[Ads-l] "smart Alecs" 1864 antedating

[Stephen Goranson]

New York Clipper, Jan. 2, 1864, 300/4.
Title: Frank Burns' "Oriental."
It reportedly was a NYC "concert saloon," affected by NY State Albany lawmakers  from "rural districts," "abolishing waiter girls from our concert halls."

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Soon after the bursting up of the "upper houses" from the loss of one of their principal attractions, the barmaids, he took it into his head to establish something new, whereby he could laugh in his sleeve at the "smart Alecs" of Albany town, and started a saloon with no other performance than a piano and violin, similar to the German "museke" shops, where female waiters had been tolerated without let or hindrance,
<end quote>

Stephen Goranson
http://people.duke.edu/~goranson/

https://idnc.library.illinois.edu/cgi-bin/illinois?a=d&d=NYC18640102.2.8&e=-------en-20--1--img-txIN-%252522smart+alecs%252522--------









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