A History of the World in Six Glasses - sounds like an interesting book

[question everything]

The Wall Street Journal

May 25, 2005

BOOKS

Civilization's Liquid Assets

By MATTHEW REES
May 25, 2005; Page D12

It is a truth that even schoolchildren know, especially if they are ever asked to re-enact the Boston Tea Party: Britain's tax on tea was a catalyst for the American Revolution. But it turns out that another beverage deserves equal billing: rum. It was also the target of an unpopular tax, along with the molasses needed to make it. Years after the Revolution, no less an authority than John Adams wrote that "molasses was an essential ingredient in American independence."

Historians, understandably, devote most of their attention to war, politics and, not least, money. But history can also be seen through the prism of the commodities that money buys. In "A History of the World in Six Glasses" (Walker and Company, 311 pages, $25), Tom Standage, a writer for the Economist magazine, argues that beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea and cola have each, in their own way, helped to shape the course of history. Consider the case of beer. As humans moved from hunter-gathering to farming, Mr. Standage argues, they made two critical discoveries: Cereal grain soaked in water would turn into malt; and gruel made with malted grain would, after a few days, turn to beer. At the time, beer's talent for intoxicating left many people believing that it was a gift from the gods.

(snip)

Wine also had a civilizing force... It is interesting to observe that the drink has also served as a powerful religious symbol -- representing the blood of Christ among Christians while being banned by the Prophet Muhammad, according to some scholars, because of its associations with Christianity and for its distracting effects. The prophet viewed alcohol as an abomination "devised by Satan" to keep his followers "from remembrance of Allah."

The Whiskey Rebellion of 1794 was one of the first tests of the new Republic. A federal excise tax infuriated farmers in western Pennsylvania and elsewhere, who rose up violently in protest. As one of their tribunes put it in the House of Representatives: The tax would "deprive the mass of people of almost the only luxury they enjoy, that of distilled spirits." It was George Washington himself, with 13,000 militiamen, who put the rebellion down and asserted the pre-eminence of federal law. When the Republic rose to become a global superpower, says Mr. Standage, Coke was there to help it along. During the 1943 campaign in North Africa, Gen. Dwight Eisenhower sent a telegram requesting the delivery of three million bottles of Coke for his troops. One of them wrote home to say that half of his fellow soldiers were fighting for "the right to buy Coca-Cola again." Americans would later use "Coca-Cola" as a password while trying to cross the Rhine.

(snip)

But nothing can compare with coffee, the beverage on which so much depends. Coffee's rise is closely linked with the Enlightenment, Mr. Standage notes, since it was a drink favored by intellectuals, and others at desk-bound vocations, for its stimulative powers and its talent for spurring discussion and debate. The coffeehouse served as a medium of ideas -- a meeting place of minds -- and advanced the cause of both business and revolution.

(snip)

Mr. Rees is a speechwriter in Washington and a former staff writer for the Weekly Standard.

URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111697407273942283,00.html

[burrowowl]

1. Only 6 glasses for

the history of the world!?