January 17, 1920, 12:01 a.m.
A minute after midnight on Saturday, January 17, 1920, the Manchester Guardian reported the first of its kind – one of the most extraordinary experiments in modern history. “One minute after midnight tonight,” it began, “America will become an entirely arid desert as far as alcoholics are concerned, any drinkable containing more than half of 1 percent alcohol being forbidden.”
Uh oh. Think of all the drinkers of the time having to read that front page the next morning. The Volstead Act prohibited the sale of “intoxicating liquors,” and now, with this news, Americans became aware that any attempt to buy alcohol could land them in jail. But before the land would become dry, authorities granted drinkers one last day – one last drunken night at the bar – before the iron shutters came down.