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OldWaldotf Bar Days
INSPIRATIONAL COMPOSITION
AND FREE LUNCH
The like of the rectangular counter that graced the room,
and what happened behind it, and before it, and passed
over it, may never again be seen in this country-at
least in our time. Many forms of beverage dated their
origin to the inspiration of some clever Waldorf bar–
tender. Or, perhaps, it was a translation of the passing
fancy of a patron who wanted something different to
drink, and entirely of his own conception.
If
the result
met his expectations, he might thereafter call only for
his own cocktail, or whatever it was, and the bartender,
out of compliment, would christen the new drink after
its godfather.
A school of drinking, and a distinctive one, the Wal–
dorf's Bar undoubtedly was. And-which may surprise
many-it was a real school of art-a school in which
more than one connoisseur who has since spent hundreds
of thousands in collecting paintings and sculpture got
his first tuition from the pictures on the Bar walls, whose
appeal was often emphasized by the cumulative influence
of cocktails or highballs.
More than one middle-aged American who has sur–
vived into the era that has seen bootlegging grow into
one of our most important industries, has reason to re–
member gratefully at least one feature of this particular
American School of Drinking, and in which, perhaps, it
was preeminent among institutions of similar learning.
This was the free lunch table. There are many rich men
in this land to-day, who, were they frank, could date
their first acquaintance with Russian caviar to that gen-
[ I
8.]