The History of Speakeasies: From Prohibition to the Modern Revival

The speakeasy didn’t start as an aesthetic. It started as a crime.

Before it was a cocktail bar with a bookcase door, the speakeasy was a survival mechanism — a place where Americans kept drinking after the government told them they couldn’t. The story of how we got from there to here is one of the stranger chapters in American history, and it explains a lot about why hidden bars still hold so much appeal.

How America Banned Alcohol

The temperance movement had been building for decades before it actually won. Religious groups, women’s organizations (notably the Women’s Christian Temperance Union), and progressive reformers had been pushing for alcohol restrictions since the mid-1800s. Their argument was straightforward: alcohol destroyed families, fueled domestic violence, and kept the working class poor.

By the early 1900s, many states and counties had already gone dry through local legislation. The Anti-Saloon League, one of the most effective political lobbying organizations in American history, pushed for a constitutional amendment. World War I gave them additional ammunition — many breweries were German-owned, and anti-German sentiment made it easier to argue against the beer industry.

On January 16, 1919, the 18th Amendment was ratified by three-quarters of US states. It read: “The manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.”

The Volstead Act, passed in October 1919 over President Wilson’s veto, provided the enforcement framework. It defined “intoxicating liquors” as anything with more than 0.5% alcohol by volume — essentially killing beer and wine along with hard spirits.

On January 17, 1920, Prohibition went into effect. Every bar, saloon, brewery, and distillery in the country was now operating illegally.

How Speakeasies Got Their Name

The exact origin is debated, but the most widely accepted explanation is practical: if you were drinking in an illegal establishment, you needed to keep your voice down. Bartenders and proprietors would tell patrons to “speak easy” — don’t be loud, don’t draw attention, don’t give us away.

Some historians trace the term further back to the 1880s, when it referred to unlicensed saloons in Pennsylvania and other states that had enacted local prohibition laws before the national one. These early “speak-easies” operated in a legal gray area and relied on discretion to avoid getting shut down.

Either way, by the 1920s, “speakeasy” was the universal term for an underground bar. And there were a lot of them.

The Golden Age of Illegal Drinking

The numbers are hard to pin down because, by definition, these places didn’t file paperwork. But historians estimate that by the mid-1920s:

New York City had between 20,000 and 100,000 speakeasies (compared to roughly 15,000 legal bars before Prohibition)
Chicago had thousands, many controlled or supplied by organized crime
Detroit, positioned on the Canadian border, became a major smuggling hub and speakeasy hotspot
San Francisco, New Orleans, Kansas City, and dozens of other cities had thriving underground scenes

The irony was brutal: Prohibition created more drinking establishments than existed before it. And it removed all regulation. Before 1920, bars had licenses, inspections, and rules. After 1920, the speakeasy answered to nobody — except maybe the mob.

Where They Operated

Speakeasies hid in plain sight. Common locations included:

Basements of otherwise legitimate businesses
Back rooms of restaurants, barbershops, and pharmacies
Upper floors accessible only through specific stairwells
Private homes converted into drinking rooms
Boats and floating establishments (harder to raid)
Behind secret doors, fake walls, and concealed passages

The creativity of concealment was remarkable. Some had multiple exits for quick escapes during raids. Others had systems to dump liquor into hidden drains when police showed up. A few had bars that could literally flip over or retract into walls, leaving an empty room for the cops to find.

Who Ran Them

Three types of operators dominated the speakeasy landscape:

Small-time proprietors — Regular people who saw an opportunity. A restaurant owner adds a back room. A widow turns her parlor into a drinking spot. These were the most common and the most vulnerable to raids.

Organized crime — This is the big one. Prohibition was the single greatest economic gift ever handed to American organized crime. Bootleggers like Al Capone in Chicago, Lucky Luciano and Dutch Schultz in New York, and the Purple Gang in Detroit built empires on illegal alcohol. They controlled the supply chain — smuggling from Canada, distilling in hidden operations, distributing to speakeasies — and they either owned or “protected” thousands of establishments. Capone’s operation in Chicago was reportedly generating $60 million a year by the late 1920s.

