The Correct Date for The Storming of the Sazerac
In September 1949, the Sazerac Bar opened at the Roosevelt Hotel. The hotel’s general manager Seymour Weiss bought the right to use the name from the Sazerac Company, who retained the right to continue to bottle the drink.
Subsequently, over the last few decades, annually on or near September 26, 1949, the Roosevelt Hotel holds the Storming of the Sazerac, which commemorates the date that women were first allowed in the Sazerac Bar. It was hardly a “storming” as legend has it that Weiss went around to local beauty parlors and cosmetic counters and invited local women to attend on that date.
However, the date and the story published in various books and articles behind the female invasion are incorrect.
The real day occurred on September 30, 1949, and it was less a ‘storm’ than a breeze on Weiss’ lips as a large ad was taken out in the newspapers announcing that a century-old New Orleans custom was “shattered,” by officially inviting women to patronize the bar.
This 3/4 ad ran in the Times-Picayune and the New Orleans States.
“For the first time,” the ad announced, “in its 100-year history Ladies will be cordially invited to the Sazerac Bar at all times.” Women gathered in droves – as previously they were only allowed inside on Mardi Gras day. It was common, however, for men to park their wives and girlfriends in cabs out front of the hotel and bring them cocktails. Veteran bartender Albert Chaplain said women became the bar’s biggest customers after they were allowed in.
According to the newspaper from right is Mrs. Charles (Margery) Stich, Mrs. Julius (Noella) Weiss and Mrs. Bernard (Mildred Wohl). Behind them is the mural.
According to the Times-Picayune in October 27, 1974 - “The young woman, whose identity could not be definitely established, was the first woman to sip a Sazerac after bar’s policy was changed.”
Days after the ‘storming,’ Jenny Martin drank thirteen Sazeracs in one evening. “She was something out of this world,” Chaplain said. The next day she called the bar to report she lost her glasses. The main attraction, however, was the 31-foot Sazerac Mural by Joseph Donaldson Jr. and Walter Scott depicting the “Saga of the Sazerac” and its 100-year reign in New Orleans: “ – from the jungle and tropic origins of its spicy ingredients, to the vineyards of France whence came the original Sazerac brandy, to the Golden Age of the South when the Creoles introduced the cocktails to a thirsty populace, and finally to 100 years later when the Sazerac reached the pinnacle of status as the royal libation of Rex, King of Carnival.” In 1974, the mural was reported to be in storage at the Fairmont Hotel.
Bartenders Andrew Daroca (right) and Aristide Martin, who tended the original bar at Royal Street-Exchange Place, serve drinks to women on the opening day of the new Sazerac Bar.
Because of its storied history, in 2008, the Louisiana House of Representatives voted to make the Sazerac the official drink of New Orleans. In 2019, the Sazerac House, a 48,000 square-foot museum dedicated to the cocktail, opened on Canal Street, continuing the city’s love affair with the drink.
And although people may have been commemorating the wrong date for decades, there is always reason to celebrate the historic (and delicious) Sazerac. Cheers!