer-Wagon Drivers

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · Nov 4, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 42.

Beer-Wagon Drivers.

If beer is a helper to temperance habits, as brewers claim, we would expect to see some evidence of this in those employed by brewers. For years we have observed in this city that the most dangerous class of drivers are those in charge of the teams belonging to the great breweries. Within a few days a passenger in a street-car had his arm broken by the pole of a beer-wagon crashing through the window. Within a week we saw the driver of a beer-wagon stretched on the pavement by the side of his wagon, from which he had fallen, apparently in drunken stupor. Not long since we watched a drunken driver on a beer-wagon driving his team from one side to the other of Fifth Avenue, endangering lives at every moment, and encountering no policeman for several squares. Not long since we saw the driver of a beer-wagon on a ferry-boat so stupefied by liquor that he could not take his team from the boat when it reached the slip. Very often we see them when they appear about to roll off their seats in helpless drunkenness, but such is the force of habit that they are able to make their way, even in this wretched condition. Doubtless other teamsters drink too much, but we do not observe any other class of drivers which presents so many instances of gross intoxication. If the observation of others and statistics confirm this impression, it will add much to the conviction that beer is nothing but one of the grosser elements of physical and moral degradation.—New York Observer, August 12, 1886.