Corrupt officials and police — The enforcement of Prohibition was deeply compromised from day one. Prohibition agents were underpaid and easily bribed. In many cities, police and politicians received regular payments to look the other way. Some even owned stakes in speakeasies themselves.

The Culture Inside

Speakeasies weren’t just places to drink. They became cultural hotspots that shaped American society in ways nobody anticipated.

Jazz

The connection between speakeasies and jazz is not a coincidence. Jazz musicians needed venues, and speakeasies needed entertainment. The two found each other. Clubs like the Cotton Club in Harlem and the Green Mill in Chicago became legendary jazz venues, hosting artists like Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, and Cab Calloway.

The Green Mill in Chicago is still operating today — same location, same stage where jazz legends played during Prohibition. It’s one of the very few original speakeasy spaces you can still visit.

Pre-Prohibition saloons were almost exclusively male spaces. Speakeasies changed that. Women — particularly young, independent women called “flappers” — became regular patrons. For the first time, men and women drank together in social settings as a normal activity.

Speakeasies also broke racial barriers in some cases. While segregation was still the law in many states, certain underground clubs in cities like New York and Chicago served mixed-race clientele. The illegality of the space already put everyone outside the law, which made some of the usual social rules feel less rigid.

The Cocktail Boom

Here’s something that gets overlooked: Prohibition actually improved cocktail culture. The illegal liquor available during Prohibition was often terrible — bathtub gin, poorly distilled whiskey, industrial alcohol cut with flavoring. It tasted bad. So bartenders got creative with mixing, using juices, syrups, bitters, and other ingredients to mask the harsh flavor of low-quality booze.

Many classic cocktails that are still ordered today were invented or popularized during Prohibition: the Bee’s Knees (honey and lemon to cover bad gin), the Sidecar, the French 75, and many others. The necessity of making bad alcohol drinkable drove genuine innovation in mixology.

Famous Historical Speakeasies

A few deserve special mention for their place in the story.

21 Club — New York City

Originally called “Jack and Charlie’s,” the 21 Club at 21 West 52nd Street was one of the most famous speakeasies in New York. It catered to the wealthy and well-connected, serving everyone from Humphrey Bogart to Ernest Hemingway. The building had an elaborate system of levers that could sweep the entire bar’s contents into a hidden chute, sending bottles crashing into the sewers below during a raid. It operated continuously through Prohibition and transitioned into a legal restaurant after repeal. The building still stands, though the restaurant closed in 2020.

The Green Mill — Chicago

A jazz club and cocktail lounge that opened in 1907 and became a favorite haunt of Al Capone during Prohibition. Capone had his own booth — reportedly always positioned so he could see both entrances. Machine Gun Jack McGurn, Capone’s enforcer, was said to have cut the ear of a jazz singer who tried to leave for a rival club. The Green Mill is still open at 4802 N. Broadway, making it one of the oldest continuously operating jazz venues in the country.

Chumley’s — New York City

Located at 86 Bedford Street in the West Village, Chumley’s was a literary speakeasy frequented by F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner, e.e. cummings, and other writers. It had no sign on the door — a tradition it maintained for decades after Prohibition ended. The phrase “86’d” (meaning to be kicked out or cut off) is often attributed to Chumley’s address, though the etymology is debated. After a building collapse in 2007, it reopened in 2016.

“Blind pig” and “blind tiger” were alternative terms for speakeasies, particularly in the Midwest and South. The name comes from an early trick: charge admission to see a “blind pig” (or some other curiosity), then serve “complimentary” drinks — technically you were paying for entertainment, not alcohol. Many modern bars use the name as a direct homage.

The End of Prohibition

By the late 1920s, Prohibition was widely acknowledged as a failure. Alcohol consumption hadn’t meaningfully decreased. Organized crime had exploded. Tax revenue had disappeared. The Great Depression, beginning in 1929, made the economic argument even stronger — legalizing alcohol would create jobs and generate desperately needed tax revenue.

Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for president in 1932 on a platform that included repealing Prohibition. He won in a landslide. The 21st Amendment was ratified on December 5, 1933, making the US the only country in history to repeal an amendment to its own constitution.

Prohibition lasted 13 years, 10 months, and 19 days. In that time, it managed to:

Create a massive organized crime infrastructure that persisted for decades
Normalize law-breaking among ordinary citizens
Kill an estimated 10,000 people from poisoned industrial alcohol
Eliminate billions in tax revenue
Generate some of the best cocktails ever invented

The Revival: 2000s to Today

For about 70 years after repeal, the speakeasy was history. Bars opened legally, put up signs, and got on with it. The concept of a hidden bar was a novelty in movies and TV shows, not a real-world business model.

That changed around 2000, when a new generation of bartenders and entrepreneurs started looking back at pre-Prohibition cocktail culture. They were rediscovering classic recipes, sourcing better spirits, and taking the craft of bartending seriously. And they realized that the speakeasy format — small, intimate, hidden, cocktail-focused — was perfect for what they wanted to do.

The Pioneers

Milk & Honey (New York, 2000) — Sasha Petraske opened this bar on Eldridge Street with an unlisted phone number and a strict set of rules. Reservations only. No standing at the bar. No name-dropping. No “star-f***ing.” It was genuinely exclusive, genuinely hidden, and set the template for everything that followed. Milk & Honey closed in 2013, but its influence is incalculable.

PDT — Please Don’t Tell (New York, 2007) — Jim Meehan hid a cocktail bar behind a phone booth inside Crif Dogs, a hot dog shop on St. Marks Place. Pick up the phone, make a reservation (or get lucky with walk-ups), and a panel slides open into one of the best cocktail bars in the world. PDT proved that the speakeasy concept could be both commercially successful and critically acclaimed.

Death & Co (New York, 2007) — Not quite a speakeasy in the hidden-entrance sense, but its unmarked facade and serious cocktail program made it a cornerstone of the revival. The bar’s cocktail book became an industry bible.

The Violet Hour (Chicago, 2007) — No sign, an unmarked facade that blends into the wall of a Wicker Park street, and a curtain you push through to enter. One of the first major speakeasy-style bars outside New York.

Williams & Graham (Denver, 2011) — A fake bookstore entrance leads to one of Denver’s best cocktail bars. The concept — hidden door inside what appears to be a legitimate business — became one of the most imitated formats in the industry.

The Explosion

After these pioneers proved the model, the floodgates opened. Every mid-size to large city in America now has at least a few speakeasies. Some cities have dozens. The concept has also gone global, with hidden bars operating in London, Tokyo, Mexico City, Bangkok, Sydney, and basically anywhere cocktail culture has taken hold.

The modern speakeasy scene is vast and varied. You’ll find everything from faithful Prohibition recreations with live jazz and bartenders in period costume to completely reimagined concepts — tiki speakeasies, mezcal speakeasies, wine-focused speakeasies, even speakeasy-style coffee bars.

We track over 4,700 of them across 60 US cities in our directory. If you want to find one near you, that’s a good place to start.

Why We’re Still Drawn to Hidden Bars

There’s something about the speakeasy that endures beyond nostalgia. The appeal isn’t really about Prohibition or history — it’s about the experience of discovery. Finding the unmarked door. Knowing the password. Walking into a space that most people walk right past.

In a world where everything is reviewed, photographed, mapped, and geo-tagged, there’s real value in a place that asks you to work a little to find it. The effort creates a sense of ownership. You didn’t just go to a bar — you found something.

That’s what drew people to speakeasies in the 1920s (minus the legal consequences), and it’s what draws people to them now. The format works because the human desire for discovery, exclusivity, and good drinks hasn’t changed in a hundred years.

Explore our city-by-city directory to find speakeasies near you — from the famous to the genuinely hidden.